Mistipedia - User contributions [en]

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (NPC)

2022-02-18T16:29:54Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* Role Playing */

[[File:Original VR.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
[[File:Rudolph van richten.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten and [[Strahd]] by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
{{canon}}
'''Dr. Rudolph Van Richten''' is the greatest monster hunter that has ever lived and the most well-known hero of the Lands of the Mists.

==History==
He was born in [[Rivalis]] in [[Darkon]] in [[671 BC]]. He took [[medicine]] at the [[University of Il Aluk]], completing his four or five year program of study in [[693 BC]]. This humble man was spurred into a life of monster hunting when his son [[Erasmus van Richten]] was kidnapped by the [[Radanavich clan]] and sold to [[Baron Metus]]. Metus turned Erasmus into a [[vampire groom]] and Van Richten was forced to slay his son. In revenge, Metus killed Rudolph's wife, [[Ingrid van Richten]]. Van Richten eventually slew Metus, and then, with the help of [[Azalin]], the entire [[Radanavich tribe]].

Until his disappearance in [[750 BC]], he resided in [[Mordentshire]], where he ran an [[Van Richten's Herbalist Shop|herbalist shop]], as well as wrote several of his famous [[Van Richten's Guides]], and mentored [[The Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]], who regarded him as an uncle and took up his work.

==In [[Curse of Strahd]]==
Dr. van Richten makes a notable appearance in the [[5th Edition]] [[module]], [[Curse of Strahd]], though not in his [[famous]] persona as the monster hunter and [[writer]] of the [[Van Richten's Guides]] he is notable for in previous Ravenloft products. Instead, he adopts the guise of [[Rictavio]], a traveling [[half-elf]] [[bard]], [[storyteller]], and [[ringmaster]] gathering stories and watching out for talent. In reality he is gathering formation and waiting for an optimal time to strike at [[Strahd]], preferably when the vampire lord is in [[hibernation]]. Unlike other versions of van Richten, the Curse of Strahd van Richten is a [[loner]] because he knows the full extent of his [[curse]].<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> For more details, see [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Curse of Strahd)]]

==Role Playing==

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Appearances==
===[[Campaign Setting]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[Ravenloft: Realm of Terror]]
**[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting (Box)]]

===[[Modules]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[The Nightmare Lands (Boxed Set)]] (referenced only)
**[[Chilling Tales]]
**[[Dungeon Magazine #55]]: [[The Sea Wolf]]
**[[Bleak House: The Death of Rudolph Van Richten]]

===[[Novels]], stories===

*[[Tales of Ravenloft]]: [[The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]
*[[I, Strahd: The War Against Azalin]]

==Authored:==

* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Witches (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Witches]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Demons]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]]''

Credited for marketing purposes with:
* ''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Mists (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Mists]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead]]''

==[[Associate of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]==

==Chronology==

[[671 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten born<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, son of Otto and Mrs. Van Richten
 
{{Spec|[[678 BC]] - Rudolph’s sister [[Maria Van Richten]] born.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 18 "Speculation based on BH. We only know that she is younger than Rudolph."</ref>
 

[[679 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten sent to boarding school in [[Nartok]]. A childhood friend is [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]].<ref name="VRMHCII p.25-26">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 25-26</ref>

[[680 BC]] - [[Casimir (of Richten Haus)|Casimir]] (not to be confused with [[Casimir Lukas|Harkon Lukas’ son]]) starts working at Richten Haus as the gate keeper.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 6">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 6</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[683 BC]] - The servants of [[Richten Haus]] are all killed while the family is away one day. (summer)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.18: "Speculation based on [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] pg. 15, 24: I’m going on the hunch that VR grows younger until he reaches the age he was at when this event occurred"</ref>
 

[[685 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten meets [[Robert Tatenna]], a fellow student at boarding school. (fall)<ref name="CT p.14">[[Chilling Tales]] p.14</ref>

[[688 BC]] - The [[The Crimson Death Epidemic | Crimson Death]] spreads across Darkon (winter); it claims Van Richten’s great aunt Helga, despite his efforts; Rudolph is even more driven into his medical studies.<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[689 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten attends the [[University of Il Aluk]]. While there, he meets a fellow student, [[Dr. Harmon Ruscheider]]. (fall)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]] pg. 15"</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[691 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten marries his childhood sweetheart, [[Ingrid van Richten|Ingrid]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "[[Realm of Terror]]; [[VRGtV]]: Give VR a good respectable year between their marriage and birth of Erasmus in 692"</ref>
 

[[692 BC]] - Rudolph and Ingrid Van Richten's son [[Erasmus van Richten|Erasmus]] is born.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]] p. 4; [[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 8, "fourteen summers" before [[706 BC]]</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[693 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten finishes his studies; opens his practice back home in [[Rivalis]].}},<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VR’s age, RoT; VRGtV; and ToDm pg. 86, which indicates it takes 4-5 years to get a medical education at the University of Il Aluk"</ref> 
 
{{Spec|693 BC - Dr. Van Richten travels to [[Lamordia]], hears of the [[Loud Man of Lamordia]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VRGtG pg. 9: “When I was young.”</ref> 

[[696 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Antonin Madren]] and becomes his mentor.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 21: "VRGttC pg. 6: Van Richten takes Madren on as a medical student, which implies Van Richten has time to offer such an education (which lasts up to 8 years), i.e., while he was still a simple doctor (693-706)."</ref>

[[706 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten suffers the wrath of the [[Radanavich clan]]; the Vistani steal his son Erasmus; they sell Erasmus to [[Baron Metus]]<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, a vampire from [[Richemulot]]; with the help of an amused [[Azalin]], Van Richten wipes out all but one member of the Radanavich caravan<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]</ref>; [[Madame Radanavich]] [[curse | curses]] Van Richten<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, although he doesn’t realize it until the end of his career.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

[[706 BC]] Van Richten puts his Erasmus, now a vampire, out of his misery, but in spite [[Baron Metus]] tears [[Ingrid van Richten]] to pieces; Dr. Van Richten destroys Baron Metus, starting his career of hunting evil. Unable to live with the memories in [[Richten Haus]], Van Richten moves to [[Corvia]].<ref name="VRA p. 5">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 5</ref>

[[707 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten researches vampires, and meets [[Aimon Davidovitch]], a fellow scholar of the arcane.<ref> from [[JWM Timeline]] p.22: "[[VRGtF]] pg. 4: VR knew him for “some 30-odd years”]</ref>

[[710 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten encounters his first werebeast near [[Varithne]], a small village in northern [[Darkon]]. Dr. Van Richten starts hunting werebeasts as well<ref name="VRMHC p. 109-110">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 109-110</ref>

[[711 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Gedlan Ironheart]], a fearless [[dwarven]] [[innkeeper]] in [[Corvia]]. Gedlan becomes a frequent hunting companion.<ref name="Bleah House p. 11">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p.11</ref>

[[712 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets the mage [[Shauten]]; they bond when they are attacked by one of Azalin's patrols. Shauten opens Van Richten's eyes to the existence of the [[Lich]].<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref>

[[713 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten is visited by the dying Dr. Ruscheider, who tells Rudolph all he can about several months spent as a lich's captive; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting liches.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p.111-112</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[714 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten receives a visit from his childhood friend, [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]], who is now a ghostly slave to Azalin; Dr. Van Richten learns the terrible truth about [[Azalin Rex]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on [[VRGtG]] pg. 22, [[VRMHCII]] pg. 24</ref>
 

{{Spec|714 BC - Dr. Van Richten moves to [[Mordentshire]], sensing it is politically unsafe for him to remain in [[Darkon]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on VRGttL pg. 22</ref>
 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[716 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 3 n1">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade after her death, but [[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[718 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and [[Shauten]] battle a creature they believe to be a priestly [[lich]]; it is actually Van Richten's first [[ancient dead]]}}.<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] "Speculation based on VRGAD pg. 5: “Some years ago,” and other markers. It happened after VR started hunting liches, but before he started hunting ghosts. (The latter conclusion taken from numerous references to Claudia in this Guide"</ref>
 
[[724 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten battles the [[Bog Monster of Hroth]], and meets [[Jameld of Hroth|Jameld]]. This is also Van Richten's first visit to both [[Kartakass]] and [[Sithicus]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p.153</ref> 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[726 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decade n1">[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades after her death but[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade</ref> 

{{Spec|726 BC - Dr. Van Richten visits [[Sanguinia]] with [[George Weathermay]] and [[Arametrius]]; they meet [[Claudia DeShanes]]; Claudia becomes Rudolph’s assistant, and it seems he had certain unspoken feelings for her.}}<ref>Speculation from JWM Timeline p.28: "Since Arametrius is probably [[Athasian]], Van Richten may have recently visited [[Kalidnay]] and encountered [[Ahmose Tanit]]. [VRGtG pg. 73. This is the earliest possible date for this event (due to George’s inclusion, and we know from this source and BH that VR starts hunting ghosts one year after this event. That leaves only 9 years between VR starting to hunt and writing his Guide on the subject. I chose to go with this date to keep as wide a margin of opportunity as possible.]"</ref>
 

[[727 BC]] - [[Merilee Markuza]], the Child [[Vampire]], kills Claudia. Van Richten pursues the creature relentlessly, but loses her in [[Lamordia]].<ref name="Darklords p. 63">[[Darklords]] p. 63</ref>

727 BC - While hunting the Child Vampire, Van Richten witnesses the [[Thundering Carriage]]; Van Richten decides he must put an end to these ghostly horrors, too.<ref name="Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts p. 6">[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 6</ref>

[[728 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten defeats the [[Phantom Army]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 91</ref>

[[729 BC]] - The fiend [[Elsepeth]] enters Ravenloft via [[transposition]] in a small village outside [[Stangengrad]], near the [[Grashen Falls]] (sept)<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.28: "[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] pg. 14: the diary is dated “twelve years ago.”</ref>

[[730 BC]] - {{Spec|[[Gedlan Ironheart]] killed while battling evil spirits.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: "VRGtG pg. 23: Gedlan is referred to as “Geddar” in this book. The date is an estimate based on the 727-736 available time span."</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] leaves [[Borca]], having lurked there for years.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] p. 66</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] writes to Van Richten about the death of Madren’s sister.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[734 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] shows up on Van Richten's doorstep, and gives the good doctor his notes; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting the [[Created]].}}<ref>JWM Timeline p. 30: "VRGttC pg. 6: Estimate. “Years” after Madren wrote about his sister’s death"</ref> 

[[735 BC] - Dr. Van Richten is forced to kill his old friend [[Shauten]] in self-defense, when Shauten tries to sacrifice Rudolph in a bid for [[lichdom]]<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref><ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>. {{Spec|This "near-miss" may have inspired Van Richten to start recording his collected knowledge for heroes to come.}}<ref>JWM Timeline: "Speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6"</ref>

735 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''.<ref name="RLCS p.18">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.18</ref><ref name="RLPHB p.20">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.20</ref>

[[736 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''.

[[737 BC]] - The [[Vistana]] [[Cyrilla]]'s niece [[Vassa]] is [[kidnapped]] near [[Corvia]].<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 20: The golem appeared “the following year” after Vaasa’s soul is taken."</ref>

737 BC - [[Vassa]] returns as a [[clay golem]]; Cyrilla writes to Dr. Van Richten.<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 19 "just last year"</ref>

737 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''.

[[738 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''.

[[738 BC]] [[Emil Bollenbach]] engineers the [[kidnapping]] of Dr. Rudolph van Richten to the end of seizing his [[brain]] for [[transplantation]] into a super-golem. fortunately, several of Van Richten's friends intercede to thwart Dr. Bollenbach.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 33: "[[Children of the Night: The Created]] pg. 50; CT pg. 32 places this adventure 8 years after Emil’s disappearance (i.e., 746), but the dating used in CotN:C fits VR’s chronology better.</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] goes to [[Nartok]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 67-68">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.67-68</ref>

[[739 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and the adventuring band known as [[the Hand (Adventurer Band)|the Hand]] hunt and destroy [[the Gibbering Golem]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 265-276">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.265-276</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]] publishes ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''. This act earns him considerable ire from [[Agatha Clairmont]], whom sees it as an instruction manual to building [[dread golem]]s just much as it is hunting them.<ref name="Van Richten's Arsenal p. 149">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p. 149</ref>

[[740 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]'' (early spring).

740 BC - Dr. Van Richten inherits the [[library (Aimon Davidovitch)]] of [[Aimon Davidovitch]]. Dr. Van Richten starts studying tomes. (Sept)<ref>JWM Timeline p. 35 "Extrapolated from VRGtF pg. 4"</ref>

[[741 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]], [[Davvyd]], [[Samuel]] and [[Dr. Ottelie Farringer]] battle the fiend [[Drigor]]. Only Dr. van Richten survives. (Feb.)<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 79-85">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p. 79-85</ref>

741 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]]''.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Book)]] p.4</ref>

741 BC - [[Van Richten]] stumbles into the clutches of [[the nameless Amnizu]] and [[the nameless Barbazu]] infesting [[Chateaufaux]]. He is captured. However, he manages to join with some [[adventurer]]s to route the [[devil]]s from the town.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.72-73; Note that the encounter with these [[fiend]]s doesn't appear in the original uncompiled Van Richten's Guide to Fiends. Therefore, the encounter with the [[Fiends of Chateaufaux]] took place after took place after the first VRGtF was published.</ref><ref>[[Gazetteer III]] p.30-31, "just over 15 years ago"</ref>

741 BC<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> - Dr. Van Richten is [[depressed]]; he consults with the [[diviner]], [[Inarin Alster]]; Rudolph realizes he had been laboring under a [[curse]] all these years; Dr. Van Richten spends a year with [[Arturi Radanavich]] studying the Vistani.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]] p.5-7; 87-89</ref>

[[742 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten writes his ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]'' and retires.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> (Oct.)

[[750 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten dies in [[Richten Haus|Bleak House]] in the fight against [[Madame Radanavich]]<ref>[[Domains of Dread]] p. 17, as told in [[Bleak House]], particularly [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 58-63</ref> Meanwhile, all that is known to most, including the [[Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]] is that he [[disappeared]].<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

{{ref}}

[[category:Character]] [[category:NPC]]
[[category:2nd Edition Character]]
[[category:3rd Edition Character]]
[[category:4th Edition Character]]
[[category:5th Edition Character]]
[[category:Abused]]
[[category:Betrayed]]
[[Category:Cursed]]
[[category:Cursed by the Vistani]]
[[Category:Darkonian]]
[[Category:Demonologist]]
[[category:Energy Drained]]
[[Category:Filicide]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Rivalis]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Nartok]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Forest of Shadows]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Darkon]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordentshire]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordent]]
[[Category:Former Patients of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Dominia]]
[[Category:Former Medical Student]]
[[Category:Former Student of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[category:Gaslighted]]
[[category:Giogoto]]
[[Category:Ghost]]
[[Category:Graduate of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Graduate]]
[[Category:Herbalist]]
[[Category:Human]]
[[category:healer]]
[[category:Hero]]
[[Category:Hunter Of Monsters]]
[[Category:Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[category:Intellectual]]
[[Category:Kidnapped]]
[[category:Killer]]
[[category:Lorist]]
[[Category:Male]]
[[category:Mass Murderer]]
[[category:Medical Doctor]]
[[category:Medical Professional]]
[[category:Mentor]]
[[category:Murderer]]
[[Category:Necrologist]]
[[category:Old]]
[[Category:Planar Mechanic]]
[[category:Polymath]]
[[category:Posthumous Character]]
[[category:Potential Darklord]]
[[Category:Proprietor]]
[[category:Professional Killer]]
[[category:Punished]]
[[category:Ravenloft Lorist]]
[[Category:Ravenloft Loremaster]]
[[category:Redeemed]]
[[category:Reformed]]
[[category:Repentant]]
[[category:Researcher]]
[[category:Retired]]
[[Category:Rogue]]
[[category:Sage]]
[[category:Seduced]]
[[Category:Stasis]]
[[category:Tempted]]
[[category:Transgressed]]
[[category:Transgressor]]
[[Category:Van Richten Family]]
[[category:Victim of Medical Malpractice]]
[[Category:Victim of the van Richten Curse]]
[[category:Victimized]]
[[Category:Widowed]]
[[Category:writer]]
[[category:Births in 671 BC]]
[[category:Deaths in 750 BC]]
<references/>

==Data from the Ravenloft Catalogue==



{|
|-valign="top"
|[[Image:rldb_npc.jpg]]
|[[Image:rldb_primary.gif]]
|
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' 
''[[Bleak House]]''
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_art.gif]]
|
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - p4 
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - cover, p4 
''[[Bleak House:Homecoming]]'' - p4,p16 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - p7,8 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p92 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - p114 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 5,11 
''[[The Created]]'' - p13 
''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]'' - p5
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_stats.gif]]
|
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - pp4-5 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p91 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 3
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_desc.gif]]
|
''[[Ravenloft Third Edition]]'' - pp14,17-18,27,176 
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - throughout 
''[[Bleak House]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to The Created]]'' - throughout 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]'' - throughout 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - pp91-93 
''[[Tales of Ravenloft: The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]'' - pp1-17 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - pp 2-3 
''[[Heroes of Light]]'' - p64 
''[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]]'' - pp1-4, pp9-13, pp304-310
|-valign="top"
|}

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (NPC)

2022-02-18T16:28:38Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* Role Playing */

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (NPC)

2022-02-18T16:27:14Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* Appearances */

[[File:Original VR.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
[[File:Rudolph van richten.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten and [[Strahd]] by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
{{canon}}
'''Dr. Rudolph Van Richten''' is the greatest monster hunter that has ever lived and the most well-known hero of the Lands of the Mists.

==History==
He was born in [[Rivalis]] in [[Darkon]] in [[671 BC]]. He took [[medicine]] at the [[University of Il Aluk]], completing his four or five year program of study in [[693 BC]]. This humble man was spurred into a life of monster hunting when his son [[Erasmus van Richten]] was kidnapped by the [[Radanavich clan]] and sold to [[Baron Metus]]. Metus turned Erasmus into a [[vampire groom]] and Van Richten was forced to slay his son. In revenge, Metus killed Rudolph's wife, [[Ingrid van Richten]]. Van Richten eventually slew Metus, and then, with the help of [[Azalin]], the entire [[Radanavich tribe]].

Until his disappearance in [[750 BC]], he resided in [[Mordentshire]], where he ran an [[Van Richten's Herbalist Shop|herbalist shop]], as well as wrote several of his famous [[Van Richten's Guides]], and mentored [[The Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]], who regarded him as an uncle and took up his work.

==In [[Curse of Strahd]]==
Dr. van Richten makes a notable appearance in the [[5th Edition]] [[module]], [[Curse of Strahd]], though not in his [[famous]] persona as the monster hunter and [[writer]] of the [[Van Richten's Guides]] he is notable for in previous Ravenloft products. Instead, he adopts the guise of [[Rictavio]], a traveling [[half-elf]] [[bard]], [[storyteller]], and [[ringmaster]] gathering stories and watching out for talent. In reality he is gathering formation and waiting for an optimal time to strike at [[Strahd]], preferably when the vampire lord is in [[hibernation]]. Unlike other versions of van Richten, the Curse of Strahd van Richten is a [[loner]] because he knows the full extent of his [[curse]].<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> For more details, see [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Curse of Strahd)]]

==Role Playing==

MONSTER HUNTER:

The half-elf ringmaster is, in fact, the legendary human monster hunter named Rudolph Van Richten. Van Richten’s tale is a sad one. A scholar and doctor from a land called Darkon, he married his childhood sweetheart, Ingrid and together they had a son, Erasmus. When he was fourteen, Erasmus was stolen away by Vistani and sold to a vampire named Baron Metus to be used as a companion. By the time Van Richten found his son, it was too late: the Baron had already transformed Erasmus into a vampire spawn. Erasmus begged his father to end his suffering, which Van Richten did by pounding a wooden stake through his son’s chest. Baron Metus avenged that death by killing Van Richten’s wife, and Van Richten has lived with the horror of his family’s destruction ever since. After destroying Baron Metus in turn, Van Richten sought revenge against the Vistani and took up a life of hunting evil monsters.

THE WAITING GAME:

Van Richten isn’t a young man anymore. He knows his road is coming to an end, but his work isn’t done. He has come to Barovia to kill Strahd Von Zarovich, the greatest vampire of them all. Van Richten has studied Strahd for years and knows he can’t hope to best the vampire in a straight-up confrontation: he must wait for the right moment to strike. He has good evidence to suggest that Strahd periodically hibernates in his coffin, sometimes for years, when all is quite in the realm. While he bides his time, Van Richten hides in plain sight with the aid of a hat of disguise, his thoughts protected by a ring of mind shielding. He is trying to learn more about the Keepers of the Feather—a society of wereravens that oppose Strahd—while trying not to expose the secret society to their mutual enemy. He thinks the wereravens might prove helpful when the time comes. Van Richten also wants to take out as many of Strahd’s spies as he can, starting with the Vistani.

MAN WITH A PLAN:

Van Richten doesn’t know that his former protégé, a good-aligned Vistani named Ezmerelda d’Avenir, has come to Barovia looking for him. He taught her many of his monster-hunting techniques, but she doesn’t know all of his tricks and disguises. So far, their paths haven’t crossed. In the event that Van Richten becomes aware of Ezmerelda’s presence, he does his utmost to protect her without putting his own plans in jeopardy. If he can manipulate a party of adventurers into keeping an eye on her, he will do so.

VAN RICHTEN WORKS ALONE:

A curse placed on him long ago by a Vistani seer brings doom to those he befriends (see ‘Role Playing Notes’ for details). Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure. Consequently, if he thinks he’s in danger of being unmasked, he retreats to the Tower of Khazan (chapter 11) or some other quiet corner of Strahd’s domain to plan further.

TRAITS:

Ideal. “Evil cannot go unchallenged.”

Bond. “To protect those I love, I must keep them distant and hidden from my enemies.”

Flaw. “I am cursed. Thus, I will never have peace.”

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Appearances==
===[[Campaign Setting]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[Ravenloft: Realm of Terror]]
**[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting (Box)]]

===[[Modules]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[The Nightmare Lands (Boxed Set)]] (referenced only)
**[[Chilling Tales]]
**[[Dungeon Magazine #55]]: [[The Sea Wolf]]
**[[Bleak House: The Death of Rudolph Van Richten]]

===[[Novels]], stories===

*[[Tales of Ravenloft]]: [[The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]
*[[I, Strahd: The War Against Azalin]]

==Authored:==

* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Witches (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Witches]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Demons]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]]''

Credited for marketing purposes with:
* ''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Mists (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Mists]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead]]''

==[[Associate of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]==

==Chronology==

[[671 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten born<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, son of Otto and Mrs. Van Richten
 
{{Spec|[[678 BC]] - Rudolph’s sister [[Maria Van Richten]] born.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 18 "Speculation based on BH. We only know that she is younger than Rudolph."</ref>
 

[[679 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten sent to boarding school in [[Nartok]]. A childhood friend is [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]].<ref name="VRMHCII p.25-26">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 25-26</ref>

[[680 BC]] - [[Casimir (of Richten Haus)|Casimir]] (not to be confused with [[Casimir Lukas|Harkon Lukas’ son]]) starts working at Richten Haus as the gate keeper.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 6">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 6</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[683 BC]] - The servants of [[Richten Haus]] are all killed while the family is away one day. (summer)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.18: "Speculation based on [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] pg. 15, 24: I’m going on the hunch that VR grows younger until he reaches the age he was at when this event occurred"</ref>
 

[[685 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten meets [[Robert Tatenna]], a fellow student at boarding school. (fall)<ref name="CT p.14">[[Chilling Tales]] p.14</ref>

[[688 BC]] - The [[The Crimson Death Epidemic | Crimson Death]] spreads across Darkon (winter); it claims Van Richten’s great aunt Helga, despite his efforts; Rudolph is even more driven into his medical studies.<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[689 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten attends the [[University of Il Aluk]]. While there, he meets a fellow student, [[Dr. Harmon Ruscheider]]. (fall)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]] pg. 15"</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[691 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten marries his childhood sweetheart, [[Ingrid van Richten|Ingrid]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "[[Realm of Terror]]; [[VRGtV]]: Give VR a good respectable year between their marriage and birth of Erasmus in 692"</ref>
 

[[692 BC]] - Rudolph and Ingrid Van Richten's son [[Erasmus van Richten|Erasmus]] is born.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]] p. 4; [[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 8, "fourteen summers" before [[706 BC]]</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[693 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten finishes his studies; opens his practice back home in [[Rivalis]].}},<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VR’s age, RoT; VRGtV; and ToDm pg. 86, which indicates it takes 4-5 years to get a medical education at the University of Il Aluk"</ref> 
 
{{Spec|693 BC - Dr. Van Richten travels to [[Lamordia]], hears of the [[Loud Man of Lamordia]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VRGtG pg. 9: “When I was young.”</ref> 

[[696 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Antonin Madren]] and becomes his mentor.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 21: "VRGttC pg. 6: Van Richten takes Madren on as a medical student, which implies Van Richten has time to offer such an education (which lasts up to 8 years), i.e., while he was still a simple doctor (693-706)."</ref>

[[706 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten suffers the wrath of the [[Radanavich clan]]; the Vistani steal his son Erasmus; they sell Erasmus to [[Baron Metus]]<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, a vampire from [[Richemulot]]; with the help of an amused [[Azalin]], Van Richten wipes out all but one member of the Radanavich caravan<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]</ref>; [[Madame Radanavich]] [[curse | curses]] Van Richten<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, although he doesn’t realize it until the end of his career.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

[[706 BC]] Van Richten puts his Erasmus, now a vampire, out of his misery, but in spite [[Baron Metus]] tears [[Ingrid van Richten]] to pieces; Dr. Van Richten destroys Baron Metus, starting his career of hunting evil. Unable to live with the memories in [[Richten Haus]], Van Richten moves to [[Corvia]].<ref name="VRA p. 5">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 5</ref>

[[707 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten researches vampires, and meets [[Aimon Davidovitch]], a fellow scholar of the arcane.<ref> from [[JWM Timeline]] p.22: "[[VRGtF]] pg. 4: VR knew him for “some 30-odd years”]</ref>

[[710 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten encounters his first werebeast near [[Varithne]], a small village in northern [[Darkon]]. Dr. Van Richten starts hunting werebeasts as well<ref name="VRMHC p. 109-110">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 109-110</ref>

[[711 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Gedlan Ironheart]], a fearless [[dwarven]] [[innkeeper]] in [[Corvia]]. Gedlan becomes a frequent hunting companion.<ref name="Bleah House p. 11">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p.11</ref>

[[712 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets the mage [[Shauten]]; they bond when they are attacked by one of Azalin's patrols. Shauten opens Van Richten's eyes to the existence of the [[Lich]].<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref>

[[713 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten is visited by the dying Dr. Ruscheider, who tells Rudolph all he can about several months spent as a lich's captive; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting liches.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p.111-112</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[714 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten receives a visit from his childhood friend, [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]], who is now a ghostly slave to Azalin; Dr. Van Richten learns the terrible truth about [[Azalin Rex]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on [[VRGtG]] pg. 22, [[VRMHCII]] pg. 24</ref>
 

{{Spec|714 BC - Dr. Van Richten moves to [[Mordentshire]], sensing it is politically unsafe for him to remain in [[Darkon]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on VRGttL pg. 22</ref>
 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[716 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 3 n1">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade after her death, but [[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[718 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and [[Shauten]] battle a creature they believe to be a priestly [[lich]]; it is actually Van Richten's first [[ancient dead]]}}.<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] "Speculation based on VRGAD pg. 5: “Some years ago,” and other markers. It happened after VR started hunting liches, but before he started hunting ghosts. (The latter conclusion taken from numerous references to Claudia in this Guide"</ref>
 
[[724 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten battles the [[Bog Monster of Hroth]], and meets [[Jameld of Hroth|Jameld]]. This is also Van Richten's first visit to both [[Kartakass]] and [[Sithicus]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p.153</ref> 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[726 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decade n1">[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades after her death but[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade</ref> 

{{Spec|726 BC - Dr. Van Richten visits [[Sanguinia]] with [[George Weathermay]] and [[Arametrius]]; they meet [[Claudia DeShanes]]; Claudia becomes Rudolph’s assistant, and it seems he had certain unspoken feelings for her.}}<ref>Speculation from JWM Timeline p.28: "Since Arametrius is probably [[Athasian]], Van Richten may have recently visited [[Kalidnay]] and encountered [[Ahmose Tanit]]. [VRGtG pg. 73. This is the earliest possible date for this event (due to George’s inclusion, and we know from this source and BH that VR starts hunting ghosts one year after this event. That leaves only 9 years between VR starting to hunt and writing his Guide on the subject. I chose to go with this date to keep as wide a margin of opportunity as possible.]"</ref>
 

[[727 BC]] - [[Merilee Markuza]], the Child [[Vampire]], kills Claudia. Van Richten pursues the creature relentlessly, but loses her in [[Lamordia]].<ref name="Darklords p. 63">[[Darklords]] p. 63</ref>

727 BC - While hunting the Child Vampire, Van Richten witnesses the [[Thundering Carriage]]; Van Richten decides he must put an end to these ghostly horrors, too.<ref name="Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts p. 6">[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 6</ref>

[[728 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten defeats the [[Phantom Army]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 91</ref>

[[729 BC]] - The fiend [[Elsepeth]] enters Ravenloft via [[transposition]] in a small village outside [[Stangengrad]], near the [[Grashen Falls]] (sept)<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.28: "[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] pg. 14: the diary is dated “twelve years ago.”</ref>

[[730 BC]] - {{Spec|[[Gedlan Ironheart]] killed while battling evil spirits.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: "VRGtG pg. 23: Gedlan is referred to as “Geddar” in this book. The date is an estimate based on the 727-736 available time span."</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] leaves [[Borca]], having lurked there for years.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] p. 66</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] writes to Van Richten about the death of Madren’s sister.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[734 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] shows up on Van Richten's doorstep, and gives the good doctor his notes; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting the [[Created]].}}<ref>JWM Timeline p. 30: "VRGttC pg. 6: Estimate. “Years” after Madren wrote about his sister’s death"</ref> 

[[735 BC] - Dr. Van Richten is forced to kill his old friend [[Shauten]] in self-defense, when Shauten tries to sacrifice Rudolph in a bid for [[lichdom]]<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref><ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>. {{Spec|This "near-miss" may have inspired Van Richten to start recording his collected knowledge for heroes to come.}}<ref>JWM Timeline: "Speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6"</ref>

735 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''.<ref name="RLCS p.18">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.18</ref><ref name="RLPHB p.20">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.20</ref>

[[736 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''.

[[737 BC]] - The [[Vistana]] [[Cyrilla]]'s niece [[Vassa]] is [[kidnapped]] near [[Corvia]].<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 20: The golem appeared “the following year” after Vaasa’s soul is taken."</ref>

737 BC - [[Vassa]] returns as a [[clay golem]]; Cyrilla writes to Dr. Van Richten.<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 19 "just last year"</ref>

737 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''.

[[738 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''.

[[738 BC]] [[Emil Bollenbach]] engineers the [[kidnapping]] of Dr. Rudolph van Richten to the end of seizing his [[brain]] for [[transplantation]] into a super-golem. fortunately, several of Van Richten's friends intercede to thwart Dr. Bollenbach.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 33: "[[Children of the Night: The Created]] pg. 50; CT pg. 32 places this adventure 8 years after Emil’s disappearance (i.e., 746), but the dating used in CotN:C fits VR’s chronology better.</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] goes to [[Nartok]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 67-68">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.67-68</ref>

[[739 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and the adventuring band known as [[the Hand (Adventurer Band)|the Hand]] hunt and destroy [[the Gibbering Golem]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 265-276">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.265-276</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]] publishes ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''. This act earns him considerable ire from [[Agatha Clairmont]], whom sees it as an instruction manual to building [[dread golem]]s just much as it is hunting them.<ref name="Van Richten's Arsenal p. 149">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p. 149</ref>

[[740 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]'' (early spring).

740 BC - Dr. Van Richten inherits the [[library (Aimon Davidovitch)]] of [[Aimon Davidovitch]]. Dr. Van Richten starts studying tomes. (Sept)<ref>JWM Timeline p. 35 "Extrapolated from VRGtF pg. 4"</ref>

[[741 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]], [[Davvyd]], [[Samuel]] and [[Dr. Ottelie Farringer]] battle the fiend [[Drigor]]. Only Dr. van Richten survives. (Feb.)<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 79-85">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p. 79-85</ref>

741 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]]''.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Book)]] p.4</ref>

741 BC - [[Van Richten]] stumbles into the clutches of [[the nameless Amnizu]] and [[the nameless Barbazu]] infesting [[Chateaufaux]]. He is captured. However, he manages to join with some [[adventurer]]s to route the [[devil]]s from the town.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.72-73; Note that the encounter with these [[fiend]]s doesn't appear in the original uncompiled Van Richten's Guide to Fiends. Therefore, the encounter with the [[Fiends of Chateaufaux]] took place after took place after the first VRGtF was published.</ref><ref>[[Gazetteer III]] p.30-31, "just over 15 years ago"</ref>

741 BC<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> - Dr. Van Richten is [[depressed]]; he consults with the [[diviner]], [[Inarin Alster]]; Rudolph realizes he had been laboring under a [[curse]] all these years; Dr. Van Richten spends a year with [[Arturi Radanavich]] studying the Vistani.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]] p.5-7; 87-89</ref>

[[742 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten writes his ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]'' and retires.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> (Oct.)

[[750 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten dies in [[Richten Haus|Bleak House]] in the fight against [[Madame Radanavich]]<ref>[[Domains of Dread]] p. 17, as told in [[Bleak House]], particularly [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 58-63</ref> Meanwhile, all that is known to most, including the [[Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]] is that he [[disappeared]].<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

{{ref}}

[[category:Character]] [[category:NPC]]
[[category:2nd Edition Character]]
[[category:3rd Edition Character]]
[[category:4th Edition Character]]
[[category:5th Edition Character]]
[[category:Abused]]
[[category:Betrayed]]
[[Category:Cursed]]
[[category:Cursed by the Vistani]]
[[Category:Darkonian]]
[[Category:Demonologist]]
[[category:Energy Drained]]
[[Category:Filicide]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Rivalis]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Nartok]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Forest of Shadows]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Darkon]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordentshire]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordent]]
[[Category:Former Patients of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Dominia]]
[[Category:Former Medical Student]]
[[Category:Former Student of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[category:Gaslighted]]
[[category:Giogoto]]
[[Category:Ghost]]
[[Category:Graduate of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Graduate]]
[[Category:Herbalist]]
[[Category:Human]]
[[category:healer]]
[[category:Hero]]
[[Category:Hunter Of Monsters]]
[[Category:Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[category:Intellectual]]
[[Category:Kidnapped]]
[[category:Killer]]
[[category:Lorist]]
[[Category:Male]]
[[category:Mass Murderer]]
[[category:Medical Doctor]]
[[category:Medical Professional]]
[[category:Mentor]]
[[category:Murderer]]
[[Category:Necrologist]]
[[category:Old]]
[[Category:Planar Mechanic]]
[[category:Polymath]]
[[category:Posthumous Character]]
[[category:Potential Darklord]]
[[Category:Proprietor]]
[[category:Professional Killer]]
[[category:Punished]]
[[category:Ravenloft Lorist]]
[[Category:Ravenloft Loremaster]]
[[category:Redeemed]]
[[category:Reformed]]
[[category:Repentant]]
[[category:Researcher]]
[[category:Retired]]
[[Category:Rogue]]
[[category:Sage]]
[[category:Seduced]]
[[Category:Stasis]]
[[category:Tempted]]
[[category:Transgressed]]
[[category:Transgressor]]
[[Category:Van Richten Family]]
[[category:Victim of Medical Malpractice]]
[[Category:Victim of the van Richten Curse]]
[[category:Victimized]]
[[Category:Widowed]]
[[Category:writer]]
[[category:Births in 671 BC]]
[[category:Deaths in 750 BC]]
<references/>

==Data from the Ravenloft Catalogue==



{|
|-valign="top"
|[[Image:rldb_npc.jpg]]
|[[Image:rldb_primary.gif]]
|
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' 
''[[Bleak House]]''
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_art.gif]]
|
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - p4 
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - cover, p4 
''[[Bleak House:Homecoming]]'' - p4,p16 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - p7,8 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p92 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - p114 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 5,11 
''[[The Created]]'' - p13 
''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]'' - p5
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_stats.gif]]
|
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - pp4-5 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p91 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 3
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_desc.gif]]
|
''[[Ravenloft Third Edition]]'' - pp14,17-18,27,176 
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - throughout 
''[[Bleak House]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to The Created]]'' - throughout 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]'' - throughout 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - pp91-93 
''[[Tales of Ravenloft: The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]'' - pp1-17 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - pp 2-3 
''[[Heroes of Light]]'' - p64 
''[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]]'' - pp1-4, pp9-13, pp304-310
|-valign="top"
|}

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (5th Edition)

2022-02-18T16:23:16Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* Appearances */

{{canon}}

NOTE: This entry is for the [[5th Edition]] version of Dr. Rudolph van Richten presented in [[Curse of Strahd]]. For the older edition character, see [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten (NPC)]].

Dr. van Richten makes a notable appearance in the [[5th Edition]] [[module]], [[Curse of Strahd]], though not in his [[famous]] persona as the monster hunter and [[writer]] of the [[Van Richten's Guide]]s he is notable for in previous Ravenloft products. Instead, he adopts the guise of [[Rictavio]], a traveling [[half-elf]] [[bard]], [[storyteller]], and [[ringmaster]] gathering stories and watching out for talent. In reality he is gathering formation and waiting for an optimal time to strike at [[Strahd]], preferably when the vampire lord is in [[hibernation]]. Unlike other versions of van Richten, the Curse of Strahd van Richten is a [[loner]] because he knows the full extent of his [[curse]].<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref>

==History==
Much of Dr. van Richten's early history before he came a monster hunter remains the same. One key difference is that he did not wholesale murder the [[Vistani]] that [[kidnapped]] his son [[Erasmus van Richten]]. In fact, one of them, [[Ezmerelda d'Avenir]] appeared to him one day and expressed her remorse, eventually becoming van Richten's student in monster hunting. However, their relationship frayed after a couple of years, and at, Ezmerelda's suggestion, they left each other's company amicably.<ref name="CoS p. 230-231">CoS p. 230-231</ref>

At some point in his adventuring career, a [[Vistani]] [[seer]] [[cursed]] van Richten, dooming his friends to die. ''Curse of Strahd'' is not specific to when in his adventuring career or why van Richten's curse was put upon him, though he is aware of it.<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> In contrast, in the traditional van Richten story, van Richten is [[cursed]] by [[Madame Radanavich]] early on in his career but does not realize how it has effected him until [[741 BC]] (the year before he retires). He thus operates as a [[loner]], to not cause the death of any friends or allies he would work with.<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref>

Eventually, Dr. van Richten set his sights upon the destruction of Strahd. By now having adopted the identity of Rictavio, van Richten eventually encountered [[Yan]], an [[exile]]d [[Vistani]]. Once Yan discovered van Richten's intentions to go to [[Barovia]] and seek out the Vistani there, Yan tried to make off with [[Rictavio's Wagon]] along with [[Piccolo]]. Van Richten caught him and [[killed]] the [[thief]], removed his head, and preserved it with special magic oils to be used with [[speak with dead]] later on.<ref>CoS p. 171</ref>

Rictavio came to [[Barovia]] in the guise of [[Rictavio]]<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> and set up shop at a then [[abandoned]] tower formerly belonging to the [[wizard]] [[Khazan]]. Dr. van Richten made [[Van Richten's Tower|Khazan's old tower]] his own for a time, before moving on to [[Vallaki]] and setting up shop there.<ref name="CoS p. 167">CoS p. 167</ref> In the meantime, Ezmerelda heard [[rumor]]s about her former mentor's travel to [[Barovia]] to take out Strahd, and she traveled to Barovia to find van Richten, eventually setting up shop in his old tower.<ref>CoS p. 231</ref>

About a month prior to the current point in the timeline of the module, "Rictavio" came to Vallaki. There he met and purchased a [[doll]] of a [[Vistani]] from [[Gadof Blinsky]]. Noting the toymaker's loneliness and despair, van Richten left his [[pet]] [[monkey]], [[Piccolo]] with Blinsky for company.<ref name="Curse of Strahd p. 118">CoS p. 118</ref> Dr. van Richten has stayed at the [[Blue Water Inn]] and received generous treatment from the charitable [[Urwin Martikov]].<ref>CoS p. 100</ref>. Dr. van Richten keeps his wagon (and [[Rictavio's saber-toothed tiger|his sabre-toothed tiger]]) inside the [[Arasek Stockyards]], bribing off its owners to prevent any details from leaking out.<ref name="CoS p. 115-116">CoS p. 115-116</ref>

==Modus Operandi==
As previously mentioned, Dr. van Richten is a [[loner]], posing in his [[Rictavio]] guise to gather information until the time is right to strike against Strahd. Van Richten drives [[Rictavio's Carnival wagon|a carnival wagon]]<ref>CoS p. 115-116</ref> pulled by a [[horse]]] named [[Drusilla (Horse)|Drusilla]].<ref>CoS p. 101-102</ref> Dr. van Richten uses [[Rictavio's saber-toothed tiger|his sabre-toothed tiger]] to hunt [[evil]] [[Vistani]], for which it is especially trained to do.<ref name="CoS p. 115-116">CoS p. 115-116</ref> Currently, van Richten is gathering information on both a)the [[Keepers of the Feather]] to learn their allegiances/membership and b)the [[evil]] [[Vistani]] of [[Arrigal's Clan]] at the [[Vistani camp near Vallaki]]. Van Richten plans on sending the tiger after the evil Vistani in the camp.

==Art==
p. 238

==Game Statistics==

DR. RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN

Medium humanoid (human), Lawful Good

Armor Class: 17 (half plate of flowing sanctity)

Hit Points: 77 (14d8 +14)

Speed: 30 ft.

Strength: 9 (-1)

Dexterity: 13 (+1)

Constitution: 13 (+1)

Intelligence: 17 (+3)

Wisdom: 18 (+4)

Charisma: 16 (+3)

Saving Throws: Con +5, Wis +8, Cha +7

Skills: Arcana +7, Deception +7, Insight +12, Investigation +7, Medicine +8, Perception +12, Religion +6, Sleight of Hand +4

Condition Immunities: charmed

Senses: darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 22

Languages: Abyssal, Celestial, Common, Draconic, Dwarvish, Elvish, Gundarak, Infernal, Sylvan

Challenge: 9 (5,000 XP)

SPECIAL EQUIPMENT:

In addition to his +1 sword cane and light crossbow, Van Richten wears a hat of disguise, goggles of night, and a ring of mind shielding, and he carries a spell scroll of raise dead.

Half Plate of Flowing Sanctity +1 mithril half plate. Once a day, a flask of water placed in the belt of armor becomes holy water.

ACTIONS:

Spellcasting: Van Richter is a 9th level Cleric of Helm, 1st level Wizard. His spellcasting ability is Wisdom (save DC 15, +7 to hit with spell attacks). Van Richten has the following Cleric and Wizard spells prepared:

Cantrips (at will): light, mage hand, mending, minor illusion, prestidigitation, sacred flame, thaumaturgy, toll the dead

1st level (4 slots): alarm, bless, cure wounds, detect evil and good, feather fall, find familiar, healing word, identify, protection from evil and good, shield, sleep

2nd level (3 slots): augury, beacon of hope, lesser restoration, protection from poison, silence, spiritual weapon warding bond, zone of truth

3rd level (3 slots): glyph of warding, magic circle, mass healing word, revivify, speak with dead, spirit guardians

4th level (3 slots): death ward, freedom of movement

5th level (3 slots): dawn, greater restoration, mass cure wounds, raise dead

Skulker: Van Richten can hide when he is lightly obscured from the creature from which he is hiding. When he’s hidden from a creature and misses it with a ranged weapon attack, making the attack doesn’t reveal his position. Dim light doesn’t impose disadvantage on his Wisdom (Perception) checks relying on sight.

Undead Slayer: When Van Richten hits an undead with a weapon attack, the undead takes an extra 10 (3d6) damage of weapon’s type.

Cunning Action: Van Richten can use a bonus action to take the Dash, Disengage or Hide action.

Sneak Attack: When Van Richten surprises a target, has advantage on an attack roll, or an enemy is within 5 ft. of the target, Van Richten deals and extra 7 damage.

Assassin Proficiencies: Van Richten is proficient with Disguise and Poisoner’s Kits.

Assassinate: When Van Richten hits a surprised enemy, it’s automatically a critical hit. When he attacks an enemy that hasn’t yet had a turn, he gains advantage on the attack.

Channel Divinity: Turn Undead: Undead within 30 ft. of Van Richten must make a Wisdom saving throw. If the creature fails its saving throw, they are turned for 1 minute or until they take damage. A turned creature must spend its turns trying to move as far away from him as it can, and it can’t willingly move to a space within 30 ft. of him. It also can’t take reactions. For its action, it can use only the Dash action or try to escape from an effect that prevents it from moving. If there’s nowhere to move, the creature can use the Dodge action. Undead with CR 1 or less are automatically destroyed on a failed save.

Preserve Life: As an action, Van Richten can distribute 45 hit points. This feature can restore a creature to no more than half of its hit point maximum and has no effect on an undead or construct.

Multiattack: Van Richten makes two attacks with his sword cane or light crossbow.

Sword Cane: Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 6 (1d6 +2) bludgeon damage (wooden cane) or piercing damage (silvered sword).

Light Crossbow: Ranged Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, range 80/320 ft., one target. Hit: 7 (1d8 +2) piercing damage.

Healer: As an action, Van Richten can spend one use of a Healer’s Kit to tend to a creature and restore 1d6 +4 hit points to it, plus additional hit points equal to the creature’s maximum number of Hit Dice. The creature can’t regain hit points from this feat again until it finishes a short or long rest.

REACTIONS:

Final Ward: Van Richten has a permanent glyph of warding tattooed on his neck that activates when he’s bitten there and chooses to say “Erasmus, I’m coming home” in Celestial. All targets in a 20 ft. radius must make a Dexterity saving throw or take 5d20 +5 radiant damage on a failed save or half as much (rounded up) on a successful one. Van Richten automatically fails the save and is disintegrated along with all of the items on his person.

RICTAVIO:

Several months ago, a colorfully dressed half-elf bard came to Barovia in a carnival wagon, with a pet monkey on his shoulder. He took over an abandoned tower on Lake Baratok before rolling into town of Vallaki several months later. Claiming to be a carnival ringmaster in search of new actors, he began regaling locals with tales of distant lands.

MONSTER HUNTER:

The half-elf ringmaster is, in fact, the legendary human monster hunter named Rudolph Van Richten. Van Richten’s tale is a sad one. A scholar and doctor from a land called Darkon, he married his childhood sweetheart, Ingrid and together they had a son, Erasmus. When he was fourteen, Erasmus was stolen away by Vistani and sold to a vampire named Baron Metus to be used as a companion. By the time Van Richten found his son, it was too late: the Baron had already transformed Erasmus into a vampire spawn. Erasmus begged his father to end his suffering, which Van Richten did by pounding a wooden stake through his son’s chest. Baron Metus avenged that death by killing Van Richten’s wife, and Van Richten has lived with the horror of his family’s destruction ever since. After destroying Baron Metus in turn, Van Richten sought revenge against the Vistani and took up a life of hunting evil monsters.

THE WAITING GAME:

Van Richten isn’t a young man anymore. He knows his road is coming to an end, but his work isn’t done. He has come to Barovia to kill Strahd Von Zarovich, the greatest vampire of them all. Van Richten has studied Strahd for years and knows he can’t hope to best the vampire in a straight-up confrontation: he must wait for the right moment to strike. He has good evidence to suggest that Strahd periodically hibernates in his coffin, sometimes for years, when all is quite in the realm. While he bides his time, Van Richten hides in plain sight with the aid of a hat of disguise, his thoughts protected by a ring of mind shielding. He is trying to learn more about the Keepers of the Feather—a society of wereravens that oppose Strahd—while trying not to expose the secret society to their mutual enemy. He thinks the wereravens might prove helpful when the time comes. Van Richten also wants to take out as many of Strahd’s spies as he can, starting with the Vistani.

MAN WITH A PLAN:

Van Richten doesn’t know that his former protégé, a good-aligned Vistani named Ezmerelda d’Avenir, has come to Barovia looking for him. He taught her many of his monster-hunting techniques, but she doesn’t know all of his tricks and disguises. So far, their paths haven’t crossed. In the event that Van Richten becomes aware of Ezmerelda’s presence, he does his utmost to protect her without putting his own plans in jeopardy. If he can manipulate a party of adventurers into keeping an eye on her, he will do so.

VAN RICHTEN WORKS ALONE:

A curse placed on him long ago by a Vistani seer brings doom to those he befriends (see ‘Role Playing Notes’ for details). Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure. Consequently, if he thinks he’s in danger of being unmasked, he retreats to the Tower of Khazan (chapter 11) or some other quiet corner of Strahd’s domain to plan further.

TRAITS:

Ideal. “Evil cannot go unchallenged.”

Bond. “To protect those I love, I must keep them distant and hidden from my enemies.”

Flaw. “I am cursed. Thus, I will never have peace.”

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

A CURSED MAN:

Van Richten suffers a curse bestowed on him by a Vistani:

Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws.

Its effect on him can best be summarized with this statement: "Van Richten Dies Last." This curse is both a boon and a bane to him. The curse is a large part of why he has lived so long--how he has accumulated so much experience and expertise. He is cursed to always see his friends and allies die--which means he has to live long enough to see it happen.

For a long time, he was unaware of the exact nature of the curse on him, but he is apparently aware of it now.

• Van Richten feels guilty. For decades he fought alongside others with monsters, completely unaware that he was a doombringer among them. Now that he knows, he is burdened by all the deaths he feels that his presence caused.

• Van Richten isolates himself. He doesn't let people get close to him for fear that his curse will take them out.

• If Van Richten is traveling with the party, he has excellent odds of surviving--if someone is going to die in the party, it'll be someone other than him.

• Van Richten's curse should have a tangible impact if he’s traveling with the party: he is a doombringer of the highest order. His mere presence among the party should invite tragedy and disaster.

The Tragedy of Ezmerelda and Van Richten. In the backstory that created Ezmerelda d’Avenir (Appendix D: Monsters and NPCs pages 230-231), there's a tragedy in there: Van Richten's curse could have been lifted years ago.

By Ravenloft Lore, the strongest of curses laid down by a Vistani can only be lifted by the Vistani who placed it, or a blood relative of that Vistani. Van Richten's curse was a Death Curse laid on him by Ezmerelda's mother. Only Ezmerelda has the ability to revoke the curse. But here's the problem... Ezmerelda is Vistani...by nature; they are secretive about their abilities. Beyond that, Van Richten doesn't trust Vistani and likely commanded Ezmerelda to not use her Vistani abilities in his presence. As a result, Van Richten doesn't know how Vistani curses work--he doesn't know that they can be revoked by a blood relative of the one who laid it. He's a Cleric, he has undoubtedly tried remove curse on himself and it failed. As far as he knows, the curse is permanent. Van Richten is also secretive and, as mentioned, doesn't trust the Vistani. He kept Ezmerelda at arm's length as best he could both because he couldn't trust her, but also to try to protect her from the curse...and even if he was aware of the curse when they traveled together, he never told her about it.

If either one of them had been less secretive, more open, his curse would have been revoked a long time ago.

If the players want to help Van Richten break the curse, here's the backstory:

The story of Ezmerelda and Van Richten's history was written in the Van Richten's Journal (Appendix F: Handouts pages 254-255). It involves him destroying Ezmerelda's caravan while she was very, very young. She survived the undead assault and later got picked up by another caravan of Vistani (it was actually the Zarovan tribe--Madam Eva's caravan). She originally wanted revenge on Van Richten, but time with Eva (and the presence of the most powerful Vistani of them all) showed her the tragedy of what had happened from an outside perspective. Ezmerelda realized that the whole thing was a horrible tragedy and wrongs had been committed on both sides. She, thus, set out to try to find Van Richten and try to make things right...though Eva never told her about the curse her mother had laid on Van Richten.

Van Richten and Ezmerelda must travel to the place the curse was first laid...a small clearing in the forests of Barovia where the ruins of Ezmerelda's caravan still lie. Both must verbally acknowledge the wrong that had been done and verbally forgive one another for it...then the remains of Ezmerelda's caravan must be burned.

THE DISGUISE:

Van Richten got the idea for “Rictavio” from his exposure to Ezmerelda and her occasional methods for blending in when going somewhere that didn't like Vistani. In short: "Sometimes the best disguise is being the most obvious thing in the room." As mentioned above, Ezmerelda has never encountered the Rictavio disguise and Van Richten isn't familiar with any of the disguises Ezmerelda is currently using.

It is a rather perfect disguise. Van Richten is known as a grim and serious individual, a dour old man who roves the world slaying monsters. “Rictavio” is a flamboyant fop who tells ludicrous stories, commits crimes against music, and is constantly trying to recruit people to his Circus of Wonders. He should be portrayed as extremely over the top and completely harmless. It should be very jarring to your players if he drops the act and reveals who he truly is. Furthermore, Rictavio knows that even if someone suspects he's hiding something, they are extremely unlikely to guess the truth. If a player rolls well on Insight against him and figures out he's full of crap, that only tells them that he's lying about something...not what he is lying about. And his response is to just carry on and ignore accusations. Sure, the PCs may figure out that he's full of it (his stories are obvious fabrications) but he just carries right along, sticking to his guns even though the players know it’s a load of BS.

The players should have a hard time to get a serious read on Rictavio's personality. He strikes them as so straight forward--a carnie who is spinning tall tales for amusement. So they shouldn’t suspect that he's any more than what he appears to be.

A HARD MAN TO PIN DOWN:

Van Richten is a man with a plan for killing Strahd Von Zarovich, and it's a plan that plays well to his aged capabilities: "wait til Strahd takes a long nap, then stake him in his sleep." Of anyone in the valley, Van Richten knows how deadly Strahd is. He has fought elder vampires before and Strahd is the greatest of them all. He may very well believe that trying to fight him head on is pure folly, but he’s the one most capable of doing so.

It's important to note: Most of the "Destined Allies" the party can draw from Madame Eva’s Tarokka card reading have notes about how the PCs can get that individual to join them. Van Richten has no such notes. Instead, it says this...

Van Richten works alone. [...] Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure.

Van Richten is aware of Madame Eva but (unlike many others in the valley) he won't immediately cave to her prophecies, drop everything he has been working on, and throw his lot in with the PCs. Here are a few important things to keep in mind if the party is trying to recruit him...

• Van Richten is quite certain that if he drops his disguise, Strahd will find him and set out to kill him. (This is one of Strahd's Primary Goals as listed in Chapter 1)

• Van Richten's disguise is magically augmented. As long as the party can't get his hat off, they cannot prove that he’s not a carnie ringmaster

• Van Richten's disguise is only useful against Strahd as long as no one knows who he really is. The ring of mind shielding only works on him...it doesn't work on the PCs. He knows that if anyone else finds out, Strahd can charm them, read their mind or otherwise extract that information from them.

• Van Richten is fully aware of his curse. He will avoid physically joining up with the party for fear that he will get them all killed.

• Van Richten does not talk about his curse. He knows well the bravery of adventurers and that telling them about his curse tends to result in responses like "Oh, you don't need to worry about us, we're strong!" followed shortly by ":dying noises:." Rebuffing their advances without mentioning the curse is much more effective at getting them to stay away from him so his curse doesn't kill them.

• Even if Van Richten consents to offer them aid, it should be indirect as much as possible. He has his plan, he's set in his ways, and he’s not going to go gallivanting off with a bunch of young adventurers. And, he should stay in character as much as possible...blowing his cover will only bring Strahd down on him AND the PCs.

Ideally, even if the party can convince him to help...his help should primarily take the form of a surprisingly knowledgeable carnival ringmaster who is "certainly not going to go out and fight monsters with you. I'm a ringmaster, not an adventurer!"

He may lend the party his carnival wagon to travel around in (once he finds somewhere else to stash his saber-toothed tiger that has been trained to hunt Vistani, or he may lend them the tiger), give them helpful advice--possibly using ravens to stay in touch over long-distance if the PCs make friends with the Keepers of the Feather, and provide the sort of support that a Carnie could offer. But, it should take rather extreme circumstances for him to actually be honest with the PCs...and they may have to do something about his curse before he'll actually travel with them.

GETTING HIM TO JOIN UP:

Van Richten wants to stay under cover...so how does the party get him to change his mind?

Easy: Ruin his plan.

If Van Richten's cover is blown, his plan is a wash. The whole plan depends on his identity staying a secret until Strahd goes into hibernation. If Strahd identifies Van Richten before then, he will try to kill him and Van Richten is pretty sure he can't take Strahd in a straight-up fight. Thus...if Van Richten’s cover is blown, he is stuck with two bad choices: Either he tries to keep going it alone, possibly getting killed by Strahd, and fails his “final mission,” or he accepts the risk to the PCs and joins them to try to take Strahd down directly. A few example ways to blow his cover...

• Knock his hat off. A hat of disguise only works as long as it stays on your head, so if something happens that knocks his hat off; “Rictavio” is replaced by Van Richten.

• Let the Tyger Tyger event happen (chapter 5). When Rictavio flees to the Tower of Khazan, he's inside an antimagic field and cannot disguise himself.

• Even if Van Richten is distorting his voice, if the PCs have already befriended Ezmerelda, she may still recognize it...even if what she recognizes is the cadence his voice adopts when he's explaining something.

ABILITY LOADOUT:

Van Richten is a Cleric...and his listed prepared spells speaks more of a support caster than a monster hunter who has gone solo. But, because he's a Cleric, he can swap out his prepared spells at will to any other spells on the Cleric list. Here are a few notes on spells for him to use...

• Dawn creates sunlight. If he can lock a vampire down within the area of effect, they will be dust in short order.

• Dispel Evil and Good breaks a vampire's charm. However...things can't really leave Barovia, so the dismissal part of that spell won't be terribly effective here.

• Geas is useful when he needs to find something. For example, capture a werewolf then place a geas on it to lead them to the den.

• Lesser and Greater Restoration are enormously useful, as is remove curse.

• Guiding Bolt is a great weapon against Vampires. Shuts down their regeneration, and gives the next attack advantage.

• Hallow: If Van Richten can get his hands on the material components for this, he can create holy ground to help protect the PCs. Create a bubble of hallowed ground around the antimagic field that covers the Tower of Khazan....talk about a fortress. Sure, you'll have a bubble of non-hallowed ground where the antimagic field zone is...but the territory around the tower itself will be holy ground.

• Given his skill at predicting his foes...dropping sanctuary on a creature they are about to attack can completely trash their attempts.

• Spirit Guardians is another spell that is just....awesome.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Appearances==

*[[5th Edition]]
**[[Curse of Strahd]]
**[[Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft]]

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Article)

2022-02-18T16:21:58Z

Blade Runner Rock:

DR. RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN

Medium humanoid (human), Lawful Good

Armor Class: 17 (half plate of flowing sanctity)

Hit Points: 77 (14d8 +14)

Speed: 30 ft.

Strength: 9 (-1)

Dexterity: 13 (+1)

Constitution: 13 (+1)

Intelligence: 17 (+3)

Wisdom: 18 (+4)

Charisma: 16 (+3)

Saving Throws: Con +5, Wis +8, Cha +7

Skills: Arcana +7, Deception +7, Insight +12, Investigation +7, Medicine +8, Perception +12, Religion +6, Sleight of Hand +4

Condition Immunities: charmed

Senses: darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 22

Languages: Abyssal, Celestial, Common, Draconic, Dwarvish, Elvish, Gundarak, Infernal, Sylvan

Challenge: 9 (5,000 XP)

SPECIAL EQUIPMENT:

In addition to his +1 sword cane and light crossbow, Van Richten wears a hat of disguise, goggles of night, and a ring of mind shielding, and he carries a spell scroll of raise dead.

Half Plate of Flowing Sanctity +1 mithril half plate. Once a day, a flask of water placed in the belt of armor becomes holy water.

ACTIONS:

Spellcasting: Van Richter is a 9th level Cleric of Helm, 1st level Wizard. His spellcasting ability is Wisdom (save DC 15, +7 to hit with spell attacks). Van Richten has the following Cleric and Wizard spells prepared:

Cantrips (at will): light, mage hand, mending, minor illusion, prestidigitation, sacred flame, thaumaturgy, toll the dead

1st level (4 slots): alarm, bless, cure wounds, detect evil and good, feather fall, find familiar, healing word, identify, protection from evil and good, shield, sleep

2nd level (3 slots): augury, beacon of hope, lesser restoration, protection from poison, silence, spiritual weapon warding bond, zone of truth

3rd level (3 slots): glyph of warding, magic circle, mass healing word, revivify, speak with dead, spirit guardians

4th level (3 slots): death ward, freedom of movement

5th level (3 slots): dawn, greater restoration, mass cure wounds, raise dead

Skulker: Van Richten can hide when he is lightly obscured from the creature from which he is hiding. When he’s hidden from a creature and misses it with a ranged weapon attack, making the attack doesn’t reveal his position. Dim light doesn’t impose disadvantage on his Wisdom (Perception) checks relying on sight.

Undead Slayer: When Van Richten hits an undead with a weapon attack, the undead takes an extra 10 (3d6) damage of weapon’s type.

Cunning Action: Van Richten can use a bonus action to take the Dash, Disengage or Hide action.

Sneak Attack: When Van Richten surprises a target, has advantage on an attack roll, or an enemy is within 5 ft. of the target, Van Richten deals and extra 7 damage.

Assassin Proficiencies: Van Richten is proficient with Disguise and Poisoner’s Kits.

Assassinate: When Van Richten hits a surprised enemy, it’s automatically a critical hit. When he attacks an enemy that hasn’t yet had a turn, he gains advantage on the attack.

Channel Divinity: Turn Undead: Undead within 30 ft. of Van Richten must make a Wisdom saving throw. If the creature fails its saving throw, they are turned for 1 minute or until they take damage. A turned creature must spend its turns trying to move as far away from him as it can, and it can’t willingly move to a space within 30 ft. of him. It also can’t take reactions. For its action, it can use only the Dash action or try to escape from an effect that prevents it from moving. If there’s nowhere to move, the creature can use the Dodge action. Undead with CR 1 or less are automatically destroyed on a failed save.

Preserve Life: As an action, Van Richten can distribute 45 hit points. This feature can restore a creature to no more than half of its hit point maximum and has no effect on an undead or construct.

Multiattack: Van Richten makes two attacks with his sword cane or light crossbow.

Sword Cane: Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 6 (1d6 +2) bludgeon damage (wooden cane) or piercing damage (silvered sword).

Light Crossbow: Ranged Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, range 80/320 ft., one target. Hit: 7 (1d8 +2) piercing damage.

Healer: As an action, Van Richten can spend one use of a Healer’s Kit to tend to a creature and restore 1d6 +4 hit points to it, plus additional hit points equal to the creature’s maximum number of Hit Dice. The creature can’t regain hit points from this feat again until it finishes a short or long rest.

REACTIONS:

Final Ward: Van Richten has a permanent glyph of warding tattooed on his neck that activates when he’s bitten there and chooses to say “Erasmus, I’m coming home” in Celestial. All targets in a 20 ft. radius must make a Dexterity saving throw or take 5d20 +5 radiant damage on a failed save or half as much (rounded up) on a successful one. Van Richten automatically fails the save and is disintegrated along with all of the items on his person.

RICTAVIO:

Several months ago, a colorfully dressed half-elf bard came to Barovia in a carnival wagon, with a pet monkey on his shoulder. He took over an abandoned tower on Lake Baratok before rolling into town of Vallaki several months later. Claiming to be a carnival ringmaster in search of new actors, he began regaling locals with tales of distant lands.

MONSTER HUNTER:

The half-elf ringmaster is, in fact, the legendary human monster hunter named Rudolph Van Richten. Van Richten’s tale is a sad one. A scholar and doctor from a land called Darkon, he married his childhood sweetheart, Ingrid and together they had a son, Erasmus. When he was fourteen, Erasmus was stolen away by Vistani and sold to a vampire named Baron Metus to be used as a companion. By the time Van Richten found his son, it was too late: the Baron had already transformed Erasmus into a vampire spawn. Erasmus begged his father to end his suffering, which Van Richten did by pounding a wooden stake through his son’s chest. Baron Metus avenged that death by killing Van Richten’s wife, and Van Richten has lived with the horror of his family’s destruction ever since. After destroying Baron Metus in turn, Van Richten sought revenge against the Vistani and took up a life of hunting evil monsters.

THE WAITING GAME:

Van Richten isn’t a young man anymore. He knows his road is coming to an end, but his work isn’t done. He has come to Barovia to kill Strahd Von Zarovich, the greatest vampire of them all. Van Richten has studied Strahd for years and knows he can’t hope to best the vampire in a straight-up confrontation: he must wait for the right moment to strike. He has good evidence to suggest that Strahd periodically hibernates in his coffin, sometimes for years, when all is quite in the realm. While he bides his time, Van Richten hides in plain sight with the aid of a hat of disguise, his thoughts protected by a ring of mind shielding. He is trying to learn more about the Keepers of the Feather—a society of wereravens that oppose Strahd—while trying not to expose the secret society to their mutual enemy. He thinks the wereravens might prove helpful when the time comes. Van Richten also wants to take out as many of Strahd’s spies as he can, starting with the Vistani.

MAN WITH A PLAN:

Van Richten doesn’t know that his former protégé, a good-aligned Vistani named Ezmerelda d’Avenir, has come to Barovia looking for him. He taught her many of his monster-hunting techniques, but she doesn’t know all of his tricks and disguises. So far, their paths haven’t crossed. In the event that Van Richten becomes aware of Ezmerelda’s presence, he does his utmost to protect her without putting his own plans in jeopardy. If he can manipulate a party of adventurers into keeping an eye on her, he will do so.

VAN RICHTEN WORKS ALONE:

A curse placed on him long ago by a Vistani seer brings doom to those he befriends (see ‘Role Playing Notes’ for details). Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure. Consequently, if he thinks he’s in danger of being unmasked, he retreats to the Tower of Khazan (chapter 11) or some other quiet corner of Strahd’s domain to plan further.

TRAITS:

Ideal. “Evil cannot go unchallenged.”

Bond. “To protect those I love, I must keep them distant and hidden from my enemies.”

Flaw. “I am cursed. Thus, I will never have peace.”

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

A CURSED MAN:

Van Richten suffers a curse bestowed on him by a Vistani:

Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws.

Its effect on him can best be summarized with this statement: "Van Richten Dies Last." This curse is both a boon and a bane to him. The curse is a large part of why he has lived so long--how he has accumulated so much experience and expertise. He is cursed to always see his friends and allies die--which means he has to live long enough to see it happen.

For a long time, he was unaware of the exact nature of the curse on him, but he is apparently aware of it now.

• Van Richten feels guilty. For decades he fought alongside others with monsters, completely unaware that he was a doombringer among them. Now that he knows, he is burdened by all the deaths he feels that his presence caused.

• Van Richten isolates himself. He doesn't let people get close to him for fear that his curse will take them out.

• If Van Richten is traveling with the party, he has excellent odds of surviving--if someone is going to die in the party, it'll be someone other than him.

• Van Richten's curse should have a tangible impact if he’s traveling with the party: he is a doombringer of the highest order. His mere presence among the party should invite tragedy and disaster.

The Tragedy of Ezmerelda and Van Richten. In the backstory that created Ezmerelda d’Avenir (Appendix D: Monsters and NPCs pages 230-231), there's a tragedy in there: Van Richten's curse could have been lifted years ago.

By Ravenloft Lore, the strongest of curses laid down by a Vistani can only be lifted by the Vistani who placed it, or a blood relative of that Vistani. Van Richten's curse was a Death Curse laid on him by Ezmerelda's mother. Only Ezmerelda has the ability to revoke the curse. But here's the problem... Ezmerelda is Vistani...by nature; they are secretive about their abilities. Beyond that, Van Richten doesn't trust Vistani and likely commanded Ezmerelda to not use her Vistani abilities in his presence. As a result, Van Richten doesn't know how Vistani curses work--he doesn't know that they can be revoked by a blood relative of the one who laid it. He's a Cleric, he has undoubtedly tried remove curse on himself and it failed. As far as he knows, the curse is permanent. Van Richten is also secretive and, as mentioned, doesn't trust the Vistani. He kept Ezmerelda at arm's length as best he could both because he couldn't trust her, but also to try to protect her from the curse...and even if he was aware of the curse when they traveled together, he never told her about it.

If either one of them had been less secretive, more open, his curse would have been revoked a long time ago.

If the players want to help Van Richten break the curse, here's the backstory:

The story of Ezmerelda and Van Richten's history was written in the Van Richten's Journal (Appendix F: Handouts pages 254-255). It involves him destroying Ezmerelda's caravan while she was very, very young. She survived the undead assault and later got picked up by another caravan of Vistani (it was actually the Zarovan tribe--Madam Eva's caravan). She originally wanted revenge on Van Richten, but time with Eva (and the presence of the most powerful Vistani of them all) showed her the tragedy of what had happened from an outside perspective. Ezmerelda realized that the whole thing was a horrible tragedy and wrongs had been committed on both sides. She, thus, set out to try to find Van Richten and try to make things right...though Eva never told her about the curse her mother had laid on Van Richten.

Van Richten and Ezmerelda must travel to the place the curse was first laid...a small clearing in the forests of Barovia where the ruins of Ezmerelda's caravan still lie. Both must verbally acknowledge the wrong that had been done and verbally forgive one another for it...then the remains of Ezmerelda's caravan must be burned.

THE DISGUISE:

Van Richten got the idea for “Rictavio” from his exposure to Ezmerelda and her occasional methods for blending in when going somewhere that didn't like Vistani. In short: "Sometimes the best disguise is being the most obvious thing in the room." As mentioned above, Ezmerelda has never encountered the Rictavio disguise and Van Richten isn't familiar with any of the disguises Ezmerelda is currently using.

It is a rather perfect disguise. Van Richten is known as a grim and serious individual, a dour old man who roves the world slaying monsters. “Rictavio” is a flamboyant fop who tells ludicrous stories, commits crimes against music, and is constantly trying to recruit people to his Circus of Wonders. He should be portrayed as extremely over the top and completely harmless. It should be very jarring to your players if he drops the act and reveals who he truly is. Furthermore, Rictavio knows that even if someone suspects he's hiding something, they are extremely unlikely to guess the truth. If a player rolls well on Insight against him and figures out he's full of crap, that only tells them that he's lying about something...not what he is lying about. And his response is to just carry on and ignore accusations. Sure, the PCs may figure out that he's full of it (his stories are obvious fabrications) but he just carries right along, sticking to his guns even though the players know it’s a load of BS.

The players should have a hard time to get a serious read on Rictavio's personality. He strikes them as so straight forward--a carnie who is spinning tall tales for amusement. So they shouldn’t suspect that he's any more than what he appears to be.

A HARD MAN TO PIN DOWN:

Van Richten is a man with a plan for killing Strahd Von Zarovich, and it's a plan that plays well to his aged capabilities: "wait til Strahd takes a long nap, then stake him in his sleep." Of anyone in the valley, Van Richten knows how deadly Strahd is. He has fought elder vampires before and Strahd is the greatest of them all. He may very well believe that trying to fight him head on is pure folly, but he’s the one most capable of doing so.

It's important to note: Most of the "Destined Allies" the party can draw from Madame Eva’s Tarokka card reading have notes about how the PCs can get that individual to join them. Van Richten has no such notes. Instead, it says this...

Van Richten works alone. [...] Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure.

Van Richten is aware of Madame Eva but (unlike many others in the valley) he won't immediately cave to her prophecies, drop everything he has been working on, and throw his lot in with the PCs. Here are a few important things to keep in mind if the party is trying to recruit him...

• Van Richten is quite certain that if he drops his disguise, Strahd will find him and set out to kill him. (This is one of Strahd's Primary Goals as listed in Chapter 1)

• Van Richten's disguise is magically augmented. As long as the party can't get his hat off, they cannot prove that he’s not a carnie ringmaster

• Van Richten's disguise is only useful against Strahd as long as no one knows who he really is. The ring of mind shielding only works on him...it doesn't work on the PCs. He knows that if anyone else finds out, Strahd can charm them, read their mind or otherwise extract that information from them.

• Van Richten is fully aware of his curse. He will avoid physically joining up with the party for fear that he will get them all killed.

• Van Richten does not talk about his curse. He knows well the bravery of adventurers and that telling them about his curse tends to result in responses like "Oh, you don't need to worry about us, we're strong!" followed shortly by ":dying noises:." Rebuffing their advances without mentioning the curse is much more effective at getting them to stay away from him so his curse doesn't kill them.

• Even if Van Richten consents to offer them aid, it should be indirect as much as possible. He has his plan, he's set in his ways, and he’s not going to go gallivanting off with a bunch of young adventurers. And, he should stay in character as much as possible...blowing his cover will only bring Strahd down on him AND the PCs.

Ideally, even if the party can convince him to help...his help should primarily take the form of a surprisingly knowledgeable carnival ringmaster who is "certainly not going to go out and fight monsters with you. I'm a ringmaster, not an adventurer!"

He may lend the party his carnival wagon to travel around in (once he finds somewhere else to stash his saber-toothed tiger that has been trained to hunt Vistani, or he may lend them the tiger), give them helpful advice--possibly using ravens to stay in touch over long-distance if the PCs make friends with the Keepers of the Feather, and provide the sort of support that a Carnie could offer. But, it should take rather extreme circumstances for him to actually be honest with the PCs...and they may have to do something about his curse before he'll actually travel with them.

GETTING HIM TO JOIN UP:

Van Richten wants to stay under cover...so how does the party get him to change his mind?

Easy: Ruin his plan.

If Van Richten's cover is blown, his plan is a wash. The whole plan depends on his identity staying a secret until Strahd goes into hibernation. If Strahd identifies Van Richten before then, he will try to kill him and Van Richten is pretty sure he can't take Strahd in a straight-up fight. Thus...if Van Richten’s cover is blown, he is stuck with two bad choices: Either he tries to keep going it alone, possibly getting killed by Strahd, and fails his “final mission,” or he accepts the risk to the PCs and joins them to try to take Strahd down directly. A few example ways to blow his cover...

• Knock his hat off. A hat of disguise only works as long as it stays on your head, so if something happens that knocks his hat off; “Rictavio” is replaced by Van Richten.

• Let the Tyger Tyger event happen (chapter 5). When Rictavio flees to the Tower of Khazan, he's inside an antimagic field and cannot disguise himself.

• Even if Van Richten is distorting his voice, if the PCs have already befriended Ezmerelda, she may still recognize it...even if what she recognizes is the cadence his voice adopts when he's explaining something.

ABILITY LOADOUT:

Van Richten is a Cleric...and his listed prepared spells speaks more of a support caster than a monster hunter who has gone solo. But, because he's a Cleric, he can swap out his prepared spells at will to any other spells on the Cleric list. Here are a few notes on spells for him to use...

• Dawn creates sunlight. If he can lock a vampire down within the area of effect, they will be dust in short order.

• Dispel Evil and Good breaks a vampire's charm. However...things can't really leave Barovia, so the dismissal part of that spell won't be terribly effective here.

• Geas is useful when he needs to find something. For example, capture a werewolf then place a geas on it to lead them to the den.

• Lesser and Greater Restoration are enormously useful, as is remove curse.

• Guiding Bolt is a great weapon against Vampires. Shuts down their regeneration, and gives the next attack advantage.

• Hallow: If Van Richten can get his hands on the material components for this, he can create holy ground to help protect the PCs. Create a bubble of hallowed ground around the antimagic field that covers the Tower of Khazan....talk about a fortress. Sure, you'll have a bubble of non-hallowed ground where the antimagic field zone is...but the territory around the tower itself will be holy ground.

• Given his skill at predicting his foes...dropping sanctuary on a creature they are about to attack can completely trash their attempts.

• Spirit Guardians is another spell that is just....awesome.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Appearances==
===[[Campaign Setting]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[Ravenloft: Realm of Terror]]
**[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting (Box)]]

===[[Modules]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[The Nightmare Lands (Boxed Set)]] (referenced only)
**[[Chilling Tales]]
**[[Dungeon Magazine #55]]: [[The Sea Wolf]]
**[[Bleak House: The Death of Rudolph Van Richten]]
*[[4th Edition]]
**[[Strahd and Van Richten]] ([[Dragon magazine #416]], online)
*[[5th Edition]]
**[[Curse of Strahd]]
**[[Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft]]

===[[Novels]], stories===

*[[Tales of Ravenloft]]: [[The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]
*[[I, Strahd: The War Against Azalin]]

==Authored:==

* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Witches (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Witches]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Demons]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]]''

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (5th Edition)

2022-02-17T18:56:09Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* Game Statistics */

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Article)

2022-02-17T18:55:17Z

Blade Runner Rock: Replaced content with " ==Appearances== ===Campaign Setting=== *2nd Edition **Ravenloft: Realm of Terror **Ravenloft Campaign Setting (Box) ===Modules=== *2nd Edition..."

==Appearances==
===[[Campaign Setting]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[Ravenloft: Realm of Terror]]
**[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting (Box)]]

===[[Modules]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[The Nightmare Lands (Boxed Set)]] (referenced only)
**[[Chilling Tales]]
**[[Dungeon Magazine #55]]: [[The Sea Wolf]]
**[[Bleak House: The Death of Rudolph Van Richten]]
*[[4th Edition]]
**[[Strahd and Van Richten]] ([[Dragon magazine #416]], online)
*[[5th Edition]]
**[[Curse of Strahd]]
**[[Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft]]

===[[Novels]], stories===

*[[Tales of Ravenloft]]: [[The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]
*[[I, Strahd: The War Against Azalin]]

==Authored:==

* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Witches (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Witches]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Demons]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]]''

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Article)

2022-02-04T13:35:39Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* Modules */

DR. RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN

Medium humanoid (human), Lawful Good

Armor Class: 17 (half plate of flowing sanctity)

Hit Points: 77 (14d8 +14)

Speed: 30 ft.

Strength: 9 (-1)

Dexterity: 13 (+1)

Constitution: 13 (+1)

Intelligence: 17 (+3)

Wisdom: 18 (+4)

Charisma: 16 (+3)

Saving Throws: Con +5, Wis +8, Cha +7

Skills: Arcana +7, Deception +7, Insight +12,
Investigation +7, Medicine +8, Perception +12,
Religion +6, Sleight of Hand +4

Condition Immunities: charmed

Senses: darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 22

Languages: Abyssal, Celestial, Common, Draconic, Dwarvish, Elvish, Gundarak, Infernal, Sylvan

Challenge: 9 (5,000 XP)

SPECIAL EQUIPMENT:

In addition to his +1 sword cane and light crossbow, Van Richten wears a hat of disguise, goggles of night, and a ring of mind shielding, and he carries a spell scroll of raise dead.

Half Plate of Flowing Sanctity +1 mithril half plate. Once a day, a flask of water placed in the belt of armor becomes holy water.

ACTIONS:

Spellcasting: Van Richter is a 9th level Cleric of Helm, 1st level Wizard. His spellcasting ability is Wisdom (save DC 15, +7 to hit with spell attacks). Van Richten has the following Cleric and Wizard spells prepared:

Cantrips (at will): light, mage hand, mending, minor illusion, prestidigitation, sacred flame, thaumaturgy, toll the dead

1st level (4 slots): alarm, bless, cure wounds, detect evil and good, feather fall, find familiar, healing word, identify, protection from evil and good, shield, sleep

2nd level (3 slots): augury, beacon of hope, lesser restoration, protection from poison, silence, spiritual weapon warding bond, zone of truth

3rd level (3 slots): glyph of warding, magic circle, mass healing word, revivify, speak with dead, spirit guardians

4th level (3 slots): death ward, freedom of movement

5th level (3 slots): dawn, greater restoration, mass cure wounds, raise dead

Skulker: Van Richten can hide when he is lightly obscured from the creature from which he is hiding. When he’s hidden from a creature and misses it with a ranged weapon attack, making the attack doesn’t reveal his position. Dim light doesn’t impose disadvantage on his Wisdom (Perception) checks relying on sight.

Undead Slayer: When Van Richten hits an undead with a weapon attack, the undead takes an extra 10 (3d6) damage of weapon’s type.

Cunning Action: Van Richten can use a bonus action to take the Dash, Disengage or Hide action.

Sneak Attack: When Van Richten surprises a target, has advantage on an attack roll, or an enemy is within 5 ft. of the target, Van Richten deals and extra 7 damage.

Assassin Proficiencies: Van Richten is proficient with Disguise and Poisoner’s Kits.

Assassinate: When Van Richten hits a surprised enemy, it’s automatically a critical hit. When he attacks an enemy that hasn’t yet had a turn, he gains advantage on the attack.

Channel Divinity: Turn Undead: Undead within 30 ft. of Van Richten must make a Wisdom saving throw. If the creature fails its saving throw, they are turned for 1 minute or until they take damage. A turned creature must spend its turns trying to move as far away from him as it can, and it can’t willingly move to a space within 30 ft. of him. It also can’t take reactions. For its action, it can use only the Dash action or try to escape from an effect that prevents it from moving. If there’s nowhere to move, the creature can use the Dodge action. Undead with CR 1 or less are automatically destroyed on a failed save.

Preserve Life: As an action, Van Richten can distribute 45 hit points. This feature can restore a creature to no more than half of its hit point maximum and has no effect on an undead or construct.

Multiattack: Van Richten makes two attacks with his sword cane or light crossbow.

Sword Cane: Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 6 (1d6 +2) bludgeon damage (wooden cane) or piercing damage (silvered sword).

Light Crossbow: Ranged Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, range 80/320 ft., one target. Hit: 7 (1d8 +2) piercing damage.

Healer: As an action, Van Richten can spend one use of a Healer’s Kit to tend to a creature and restore 1d6 +4 hit points to it, plus additional hit points equal to the creature’s maximum number of Hit Dice. The creature can’t regain hit points from this feat again until it finishes a short or long rest.

REACTIONS:

Final Ward: Van Richten has a permanent glyph of warding tattooed on his neck that activates when he’s bitten there and chooses to say “Erasmus, I’m coming home” in Celestial. All targets in a 20 ft. radius must make a Dexterity saving throw or take 5d8 +5 radiant damage on a failed save or half as much (rounded up) on a successful one. Van Richten automatically fails the save and is disintegrated along with all of the items on his person.

RICTAVIO:

Several months ago a colorfully dressed half-elf bard came to Barovia in a carnival wagon, with a pet monkey on his shoulder. He took over an abandoned tower on Lake Baratok before rolling into town of Vallaki several months later. Claiming to be a carnival ringmaster in search of new actors, he began regaling locals with tales of distant lands.

MONSTER HUNTER:

The half-elf ringmaster is, in fact, the legendary human monster hunter named Rudolph Van Richten. Van Richten’s tale is a sad one. A scholar and doctor from a land called Darkon, he married his childhood sweetheart, Ingrid and together they had a son, Erasmus. When he was fourteen, Erasmus was stolen away by Vistani and sold to a vampire named Baron Metus to be used as a companion. By the time Van Richten found his son, it was too late: the Baron had already transformed Erasmus into a vampire spawn. Erasmus begged his father to end his suffering, which Van Richten did by pounding a wooden stake through his son’s chest. Baron Metus avenged that death by killing Van Richten’s wife, and Van Richten has lived with the horror of his family’s destruction ever since. After destroying Baron Metus in turn, Van Richten sought revenge against the Vistani and took up a life of hunting evil monsters.

THE WAITING GAME:

Van Richten isn’t a young man anymore. He knows his road is coming to an end, but his work isn’t done. He has come to Barovia to kill Strahd Von Zarovich, the greatest vampire of them all. Van Richten has studied Strahd for years and knows he can’t hope to best the vampire in a straight-up confrontation: he must wait for the right moment to strike. He has good evidence to suggest that Strahd periodically hibernates in his coffin, sometimes for years, when all is quite in the realm. While he bides his time, Van Richten hides in plain sight with the aid of a hat of disguise, his thoughts protected by a ring of mind shielding. He is trying to learn more about the Keepers of the Feather—a society of wereravens that oppose Strahd—while trying not to expose the secret society to their mutual enemy. He thinks the wereravens might prove helpful when the time comes. Van Richten also wants to take out as many of Strahd’s spies as he can, starting with the Vistani.

MAN WITH A PLAN:

Van Richten doesn’t know that his former protégé, a good-aligned Vistani named Ezmerelda d’Avenir, has come to Barovia looking for him. He taught her many of his monster-hunting techniques, but she doesn’t know all of his tricks and disguises. So far, their paths haven’t crossed. In the event that Van Richten becomes aware of Ezmerelda’s presence, he does his utmost to protect her without putting his own plans in jeopardy. If he can manipulate a party of adventurers into keeping an eye on her, he will do so.

VAN RICHTEN WORKS ALONE:

A curse placed on him long ago by a Vistani seer brings doom to those he befriends (see ‘Role Playing Notes’ for details). Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure. Consequently, if he thinks he’s in danger of being unmasked, he retreats to the Tower of Khazan (chapter 11) or some other quiet corner of Strahd’s domain to plan further.

TRAITS:

Ideal. “Evil cannot go unchallenged.”

Bond. “To protect those I love, I must keep them distant and hidden from my enemies.”

Flaw. “I am cursed. Thus, I will never have peace.”

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

A CURSED MAN:

Van Richten suffers a curse bestowed on him by a Vistani:

Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws.

Its effect on him can best be summarized with this statement: "Van Richten Dies Last." This curse is both a boon and a bane to him. The curse is a large part of why he has lived so long--how he has accumulated so much experience and expertise. He is cursed to always see his friends and allies die--which means he has to live long enough to see it happen.

For a long time, he was unaware of the exact nature of the curse on him, but he is apparently aware of it now.

• Van Richten feels guilty. For decades he fought alongside others with monsters, completely unaware that he was a doombringer among them. Now that he knows, he is burdened by all the deaths he feels that his presence caused.

• Van Richten isolates himself. He doesn't let people get close to him for fear that his curse will take them out.

• If Van Richten is traveling with the party, he has excellent odds of surviving--if someone is going to die in the party, it'll be someone other than him.

• Van Richten's curse should have a tangible impact if he’s traveling with the party: he is a doombringer of the highest order. His mere presence among the party should invite tragedy and disaster.

The Tragedy of Ezmerelda and Van Richten. In the backstory that created Ezmerelda d’Avenir (Appendix D: Monsters and NPCs pages 230-231), there's a tragedy in there: Van Richten's curse could have been lifted years ago.

By Ravenloft Lore, the strongest of curses laid down by a Vistani can only be lifted by the Vistani who placed it, or a blood relative of that Vistani. Van Richten's curse was a Death Curse laid on him by Ezmerelda's mother. Only Ezmerelda has the ability to revoke the curse. But here's the problem...
Ezmerelda is Vistani...by nature; they are secretive about their abilities. Beyond that, Van Richten doesn't trust Vistani and likely commanded Ezmerelda to not use her Vistani abilities in his presence. As a result, Van Richten doesn't know how Vistani curses work--he doesn't know that they can be revoked by a blood relative of the one who laid it. He's a Cleric, he has undoubtedly tried remove curse on himself and it failed. As far as he knows, the curse is permanent.
Van Richten is also secretive and, as mentioned, doesn't trust the Vistani. He kept Ezmerelda at arm's length as best he could both because he couldn't trust her, but also to try to protect her from the curse...and even if he was aware of the curse when they traveled together, he never told her about it.

If either one of them had been less secretive, more open, his curse would have been revoked a long time ago.

If the players want to help Van Richten break the curse, here's the backstory:

The story of Ezmerelda and Van Richten's history was written in the Van Richten's Journal (Appendix F: Handouts pages 254-255). It involves him destroying Ezmerelda's caravan while she was very, very young. She survived the undead assault and later got picked up by another caravan of Vistani (it was actually the Zarovan tribe--Madam Eva's caravan). She originally wanted revenge on Van Richten, but time with Eva (and the presence of the most powerful Vistani of them all) showed her the tragedy of what had happened from an outside perspective. Ezmerelda realized that the whole thing was a horrible tragedy and wrongs had been committed on both sides. She, thus, set out to try to find Van Richten and try to make things right...though Eva never told her about the curse her mother had laid on Van Richten.

Van Richten and Ezmerelda must travel to the place the curse was first laid...a small clearing in the forests of Barovia where the ruins of Ezmerelda's caravan still lie. Both must verbally acknowledge the wrong that had been done and verbally forgive one another for it...then the remains of Ezmerelda's caravan must be burned.

THE DISGUISE:

Van Richten got the idea for “Rictavio” from his exposure to Ezmerelda and her occasional methods for blending in when going somewhere that didn't like Vistani. In short: "Sometimes the best disguise is being the most obvious thing in the room." As mentioned above, Ezmerelda has never encountered the Rictavio disguise and Van Richten isn't familiar with any of the disguises Ezmerelda is currently using.

It is a rather perfect disguise. Van Richten is known as a grim and serious individual, a dour old man who roves the world slaying monsters. “Rictavio” is a flamboyant fop who tells ludicrous stories, commits crimes against music, and is constantly trying to recruit people to his Circus of Wonders. He should be portrayed as extremely over the top and completely harmless. It should be very jarring to your players if he drops the act and reveals who he truly is.
Furthermore, Rictavio knows that even if someone suspects he's hiding something, they are extremely unlikely to guess the truth. If a player rolls well on Insight against him and figures out he's full of crap, that only tells them that he's lying about something...not what he is lying about. And his response is to just carry on and ignore accusations. Sure, the PCs may figure out that he's full of it (his stories are obvious fabrications) but he just carries right along, sticking to his guns even though the players know it’s a load of BS.

The players should have a hard time to get a serious read on Rictavio's personality. He strikes them as so straight forward--a carnie who is spinning tall tales for amusement. So they shouldn’t suspect that he's any more than what he appears to be.

A HARD MAN TO PIN DOWN:

Van Richten is a man with a plan for killing Strahd Von Zarovich, and it's a plan that plays well to his aged capabilities: "wait til Strahd takes a long nap, then stake him in his sleep." Of anyone in the valley, Van Richten knows how deadly Strahd is. He has fought elder vampires before and Strahd is the greatest of them all. He may very well believe that trying to fight him head on is pure folly, but he’s the one most capable of doing so.

It's important to note: Most of the "Destined Allies" the party can draw from Madame Eva’s Tarokka card reading have notes about how the PCs can get that individual to join them. Van Richten has no such notes. Instead, it says this...

Van Richten works alone. [...] Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure.

Van Richten is aware of Madame Eva but (unlike many others in the valley) he won't immediately cave to her prophecies, drop everything he has been working on, and throw his lot in with the PCs. Here are a few important things to keep in mind if the party is trying to recruit him...

• Van Richten is quite certain that if he drops his disguise, Strahd will find him and set out to kill him. (This is one of Strahd's Primary Goals as listed in Chapter 1)

• Van Richten's disguise is magically augmented. As long as the party can't get his hat off, they cannot prove that he’s not a carnie ringmaster

• Van Richten's disguise is only useful against Strahd as long as no one knows who he really is. The ring of mind shielding only works on him...it doesn't work on the PCs. He knows that if anyone else finds out, Strahd can charm them, read their mind or otherwise extract that information from them.

• Van Richten is fully aware of his curse. He will avoid physically joining up with the party for fear that he will get them all killed.

• Van Richten does not talk about his curse. He knows well the bravery of adventurers and that telling them about his curse tends to result in responses like "Oh, you don't need to worry about us, we're strong!" followed shortly by ":dying noises:." Rebuffing their advances without mentioning the curse is much more effective at getting them to stay away from him so his curse doesn't kill them.

• Even if Van Richten consents to offer them aid, it should be indirect as much as possible. He has his plan, he's set in his ways, and he’s not going to go gallivanting off with a bunch of young adventurers. And, he should stay in character as much as possible...blowing his cover will only bring Strahd down on him AND the PCs.

Ideally, even if the party can convince him to help...his help should primarily take the form of a surprisingly knowledgeable carnival ringmaster who is "certainly not going to go out and fight monsters with you. I'm a ringmaster, not an adventurer!"

He may lend the party his carnival wagon to travel around in (once he finds somewhere else to stash his saber-toothed tiger that has been trained to hunt Vistani, or he may lend them the tiger), give them helpful advice--possibly using ravens to stay in touch over long-distance if the PCs make friends with the Keepers of the Feather, and provide the sort of support that a Carnie could offer. But, it should take rather extreme circumstances for him to actually be honest with the PCs...and they may have to do something about his curse before he'll actually travel with them.

GETTING HIM TO JOIN UP:

Van Richten wants to stay under cover...so how does the party get him to change his mind?

Easy: Ruin his plan.

If Van Richten's cover is blown, his plan is a wash. The whole plan depends on his identity staying a secret until Strahd goes into hibernation. If Strahd identifies Van Richten before then, he will try to kill him and Van Richten is pretty sure he can't take Strahd in a straight-up fight. Thus...if Van Richten’s cover is blown, he is stuck with two bad choices: Either he tries to keep going it alone, possibly getting killed by Strahd, and fails his “final mission,” or he accepts the risk to the PCs and joins them to try to take Strahd down directly. A few example ways to blow his cover...

• Knock his hat off. A hat of disguise only works as long as it stays on your head, so if something happens that knocks his hat off; “Rictavio” is replaced by Van Richten.

• Let the Tyger Tyger event happen (chapter 5). When Rictavio flees to the Tower of Khazan, he's inside an antimagic field and cannot disguise himself.

• Even if Van Richten is distorting his voice, if the PCs have already befriended Ezmerelda, she may still recognize it...even if what she recognizes is the cadence his voice adopts when he's explaining something.

ABILITY LOADOUT:

Van Richten is a Cleric...and his listed prepared spells speaks more of a support caster than a monster hunter who has gone solo. But, because he's a Cleric, he can swap out his prepared spells at will to any other spells on the Cleric list. Here are a few notes on spells for him to use...

• Dawn creates sunlight. If he can lock a vampire down within the area of effect, they will be dust in short order.

• Dispel Evil and Good breaks a vampire's charm. However...things can't really leave Barovia, so the dismissal part of that spell won't be terribly effective here.

• Geas is useful when he needs to find something. For example, capture a werewolf then place a geas on it to lead them to the den.

• Lesser and Greater Restoration are enormously useful, as is remove curse.

• Guiding Bolt is a great weapon against Vampires. Shuts down their regeneration, and gives the next attack advantage.

• Hallow: If Van Richten can get his hands on the material components for this, he can create holy ground to help protect the PCs. Create a bubble of hallowed ground around the antimagic field that covers the Tower of Khazan....talk about a fortress. Sure, you'll have a bubble of non-hallowed ground where the antimagic field zone is...but the territory around the tower itself will be holy ground.

• Given his skill at predicting his foes...dropping sanctuary on a creature they are about to attack can completely trash their attempts.

• Spirit Guardians is another spell that is just....awesome.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Appearances==
===[[Campaign Setting]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[Ravenloft: Realm of Terror]]
**[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting (Box)]]

===[[Modules]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[The Nightmare Lands (Boxed Set)]] (referenced only)
**[[Chilling Tales]]
**[[Dungeon Magazine #55]]: [[The Sea Wolf]]
**[[Bleak House: The Death of Rudolph Van Richten]]
*[[4th Edition]]
**[[Strahd and Van Richten]] ([[Dragon magazine #416]], online)
*[[5th Edition]]
**[[Curse of Strahd]]
**[[Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft]]

===[[Novels]], stories===

*[[Tales of Ravenloft]]: [[The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]
*[[I, Strahd: The War Against Azalin]]

==Authored:==

* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Witches (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Witches]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Demons]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]]''

Count Strahd von Zarovich

2022-02-04T13:34:47Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* Modules */

[[File:Strahd_by_Talon.jpg|thumb|alt=Strahd von Zarovich, by Talon Dunning|Strahd von Zarovich, by Talon Dunning]]
{{canon}}
[[Count Strahd von Zarovich]] is the [[Vampire]] [[darklord]] of [[Barovia]].<ref name="DoD p.61">[[Domains of Dread]] p.61</ref><ref name="Gaz I p.150">[[Gazetteer I]] p.150</ref> He rules the land publicly from [[Castle Ravenloft]] as Strahd XI, supposedly a descendant of Strahd I, but actually the same man.<ref name="Gazetteer I p.28">[[Gazetteer I]] p.28</ref> Strahd murdered his younger brother [[Sergei von Zarovich]] on his wedding day in an attempt to claim Sergi's bride, [[Tatyana Federovna]]. This is the final act that caused him to become the first known [[darklord]]. Tatyana rejected his love and jumped to her death from the walls of [[Castle Ravenloft]].<ref name="DoD p.14-15">[[Domains of Dread]] p.14-15</ref><ref name="R3e p.4, 12">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.4, 12</ref><ref name="RPHB p.4, 14">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.4, 14</ref> Strahd is now [[cursed]] to hunt and lose the reincarnations of Tatyana.<ref name="DoD p.62">[[Domains of Dread]] p.62</ref><ref name="Gaz I p.151">[[Gazetteer I]] p.151</ref>

Strahd was nobly born to [[Count Barov von Zarovich|Barov von Zarovich]] and [[Countess Ravenia von Zarovich|Ravenia van Roeyen]]<ref name="Gaz I p. 17">[[Gaz 1]], p 17.</ref> in [[Prime Material Barovia]] in [[299 BC]].<ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref><ref name="R3e p.12">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.12</ref><ref name="RPHB p.14">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.14</ref> He was the older brother of [[Sergei]] and [[Sturm]].

Strahd spent the first few decades of his adult life in his war with the [[Terg]]s that had invaded and occupied Barovia. In perhaps the most critical moment in his war against the [[foreigner|foreign]] [[invader]]s, Strahd [[called]] the fiend [[Inajira]] in the hope of securing victory at the cost of his soul.<ref name="Gazetteer I p. 142>[[Gazetteer I]] p.142</ref> Strahd largely managed to escape the [[arcanaloth]]'s foul contract with the contract he made with Death that gave him eternal life, or [[undead|unlife]] as the case may be. However, Strahd merely traded one form of damnation for another, as this horrible pact ultimately led to Strahd becoming an all but [[immortal]] [[darklord]].<ref name="DoD p.14-15">[[Domains of Dread]] p.14-15</ref><ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref><ref name="R3e p.4, 12">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.4, 12</ref><ref name="RPHB p.4, 14">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.4, 14</ref>

Throughout his long history as darklord of Barovia, Strahd has come into conflict with many who would challenge his dominance. For example, his great niece, [[Lyssa von Zarovich]], transformed herself into a [[vampire]] to challenge his rule. She also conspired with [[the High Master Illithid]] to generate a race of [[illithid vampire]]s to depose Strahd, but the plan failed.<ref name="Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I p. 34">[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]] p.34</ref><ref>[[Thoughts of Darkness]]</ref> With the help of [[Emil Bollenbach]], Strahd [[poisoned]] Lyssa as punishment for her plotting against him, causing her to fall into a debilitating slumber.<ref name="CotN:V p.21-26">[[Children of the Night: Vampires]] p.21-26</ref>

==Errata==

* Pg. 150

:Stygian Inquirer: Strahd's ranged and melee attacks are wrong. He has a higher ranged than melee attack, but his Strength is greater than his Dexterity and he wields a magic weapon too. I have done the math the the attacks should look like this:

::Atk +20 melee (1d6+8 and energy drain, slam) or +25/+20/+15 melee (1d10+14, +4 bastard sword) or +19/+14/+9 ranged (1d8+6, +2 mighty composite longbow); I got these number via the following. The BAB for a Ftr 4/Nec 16 is 12/7/2. For the melee attack, you add +8 for STR mod, +4 for the bastard sword and +1 for weapon focus (bastard sword). For the ranged attack, you add +5 for DEX mod and +2 for the bow.

:Also the 3.5 DR would be 25/[[Silver Weapon|silver]] and [[Magic Weapon|magic]] as per the RL:PHB entry per an [[Ancient Vampire]] .

==Strahd's Allies==
* (In [[Curse of Strahd]]) [[Baba Lysaga]] (Unacknowledged by Strahd)
* [[Beucephalus]] ([[Mount]])
* (In [[Curse of Strahd]]) The [[berserker]]s and [[druid]]s of [[Yester Hill]]
* (In [[Curse of Strahd]]) The [[Children of Mother Night]]
* [[Wachter Family]]
* [[Zarovan Tribe]]
**[[Madame Eva]]

==Strahd's Creations==
During his time in [[the Mists]], Strahd has developed a number of distinct creations, particularly in the areas of [[spell]]s and [[undead]] unique to him.
*[[Book]]s written by Strahd
**[[The Tome of Strahd]]
* {{netbook-small}}[[Ring of Mortal Mimicry]]
*Spells
**[[Augment Undead]]
**[[Ground Fog]]
**[[Misty Summons]]
**[[Neverending Nightmare]]
**[[Strahd's Baneful Attractor]]
**[[Strahd's Frightful Joining]]
**[[Strahd's Malefic Meld]]
**[[Soul Anchor]]
**[[Suppress Lycanthropy]]
*[[Spider Hound]]
*[[Strahd Undead]]
**[[Strahd Skeleton]]
**[[Strahd's Skeletal Steed]]
**[[Strahd Zombie]]

==[[:category:Foe of Count Strahd von Zarovich|Strahd's Enemies]]==
*[[Ardonk Szerieza]] and other [[Gundarakite Rebel|Gundarakite rebel]]s<ref name="Gaz I p.19">[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]] p.19</ref>
*[[Azalin Rex]]<ref name=Rootevil>[[Roots of Evil]]</ref><ref name="RL3E p.130">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.130></ref><ref name="RLPHB p.132">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.132</ref>
*[[The Dawnslayers]]<ref>[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]] p.24</ref>
*[[Duke Nharov Gundar]]<ref name="Gaz I p.19">[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]] p.19</ref>
*[[Dr. Rudolph Van Richten]]
*[[Inajira]]<ref name=Rootevil>[[Roots of Evil]]</ref><ref>[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]] p.142</ref>
*[[The Keepers of the Black Feather]]<ref>[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]] p.38</ref>
*[[Lord Leo Dilisnya]]<ref name="Gaz I p.13">[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]] p.13</ref>
*[[Lord Soth]]<ref>[[Knight of the Black Rose]]</ref>
*[[Lyssa von Zarovich]]<ref>[[Children of the Night: Vampires]] p.20-26</ref><ref>[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]] p.34</ref>
*[[Zartin the Red]]<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]]</ref>

==Statistics==
[[Fighter]] 4 / [[Necromancer]] 16, [[Chaotic Evil]]<ref name="Gaz I p.150">[[Gazetteer I]] p.150</ref>

==Chronology==
* [[299 BC]] Strahd is born.<ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref><ref name="R3e p.12">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.12</ref><ref name="RPHB p.14">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.14</ref>
* [[320 BC]] Strahd gains the military rank of [[general]].<ref name="R3e p.12">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.12</ref><ref name="RPHB p.14">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.14</ref>
* [[320 BC]] [[Terg|Tergs]] invade [[Barovia]].<ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref><ref name="Gaz I p. 17">[[Gaz 1]], p 17.</ref>
* [[326 BC]] The [[Siege of Krezk]] occurs.<ref name="Gaz I p. 17">[[Gaz 1]], p 17.</ref>
* [[333 BC]] [[Tatyana]], the future lover of Sergei von Zarovich and target for Strahd von Zarovich's desire, is born.<ref name=RoTp.127>[[Realm of Terror]] p.127</ref>
* [[346 BC]] [[Count Barov von Zarovich|Count Barov]] and [[Countess Ravenia von Zarovich]] slain by [[Terg|Tergs]].<ref name="Gaz I p. 17">[[Gaz 1]], p 17.</ref>
* [[347 BC]][[Strahd]] makes a pact with [[Inajira]] right before a critical battle with the [[Tergs]].<ref name="Gazetteer I p. 142>[[Gazetteer I]] p.142</ref>
* [[347 BC]] Last of the [[Terg|Tergs]] driven from [[Barovia]].<ref name="Gaz I p. 17">[[Gaz 1]], p 17.</ref><ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref> Strahd takes the rule over Barovia as the prize for his victory.<ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref>
* [[349 BC]] [[Castle Ravenloft]] completed.<ref name="Gaz I p. 17">[[Gaz 1]], p 17.</ref> [[Strahd]] assumes [[residence]] there.<ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref>
* [[350 BC]] [[Count Strahd von Zarovich]], [[Commander Alek Gwilym]], [[Sergei von Zarovich]], and [[Lieutenant Falov]] lead a military strike force to defeat [[Red Lukas]] and his gang of [[bandit]]s.<ref name="I, Strahd p. 73-85">[[I, Strahd]] p.73-85</ref>
* [[350 BC]] The [[Ba'al Verzi]] try and fail to assassinate [[Count Strahd von Zarovich]].<ref name="Gaz I p. 17">[[Gaz 1]], p 17.</ref>
* [[351 BC]] [[Barovia]] forms due the actions of [[Strahd von Zarovich]].<ref>[[Gaz 1]], pp 10, 16.</ref><ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref><ref name="I, Strahd">[[I, Strahd]]</ref> [[Strahd]] turns into a [[vampire]].<ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref><ref name="I, Strahd">[[I, Strahd]]</ref>
* [[352 BC]] [[Strahd]] flexes his muscles to show domination over [[Barovia]].<ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref><ref name="I, Strahd">[[I, Strahd]]</ref>
* [[398 BC]] [[Count Strahd von Zarovich]] confronts [[Lord Leo Dilisnya]] at the [[Monastery of Silver Threads]], walking into Lord Dilisnya's trap. Strahd is almost put down, but the [[monk]]s of the [[monastery]] act to turn the tide of battle. Strahd turns Lord Leo Dilisnya into a [[vampire]] and [[Imprisoned|imprisons]] him in a [[The Tomb of Leo Dilisnya|tomb]] to starve from a lack of [[blood]].<ref name="Gaz I p.13">[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]] p.13</ref><ref name="I, Strahd">[[I, Strahd]]</ref>
* [[400 BC]] First known [[reincarnation]] of [[Tatyana]].<ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref><ref name="I, Strahd">[[I, Strahd]]</ref>
*According to a version of [[Strahd]]'s diary ready by [[van Richten]] in [[736 BC]], [[Alina]], the second [[:category:Reincarnation of Tatyana Federovna|reincarnation of Tatyana Federovna]] dies of [[fever]] in this year of 445 BC. [[Count Strahd]] attempts [[suicide]] with Alina in hand, but [[the Mists]] prevent him and snatch away her [[corpse]].<ref name="I, Strahd: The War Against Azalin">[[I, Strahd: The War Against Azalin]]</ref> However, this goes against a version of Strahd's diary read by [[Jander Sunstar]] that says Tatyana's second reincarnation was [[Olya Ivanova]] who died 30 years later in [[475 BC]]<ref>[[Vampire of the Mists]] p. 266-267</ref>
* Sometime between [[450 BC]] and [[460 BC]]: [[Gregorri Kolyan]] the [[bard]] is held captive by Strahd fo several years. Kolyan is ultimately let go with the story of Strahd's past.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]] p.6-9</ref><ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p.10-13</ref>
* [[470 BC]] The [[Vistani]] appear in [[Barovia]] for the first time.<ref name="Gaz I p. 17">[[Gaz 1]], p 17.</ref>
* [[470 BC]] [[Madame Eva and Strahd form an alliance]].<ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref>
* [[485 BC]] [[Petya]] and [[Anastasia Petrovich]] killed by [[Strahd]]<ref name="VotM">[[VotM]]</ref>
* [[499 BC]] [[Alexi "Sasha" Petrovich]], [[Leisl]], and [[Jander Sunstar]] assault [[Castle Ravenloft]] drive [[Strahd]] into hibernation.<ref name="VotM">[[VotM]]</ref>
* [[525 BC]] [[Lyssa von Zarovich]] is born.<ref name="Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I p. 34">[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]] p.34</ref>
* [[528 BC]] [[Outlander]] [[adventurer]]s assault [[Castle Ravenloft]] and are destroyed.<ref name="Gaz I p.18">[[Gazetteer I]] p.18</ref><ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref><ref>[[House of Strahd]]</ref>
* [[542 BC]] [[Azalin]] enters [[Ravenloft]] and arrives in [[Barovia]].<ref name="GazII p.135">[[Gazetteer II]] p.135</ref><ref>[[King of the Dead]]</ref><ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref> Reluctantly, he serves [[Strahd]] for a time.<ref name="King of the Dead">[[King of the Dead]]</ref><ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref>
* [[542 BC]] [[Strahd]] discusses the potential threat [[Azalin]] poses with [[Madame Ilka]], the new raunie of the [[Zarovan]] tribe ([[Maruschka]] having apparently died at some point in the last 40 years). <ref>[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]] - p71, pp109-117, pp167-171</ref>
</onlyinclude>
* [[547 BC]] [[Forlorn]] appears.<ref>[[Gazetteer I]] p.63</ref> Strahd sends Azalin to investigate, but nothing of value to them is found.<ref>[[Gazetteer I]] p.73-74</ref>
* [[550 BC]] [[Lyssa von Zarovich]] becomes a [[vampire]] and discovers a way to achieve the power of a vampire much greater than her age.<ref name="Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I p. 34">[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]] p.34</ref>
* [[579 BC]] [[Strahd]] and [[Azalin]] create a [[portal]] to [[Mordent]]<ref name="GazII p.135">[[Gazetteer II]] p.135</ref>, where [[The Alchemist]] conducts strange research on changing the soul.<ref>[[I10: Ravenloft II: The House on Gryphon Hill]]</ref> [[The Mists]] snatch up [[Mordent]] before either [[Strahd]] or [[Azalin]] can make good their escape, leaving them with only hazy dream-like recollections of what happened.<ref name="GazII p.135">[[Gazetteer II]] p.135</ref>
* [[579 BC]] [[Azalin]] leaves the service of [[Strahd]].<ref name="King of the Dead">[[King of the Dead]]</ref><ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref> [[Darkon]] forms.<ref name="Gazetteer II p. 9">[[Gazetteer II]] p.9</ref><ref name="King of the Dead">[[King of the Dead]]</ref><ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref>
* [[593 BC]] The domain of [[Gundarak]] appears.<ref name="Gaz I p.18">[[Gazetteer I]] p.18</ref><ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref>
* [[593 BC]] First known contact between [[Barovian]]s and [[Gundarakite]]s.<ref name="Gaz I p.18">[[Gazetteer I]] p.18</ref>
* [[613 BC]] (approximately) Strahd encounters [[Harkon Lukas]] running amok in Barovia and thoroughly thrashes him, forcing Harkon to flee into [[the Mists]].<ref>[[Domains of Dread]] p.16, 64</ref>
* [[718 BC]] [[Tara Kolyana]] is born. Not too long thereafter, her parents flee [[Barovia]] to go to [[Hazlan]].<ref name="Gazetteer I p. 144">[[Gazetteer I]] p.144</ref>
* [[735 BC]] [[Tara Kolyana]] experiences her first brush with the supernatural with an [[afflicted lycanthrope|afflicted]] [[werewolf]]. After witnessing the man become [[cured]], Tara resolves to help people throughout the [[Land of Mists]]. Her parents make her promise to never to go to [[Barovia]].<ref name="Gazetteer I p. 144">[[Gazetteer I]] p.144</ref>
* [[736 BC]] [[Duke Gundar]] is [[assassinated]].<ref name="Gaz I p.19">[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]] p.19</ref><ref name="DoD p.17">[[Domains of Dread]] p.17</ref>
* [[739 BC]] [[Lyssa von Zarovich]] conspires with [[Bluetspurean]] [[illithid]]s to create a [[illithid vampire|vampiric version of their race]]. She hopes to use these vampire mind flayers to take over [[Barovia]], but she ultimately fails.<ref name="Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I p. 34">[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]] p.34</ref><ref>[[Thoughts of Darkness]]</ref>
* [[740 BC]] '''[[The Great Upheaval]]'''.
* [[740 BC]] [[Strahd]] begins the annexation of [[Gundarak]].<ref name="Gaz I p.19">[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]] p.19</ref>
* [[750 BC]] [[Strahd]] poisons [[Lyssa von Zarovich]] into a slumbering state that leaves her active for only a few hours each night.<ref name="Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I p. 34">[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]] p.34</ref> The [[poison]] is delivered via the [[blood]] of the [[dread flesh golem]] [[Tom]] (created by [[Emil Bollenbach]]) that acts as a stand-in for a [[human]] she hoped to enslave.<ref name="CotN:V p.21-26">[[Children of the Night: Vampires]] p.21-26</ref>
* [[753 BC]]: On his deathbed, [[Tara Kolyana]]'s father expresses how proud he is of her and tells her of the [[:category:prophecy|prophecy]] the [[Vistani]] gave about her and why they left [[Barovia]].<ref name="Gazetteer I p. 144">[[Gazetteer I]] p.144</ref>
* [[753 BC]]: [[Count Strahd von Zarovich]] personally [[execution|executes]] [[Burgomaster Shaithis Vosrovna]] for goating [[adventurer]]s into the [[murder]] of one of the [[Vistani]]..<ref>[[Ravenloft Gazetteer I]], p35.</ref>

==TSR Collector Cards==
Strahd's [[TSR 1991 Collector Card]] numbers are 489 and 611. His [[TSR 1992 Collector Card]] numbers are 285 and 608.

==Appearances==

===[[Modules]]===
*[[1st Edition]]
**[[I6: Ravenloft]]
**[[I10: The House on Gryphon Hill]]
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[Thoughts of Darkness]] (referenced only)
**[[From the Shadows]] ([[time travel]] sequence)
**[[Roots of Evil]]
**[[House of Strahd]]
**Lyssa von Zarovich's module in [[Children of the Night: Vampires]]
**[[Farewell to the Flesh]] ([[RPGA]] module)
*[[3rd Edition]]
**[[Expedition to Castle Ravenloft]] (not in continuity with Ravenloft campaign setting)
*[[4th Edition]]
**[[Fair Barovia]] ([[Dungeon Magazine]], online)
**[[Strahd and Van Richten]] ([[Dragon magazine #416]], online)
*[[5th Edition]]
**[[Curse of Strahd]]

===[[Novel]]s, short stories, and other fiction===
*[[Master of Ravenloft]] ([[AD&D Adventure Gamebook]])
*[[Vampire of the Mists]]
*[[Knight of the Black Rose]]
*[[I, Strahd, The Memoirs of a Vampire]]
*[[Tales of Ravenloft]]: [[The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]] (referenced only), [[Tales of Ravenloft: Caretaker|Caretaker]]
*[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]]
*[[Interview of the Lost Boys in the Dark Shadows of Ravenloft]] ([[Dragon Magazine]], humor comic/non-canonical)
*[[For Every Vengeance There is an Equal and Opposite Revengeance]] ([[Dragon Magazine]], humor comic/non-canonical)

===Video and computer games===
*[[Strahd's Possession]] (later included in several compilations)
*[[Iron & Blood: Warriors of Ravenloft]]

==References==
<references />
[[category:Character]][[category:NPC]]
[[category:1st Edition Character]]
[[category:2nd Edition Character]]
[[category:3rd Edition Character]]
[[category:4th Edition Character]]
[[category:5th Edition Character]]
[[category:Amicicide]]
[[Category:Ancient Vampire]]
[[Category:Arcane Loremaster]]
[[category:Amicicide]]
[[Category:Artist]]
[[Category:Barovian (Prime Material Plane)]]
[[category:Betrayer]]
[[category:Challenge 15]]
[[Category:Chaotic Evil]]
[[category:Commander]]
[[Category:Count of Barovia]]
[[Category:Count]]
[[Category:Darklord]]
[[category:Darklord (Domain Lord Magnitude of Evil)]]
[[Category:Dancer]]
[[category:Delegator]]
[[Category:Demonologist]]
[[Category:Fiend Summoner]]
[[category:Fighter]]
[[category:Foe of Azalin Rex]]
[[category:Foe of Duke Gundar]]
[[category:Foe of Jander Sunstar]]
[[category:Foe of Malocchio Aderre]]
[[category:Foe of Lord Soth]]
[[category:Foe of Rudolph van Richten]]
[[category:Foe of the Wanderers]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Prime Material Barovia]]
[[Category:Fratricide]]
[[category:General]]
[[category:Hospiticide]]
[[Category:Human]]
[[category:Imprisoner]]
[[category:Inhabitants of Castle Ravenloft]]
[[Category:Inhabitants of Barovia]]
[[category:Inventor of a Spell]]
[[category:Killer]]
[[category:Leader]]
[[category:Mass Murderer]]
[[category:Military Leader]]
[[category:Military Officer]]
[[category:Multiclass Character]]
[[category:Murderer]]
[[Category:Musician]]
[[Category:Necromancer]]
[[category:Necrologist]]
[[Category:Noble of Barovia]]
[[category:Oppressor]]
[[Category:Orator]]
[[Category:Organist]]
[[Category:Pathfinder 1st Edition Character]]
[[Category:Performing Artist]]
[[category:Personality of Barovia]]
[[Category:Poisoner]]
[[category:Professional Killer]]
[[Category:Ravenloft Loremaster]]
[[Category:Ruler]]
[[category:Soldier]]
[[Category:Son]]
[[category:Specialist Wizard]]
[[category:Standard Vampire]]
[[Category:Storyteller]]
[[category:Suppressor]]
[[category:Tempted]]
[[category:Temporal Leader]]
[[category:Tempted]]
[[category:Traitor]]
[[Category:Transgressor]]
[[category:TSR Collector Card Character]]
[[Category:Undead]]
[[Category:Vampire]]
[[Category:Van Roeyen Family]]
[[category:Veteran]]
[[Category:Von Zarovich Family]]
[[Category:Wizard]]
[[Category:Writer]]
[[category:Births in 299 BC]]
[[category:Deaths in 351 BC]]

==Data from the Ravenloft Catalogue==



{|
|-valign="top"
|[[Image:rldb_npc.jpg]]
|[[Image:rldb_primary.gif]]
|
''[[Secrets of the Dread Realms]]'' 
''[[Domains of Dread]]'' 
''[[I, Strahd]]'' 
''[[House of Strahd]]'' 
''[[Ravenloft I6]]'' 
''[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]]'' 
''[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]]''
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_art.gif]]
|
''[[Secrets of the Dread Realms]]'' - p11 
''[[Domains of Dread]]'' - p61 
''[[House of Strahd]]'' - cover, pp1,5,25,60,63 
''[[The Ravenloft Campaign Setting]]'' - box cover 
''[[The Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p9,p98 
''[[Roots of Evil]]'' - front cover, p7,69,72,93,95 [http://web.archive.org/web/20100329193632/http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/dnd/downloads Download Now! ] 
''[[Forbidden Lore: Nova Arcanum]]'' - p3, front cover 
''[[Vampire of the Mists]]'' - front cover 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - p117, front cover, reference cards 
''[[TSR JAM 1999]]'' - front cover 
''[[Ravenloft I6]]'' - cover, pp3,15 
''[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]]'' - p151 
''[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]]'' - cover
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_stats.gif]]
|
''[[Secrets of the Dread Realms]]'' - pp10-12 
''[[Domains of Dread]]'' - pp61-62 
''[[House of Strahd]]'' - pp4-5 
''[[The Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - pp97-101 
''[[Roots of Evil]]'' - p6 [http://web.archive.org/web/20100329193632/http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/dnd/downloads Download Now! ] 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp116-119 
''[[Ravenloft I6]]'' - p3 
''[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]]'' - pp150-152
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_desc.gif]]
|
''[[Secrets of the Dread Realms]]'' - pp7,10-12,18-19,27,31,114 
''[[Ravenloft Third Edition]]'' - p4,12-13,17,114,124 
''[[Domains of Dread]]'' - pp61-62 
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - pp10-13,17,43,82 
''[[I, Strahd ]]''-throughout 
''[[House of Strahd]]'' - throughout 
''[[The Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - pp7-10, pp97-101 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]'' - pp6-9,13,46,77 
''[[Roots of Evil]]'' - p6,15,39,55-57,90-95 [http://web.archive.org/web/20100329193632/http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/dnd/downloads Download Now! ] 
''[[From the Shadows]]'' - pp14-15 [http://web.archive.org/web/20100329193632/http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/dnd/downloads Download Now! ] 
''[[Tales of Ravenloft:Caretaker]]'' - pp303-316 
''[[The Evil Eye]]'' - pp57, 58 
''[[Vampire of the Mists]]'' - throughout 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - p5,pp116-119,p127 
''[[Ravenloft I6]]'' - throughout 
''[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]]'' - pp150-152 
''[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]]'' - pp15-303
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_alias.gif]]
|
The Devil Strahd 
Lord Vasili von Holz 
Strahd XI
|-valign="top"
|}

Count Strahd von Zarovich

2022-02-02T20:57:05Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* Strahd's Enemies */

[[File:Strahd_by_Talon.jpg|thumb|alt=Strahd von Zarovich, by Talon Dunning|Strahd von Zarovich, by Talon Dunning]]
{{canon}}
[[Count Strahd von Zarovich]] is the [[Vampire]] [[darklord]] of [[Barovia]].<ref name="DoD p.61">[[Domains of Dread]] p.61</ref><ref name="Gaz I p.150">[[Gazetteer I]] p.150</ref> He rules the land publicly from [[Castle Ravenloft]] as Strahd XI, supposedly a descendant of Strahd I, but actually the same man.<ref name="Gazetteer I p.28">[[Gazetteer I]] p.28</ref> Strahd murdered his younger brother [[Sergei von Zarovich]] on his wedding day in an attempt to claim Sergi's bride, [[Tatyana Federovna]]. This is the final act that caused him to become the first known [[darklord]]. Tatyana rejected his love and jumped to her death from the walls of [[Castle Ravenloft]].<ref name="DoD p.14-15">[[Domains of Dread]] p.14-15</ref><ref name="R3e p.4, 12">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.4, 12</ref><ref name="RPHB p.4, 14">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.4, 14</ref> Strahd is now [[cursed]] to hunt and lose the reincarnations of Tatyana.<ref name="DoD p.62">[[Domains of Dread]] p.62</ref><ref name="Gaz I p.151">[[Gazetteer I]] p.151</ref>

Strahd was nobly born to [[Count Barov von Zarovich|Barov von Zarovich]] and [[Countess Ravenia von Zarovich|Ravenia van Roeyen]]<ref name="Gaz I p. 17">[[Gaz 1]], p 17.</ref> in [[Prime Material Barovia]] in [[299 BC]].<ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref><ref name="R3e p.12">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.12</ref><ref name="RPHB p.14">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.14</ref> He was the older brother of [[Sergei]] and [[Sturm]].

Strahd spent the first few decades of his adult life in his war with the [[Terg]]s that had invaded and occupied Barovia. In perhaps the most critical moment in his war against the [[foreigner|foreign]] [[invader]]s, Strahd [[called]] the fiend [[Inajira]] in the hope of securing victory at the cost of his soul.<ref name="Gazetteer I p. 142>[[Gazetteer I]] p.142</ref> Strahd largely managed to escape the [[arcanaloth]]'s foul contract with the contract he made with Death that gave him eternal life, or [[undead|unlife]] as the case may be. However, Strahd merely traded one form of damnation for another, as this horrible pact ultimately led to Strahd becoming an all but [[immortal]] [[darklord]].<ref name="DoD p.14-15">[[Domains of Dread]] p.14-15</ref><ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref><ref name="R3e p.4, 12">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.4, 12</ref><ref name="RPHB p.4, 14">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.4, 14</ref>

Throughout his long history as darklord of Barovia, Strahd has come into conflict with many who would challenge his dominance. For example, his great niece, [[Lyssa von Zarovich]], transformed herself into a [[vampire]] to challenge his rule. She also conspired with [[the High Master Illithid]] to generate a race of [[illithid vampire]]s to depose Strahd, but the plan failed.<ref name="Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I p. 34">[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]] p.34</ref><ref>[[Thoughts of Darkness]]</ref> With the help of [[Emil Bollenbach]], Strahd [[poisoned]] Lyssa as punishment for her plotting against him, causing her to fall into a debilitating slumber.<ref name="CotN:V p.21-26">[[Children of the Night: Vampires]] p.21-26</ref>

==Errata==

* Pg. 150

:Stygian Inquirer: Strahd's ranged and melee attacks are wrong. He has a higher ranged than melee attack, but his Strength is greater than his Dexterity and he wields a magic weapon too. I have done the math the the attacks should look like this:

::Atk +20 melee (1d6+8 and energy drain, slam) or +25/+20/+15 melee (1d10+14, +4 bastard sword) or +19/+14/+9 ranged (1d8+6, +2 mighty composite longbow); I got these number via the following. The BAB for a Ftr 4/Nec 16 is 12/7/2. For the melee attack, you add +8 for STR mod, +4 for the bastard sword and +1 for weapon focus (bastard sword). For the ranged attack, you add +5 for DEX mod and +2 for the bow.

:Also the 3.5 DR would be 25/[[Silver Weapon|silver]] and [[Magic Weapon|magic]] as per the RL:PHB entry per an [[Ancient Vampire]] .

==Strahd's Allies==
* (In [[Curse of Strahd]]) [[Baba Lysaga]] (Unacknowledged by Strahd)
* [[Beucephalus]] ([[Mount]])
* (In [[Curse of Strahd]]) The [[berserker]]s and [[druid]]s of [[Yester Hill]]
* (In [[Curse of Strahd]]) The [[Children of Mother Night]]
* [[Wachter Family]]
* [[Zarovan Tribe]]
**[[Madame Eva]]

==Strahd's Creations==
During his time in [[the Mists]], Strahd has developed a number of distinct creations, particularly in the areas of [[spell]]s and [[undead]] unique to him.
*[[Book]]s written by Strahd
**[[The Tome of Strahd]]
* {{netbook-small}}[[Ring of Mortal Mimicry]]
*Spells
**[[Augment Undead]]
**[[Ground Fog]]
**[[Misty Summons]]
**[[Neverending Nightmare]]
**[[Strahd's Baneful Attractor]]
**[[Strahd's Frightful Joining]]
**[[Strahd's Malefic Meld]]
**[[Soul Anchor]]
**[[Suppress Lycanthropy]]
*[[Spider Hound]]
*[[Strahd Undead]]
**[[Strahd Skeleton]]
**[[Strahd's Skeletal Steed]]
**[[Strahd Zombie]]

==[[:category:Foe of Count Strahd von Zarovich|Strahd's Enemies]]==
*[[Ardonk Szerieza]] and other [[Gundarakite Rebel|Gundarakite rebel]]s<ref name="Gaz I p.19">[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]] p.19</ref>
*[[Azalin Rex]]<ref name=Rootevil>[[Roots of Evil]]</ref><ref name="RL3E p.130">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.130></ref><ref name="RLPHB p.132">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.132</ref>
*[[The Dawnslayers]]<ref>[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]] p.24</ref>
*[[Duke Nharov Gundar]]<ref name="Gaz I p.19">[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]] p.19</ref>
*[[Dr. Rudolph Van Richten]]
*[[Inajira]]<ref name=Rootevil>[[Roots of Evil]]</ref><ref>[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]] p.142</ref>
*[[The Keepers of the Black Feather]]<ref>[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]] p.38</ref>
*[[Lord Leo Dilisnya]]<ref name="Gaz I p.13">[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]] p.13</ref>
*[[Lord Soth]]<ref>[[Knight of the Black Rose]]</ref>
*[[Lyssa von Zarovich]]<ref>[[Children of the Night: Vampires]] p.20-26</ref><ref>[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]] p.34</ref>
*[[Zartin the Red]]<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]]</ref>

==Statistics==
[[Fighter]] 4 / [[Necromancer]] 16, [[Chaotic Evil]]<ref name="Gaz I p.150">[[Gazetteer I]] p.150</ref>

==Chronology==
* [[299 BC]] Strahd is born.<ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref><ref name="R3e p.12">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.12</ref><ref name="RPHB p.14">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.14</ref>
* [[320 BC]] Strahd gains the military rank of [[general]].<ref name="R3e p.12">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.12</ref><ref name="RPHB p.14">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.14</ref>
* [[320 BC]] [[Terg|Tergs]] invade [[Barovia]].<ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref><ref name="Gaz I p. 17">[[Gaz 1]], p 17.</ref>
* [[326 BC]] The [[Siege of Krezk]] occurs.<ref name="Gaz I p. 17">[[Gaz 1]], p 17.</ref>
* [[333 BC]] [[Tatyana]], the future lover of Sergei von Zarovich and target for Strahd von Zarovich's desire, is born.<ref name=RoTp.127>[[Realm of Terror]] p.127</ref>
* [[346 BC]] [[Count Barov von Zarovich|Count Barov]] and [[Countess Ravenia von Zarovich]] slain by [[Terg|Tergs]].<ref name="Gaz I p. 17">[[Gaz 1]], p 17.</ref>
* [[347 BC]][[Strahd]] makes a pact with [[Inajira]] right before a critical battle with the [[Tergs]].<ref name="Gazetteer I p. 142>[[Gazetteer I]] p.142</ref>
* [[347 BC]] Last of the [[Terg|Tergs]] driven from [[Barovia]].<ref name="Gaz I p. 17">[[Gaz 1]], p 17.</ref><ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref> Strahd takes the rule over Barovia as the prize for his victory.<ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref>
* [[349 BC]] [[Castle Ravenloft]] completed.<ref name="Gaz I p. 17">[[Gaz 1]], p 17.</ref> [[Strahd]] assumes [[residence]] there.<ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref>
* [[350 BC]] [[Count Strahd von Zarovich]], [[Commander Alek Gwilym]], [[Sergei von Zarovich]], and [[Lieutenant Falov]] lead a military strike force to defeat [[Red Lukas]] and his gang of [[bandit]]s.<ref name="I, Strahd p. 73-85">[[I, Strahd]] p.73-85</ref>
* [[350 BC]] The [[Ba'al Verzi]] try and fail to assassinate [[Count Strahd von Zarovich]].<ref name="Gaz I p. 17">[[Gaz 1]], p 17.</ref>
* [[351 BC]] [[Barovia]] forms due the actions of [[Strahd von Zarovich]].<ref>[[Gaz 1]], pp 10, 16.</ref><ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref><ref name="I, Strahd">[[I, Strahd]]</ref> [[Strahd]] turns into a [[vampire]].<ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref><ref name="I, Strahd">[[I, Strahd]]</ref>
* [[352 BC]] [[Strahd]] flexes his muscles to show domination over [[Barovia]].<ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref><ref name="I, Strahd">[[I, Strahd]]</ref>
* [[398 BC]] [[Count Strahd von Zarovich]] confronts [[Lord Leo Dilisnya]] at the [[Monastery of Silver Threads]], walking into Lord Dilisnya's trap. Strahd is almost put down, but the [[monk]]s of the [[monastery]] act to turn the tide of battle. Strahd turns Lord Leo Dilisnya into a [[vampire]] and [[Imprisoned|imprisons]] him in a [[The Tomb of Leo Dilisnya|tomb]] to starve from a lack of [[blood]].<ref name="Gaz I p.13">[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]] p.13</ref><ref name="I, Strahd">[[I, Strahd]]</ref>
* [[400 BC]] First known [[reincarnation]] of [[Tatyana]].<ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref><ref name="I, Strahd">[[I, Strahd]]</ref>
*According to a version of [[Strahd]]'s diary ready by [[van Richten]] in [[736 BC]], [[Alina]], the second [[:category:Reincarnation of Tatyana Federovna|reincarnation of Tatyana Federovna]] dies of [[fever]] in this year of 445 BC. [[Count Strahd]] attempts [[suicide]] with Alina in hand, but [[the Mists]] prevent him and snatch away her [[corpse]].<ref name="I, Strahd: The War Against Azalin">[[I, Strahd: The War Against Azalin]]</ref> However, this goes against a version of Strahd's diary read by [[Jander Sunstar]] that says Tatyana's second reincarnation was [[Olya Ivanova]] who died 30 years later in [[475 BC]]<ref>[[Vampire of the Mists]] p. 266-267</ref>
* Sometime between [[450 BC]] and [[460 BC]]: [[Gregorri Kolyan]] the [[bard]] is held captive by Strahd fo several years. Kolyan is ultimately let go with the story of Strahd's past.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]] p.6-9</ref><ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p.10-13</ref>
* [[470 BC]] The [[Vistani]] appear in [[Barovia]] for the first time.<ref name="Gaz I p. 17">[[Gaz 1]], p 17.</ref>
* [[470 BC]] [[Madame Eva and Strahd form an alliance]].<ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref>
* [[485 BC]] [[Petya]] and [[Anastasia Petrovich]] killed by [[Strahd]]<ref name="VotM">[[VotM]]</ref>
* [[499 BC]] [[Alexi "Sasha" Petrovich]], [[Leisl]], and [[Jander Sunstar]] assault [[Castle Ravenloft]] drive [[Strahd]] into hibernation.<ref name="VotM">[[VotM]]</ref>
* [[525 BC]] [[Lyssa von Zarovich]] is born.<ref name="Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I p. 34">[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]] p.34</ref>
* [[528 BC]] [[Outlander]] [[adventurer]]s assault [[Castle Ravenloft]] and are destroyed.<ref name="Gaz I p.18">[[Gazetteer I]] p.18</ref><ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref><ref>[[House of Strahd]]</ref>
* [[542 BC]] [[Azalin]] enters [[Ravenloft]] and arrives in [[Barovia]].<ref name="GazII p.135">[[Gazetteer II]] p.135</ref><ref>[[King of the Dead]]</ref><ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref> Reluctantly, he serves [[Strahd]] for a time.<ref name="King of the Dead">[[King of the Dead]]</ref><ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref>
* [[542 BC]] [[Strahd]] discusses the potential threat [[Azalin]] poses with [[Madame Ilka]], the new raunie of the [[Zarovan]] tribe ([[Maruschka]] having apparently died at some point in the last 40 years). <ref>[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]] - p71, pp109-117, pp167-171</ref>
</onlyinclude>
* [[547 BC]] [[Forlorn]] appears.<ref>[[Gazetteer I]] p.63</ref> Strahd sends Azalin to investigate, but nothing of value to them is found.<ref>[[Gazetteer I]] p.73-74</ref>
* [[550 BC]] [[Lyssa von Zarovich]] becomes a [[vampire]] and discovers a way to achieve the power of a vampire much greater than her age.<ref name="Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I p. 34">[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]] p.34</ref>
* [[579 BC]] [[Strahd]] and [[Azalin]] create a [[portal]] to [[Mordent]]<ref name="GazII p.135">[[Gazetteer II]] p.135</ref>, where [[The Alchemist]] conducts strange research on changing the soul.<ref>[[I10: Ravenloft II: The House on Gryphon Hill]]</ref> [[The Mists]] snatch up [[Mordent]] before either [[Strahd]] or [[Azalin]] can make good their escape, leaving them with only hazy dream-like recollections of what happened.<ref name="GazII p.135">[[Gazetteer II]] p.135</ref>
* [[579 BC]] [[Azalin]] leaves the service of [[Strahd]].<ref name="King of the Dead">[[King of the Dead]]</ref><ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref> [[Darkon]] forms.<ref name="Gazetteer II p. 9">[[Gazetteer II]] p.9</ref><ref name="King of the Dead">[[King of the Dead]]</ref><ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref>
* [[593 BC]] The domain of [[Gundarak]] appears.<ref name="Gaz I p.18">[[Gazetteer I]] p.18</ref><ref name="DoD p.16">[[Domains of Dread]] p.16</ref>
* [[593 BC]] First known contact between [[Barovian]]s and [[Gundarakite]]s.<ref name="Gaz I p.18">[[Gazetteer I]] p.18</ref>
* [[613 BC]] (approximately) Strahd encounters [[Harkon Lukas]] running amok in Barovia and thoroughly thrashes him, forcing Harkon to flee into [[the Mists]].<ref>[[Domains of Dread]] p.16, 64</ref>
* [[718 BC]] [[Tara Kolyana]] is born. Not too long thereafter, her parents flee [[Barovia]] to go to [[Hazlan]].<ref name="Gazetteer I p. 144">[[Gazetteer I]] p.144</ref>
* [[735 BC]] [[Tara Kolyana]] experiences her first brush with the supernatural with an [[afflicted lycanthrope|afflicted]] [[werewolf]]. After witnessing the man become [[cured]], Tara resolves to help people throughout the [[Land of Mists]]. Her parents make her promise to never to go to [[Barovia]].<ref name="Gazetteer I p. 144">[[Gazetteer I]] p.144</ref>
* [[736 BC]] [[Duke Gundar]] is [[assassinated]].<ref name="Gaz I p.19">[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]] p.19</ref><ref name="DoD p.17">[[Domains of Dread]] p.17</ref>
* [[739 BC]] [[Lyssa von Zarovich]] conspires with [[Bluetspurean]] [[illithid]]s to create a [[illithid vampire|vampiric version of their race]]. She hopes to use these vampire mind flayers to take over [[Barovia]], but she ultimately fails.<ref name="Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I p. 34">[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]] p.34</ref><ref>[[Thoughts of Darkness]]</ref>
* [[740 BC]] '''[[The Great Upheaval]]'''.
* [[740 BC]] [[Strahd]] begins the annexation of [[Gundarak]].<ref name="Gaz I p.19">[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]] p.19</ref>
* [[750 BC]] [[Strahd]] poisons [[Lyssa von Zarovich]] into a slumbering state that leaves her active for only a few hours each night.<ref name="Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I p. 34">[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]] p.34</ref> The [[poison]] is delivered via the [[blood]] of the [[dread flesh golem]] [[Tom]] (created by [[Emil Bollenbach]]) that acts as a stand-in for a [[human]] she hoped to enslave.<ref name="CotN:V p.21-26">[[Children of the Night: Vampires]] p.21-26</ref>
* [[753 BC]]: On his deathbed, [[Tara Kolyana]]'s father expresses how proud he is of her and tells her of the [[:category:prophecy|prophecy]] the [[Vistani]] gave about her and why they left [[Barovia]].<ref name="Gazetteer I p. 144">[[Gazetteer I]] p.144</ref>
* [[753 BC]]: [[Count Strahd von Zarovich]] personally [[execution|executes]] [[Burgomaster Shaithis Vosrovna]] for goating [[adventurer]]s into the [[murder]] of one of the [[Vistani]]..<ref>[[Ravenloft Gazetteer I]], p35.</ref>

==TSR Collector Cards==
Strahd's [[TSR 1991 Collector Card]] numbers are 489 and 611. His [[TSR 1992 Collector Card]] numbers are 285 and 608.

==Appearances==

===[[Modules]]===
*[[1st Edition]]
**[[I6: Ravenloft]]
**[[I10: The House on Gryphon Hill]]
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[Thoughts of Darkness]] (referenced only)
**[[From the Shadows]] ([[time travel]] sequence)
**[[Roots of Evil]]
**[[House of Strahd]]
**Lyssa von Zarovich's module in [[Children of the Night: Vampires]]
**[[Farewell to the Flesh]] ([[RPGA]] module)
*[[3rd Edition]]
**[[Expedition to Castle Ravenloft]] (not in continuity with Ravenloft campaign setting)
*[[4th Edition]]
**[[Fair Barovia]] ([[Dungeon Magazine]], online)
*[[5th Edition]]
**[[Curse of Strahd]]

===[[Novel]]s, short stories, and other fiction===
*[[Master of Ravenloft]] ([[AD&D Adventure Gamebook]])
*[[Vampire of the Mists]]
*[[Knight of the Black Rose]]
*[[I, Strahd, The Memoirs of a Vampire]]
*[[Tales of Ravenloft]]: [[The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]] (referenced only), [[Tales of Ravenloft: Caretaker|Caretaker]]
*[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]]
*[[Interview of the Lost Boys in the Dark Shadows of Ravenloft]] ([[Dragon Magazine]], humor comic/non-canonical)
*[[For Every Vengeance There is an Equal and Opposite Revengeance]] ([[Dragon Magazine]], humor comic/non-canonical)

===Video and computer games===
*[[Strahd's Possession]] (later included in several compilations)
*[[Iron & Blood: Warriors of Ravenloft]]

==References==
<references />
[[category:Character]][[category:NPC]]
[[category:1st Edition Character]]
[[category:2nd Edition Character]]
[[category:3rd Edition Character]]
[[category:4th Edition Character]]
[[category:5th Edition Character]]
[[category:Amicicide]]
[[Category:Ancient Vampire]]
[[Category:Arcane Loremaster]]
[[category:Amicicide]]
[[Category:Artist]]
[[Category:Barovian (Prime Material Plane)]]
[[category:Betrayer]]
[[category:Challenge 15]]
[[Category:Chaotic Evil]]
[[category:Commander]]
[[Category:Count of Barovia]]
[[Category:Count]]
[[Category:Darklord]]
[[category:Darklord (Domain Lord Magnitude of Evil)]]
[[Category:Dancer]]
[[category:Delegator]]
[[Category:Demonologist]]
[[Category:Fiend Summoner]]
[[category:Fighter]]
[[category:Foe of Azalin Rex]]
[[category:Foe of Duke Gundar]]
[[category:Foe of Jander Sunstar]]
[[category:Foe of Malocchio Aderre]]
[[category:Foe of Lord Soth]]
[[category:Foe of Rudolph van Richten]]
[[category:Foe of the Wanderers]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Prime Material Barovia]]
[[Category:Fratricide]]
[[category:General]]
[[category:Hospiticide]]
[[Category:Human]]
[[category:Imprisoner]]
[[category:Inhabitants of Castle Ravenloft]]
[[Category:Inhabitants of Barovia]]
[[category:Inventor of a Spell]]
[[category:Killer]]
[[category:Leader]]
[[category:Mass Murderer]]
[[category:Military Leader]]
[[category:Military Officer]]
[[category:Multiclass Character]]
[[category:Murderer]]
[[Category:Musician]]
[[Category:Necromancer]]
[[category:Necrologist]]
[[Category:Noble of Barovia]]
[[category:Oppressor]]
[[Category:Orator]]
[[Category:Organist]]
[[Category:Pathfinder 1st Edition Character]]
[[Category:Performing Artist]]
[[category:Personality of Barovia]]
[[Category:Poisoner]]
[[category:Professional Killer]]
[[Category:Ravenloft Loremaster]]
[[Category:Ruler]]
[[category:Soldier]]
[[Category:Son]]
[[category:Specialist Wizard]]
[[category:Standard Vampire]]
[[Category:Storyteller]]
[[category:Suppressor]]
[[category:Tempted]]
[[category:Temporal Leader]]
[[category:Tempted]]
[[category:Traitor]]
[[Category:Transgressor]]
[[category:TSR Collector Card Character]]
[[Category:Undead]]
[[Category:Vampire]]
[[Category:Van Roeyen Family]]
[[category:Veteran]]
[[Category:Von Zarovich Family]]
[[Category:Wizard]]
[[Category:Writer]]
[[category:Births in 299 BC]]
[[category:Deaths in 351 BC]]

==Data from the Ravenloft Catalogue==



{|
|-valign="top"
|[[Image:rldb_npc.jpg]]
|[[Image:rldb_primary.gif]]
|
''[[Secrets of the Dread Realms]]'' 
''[[Domains of Dread]]'' 
''[[I, Strahd]]'' 
''[[House of Strahd]]'' 
''[[Ravenloft I6]]'' 
''[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]]'' 
''[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]]''
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_art.gif]]
|
''[[Secrets of the Dread Realms]]'' - p11 
''[[Domains of Dread]]'' - p61 
''[[House of Strahd]]'' - cover, pp1,5,25,60,63 
''[[The Ravenloft Campaign Setting]]'' - box cover 
''[[The Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p9,p98 
''[[Roots of Evil]]'' - front cover, p7,69,72,93,95 [http://web.archive.org/web/20100329193632/http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/dnd/downloads Download Now! ] 
''[[Forbidden Lore: Nova Arcanum]]'' - p3, front cover 
''[[Vampire of the Mists]]'' - front cover 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - p117, front cover, reference cards 
''[[TSR JAM 1999]]'' - front cover 
''[[Ravenloft I6]]'' - cover, pp3,15 
''[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]]'' - p151 
''[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]]'' - cover
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_stats.gif]]
|
''[[Secrets of the Dread Realms]]'' - pp10-12 
''[[Domains of Dread]]'' - pp61-62 
''[[House of Strahd]]'' - pp4-5 
''[[The Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - pp97-101 
''[[Roots of Evil]]'' - p6 [http://web.archive.org/web/20100329193632/http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/dnd/downloads Download Now! ] 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp116-119 
''[[Ravenloft I6]]'' - p3 
''[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]]'' - pp150-152
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_desc.gif]]
|
''[[Secrets of the Dread Realms]]'' - pp7,10-12,18-19,27,31,114 
''[[Ravenloft Third Edition]]'' - p4,12-13,17,114,124 
''[[Domains of Dread]]'' - pp61-62 
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - pp10-13,17,43,82 
''[[I, Strahd ]]''-throughout 
''[[House of Strahd]]'' - throughout 
''[[The Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - pp7-10, pp97-101 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]'' - pp6-9,13,46,77 
''[[Roots of Evil]]'' - p6,15,39,55-57,90-95 [http://web.archive.org/web/20100329193632/http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/dnd/downloads Download Now! ] 
''[[From the Shadows]]'' - pp14-15 [http://web.archive.org/web/20100329193632/http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/dnd/downloads Download Now! ] 
''[[Tales of Ravenloft:Caretaker]]'' - pp303-316 
''[[The Evil Eye]]'' - pp57, 58 
''[[Vampire of the Mists]]'' - throughout 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - p5,pp116-119,p127 
''[[Ravenloft I6]]'' - throughout 
''[[Ravenloft Gazetteer Volume I]]'' - pp150-152 
''[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]]'' - pp15-303
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_alias.gif]]
|
The Devil Strahd 
Lord Vasili von Holz 
Strahd XI
|-valign="top"
|}

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Article)

2022-02-02T20:50:50Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* Authored: */

DR. RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN

Medium humanoid (human), Lawful Good

Armor Class: 17 (half plate of flowing sanctity)

Hit Points: 77 (14d8 +14)

Speed: 30 ft.

Strength: 9 (-1)

Dexterity: 13 (+1)

Constitution: 13 (+1)

Intelligence: 17 (+3)

Wisdom: 18 (+4)

Charisma: 16 (+3)

Saving Throws: Con +5, Wis +8, Cha +7

Skills: Arcana +7, Deception +7, Insight +12,
Investigation +7, Medicine +8, Perception +12,
Religion +6, Sleight of Hand +4

Condition Immunities: charmed

Senses: darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 22

Languages: Abyssal, Celestial, Common, Draconic, Dwarvish, Elvish, Gundarak, Infernal, Sylvan

Challenge: 9 (5,000 XP)

SPECIAL EQUIPMENT:

In addition to his +1 sword cane and light crossbow, Van Richten wears a hat of disguise, goggles of night, and a ring of mind shielding, and he carries a spell scroll of raise dead.

Half Plate of Flowing Sanctity +1 mithril half plate. Once a day, a flask of water placed in the belt of armor becomes holy water.

ACTIONS:

Spellcasting: Van Richter is a 9th level Cleric of Helm, 1st level Wizard. His spellcasting ability is Wisdom (save DC 15, +7 to hit with spell attacks). Van Richten has the following Cleric and Wizard spells prepared:

Cantrips (at will): light, mage hand, mending, minor illusion, prestidigitation, sacred flame, thaumaturgy, toll the dead

1st level (4 slots): alarm, bless, cure wounds, detect evil and good, feather fall, find familiar, healing word, identify, protection from evil and good, shield, sleep

2nd level (3 slots): augury, beacon of hope, lesser restoration, protection from poison, silence, spiritual weapon warding bond, zone of truth

3rd level (3 slots): glyph of warding, magic circle, mass healing word, revivify, speak with dead, spirit guardians

4th level (3 slots): death ward, freedom of movement

5th level (3 slots): dawn, greater restoration, mass cure wounds, raise dead

Skulker: Van Richten can hide when he is lightly obscured from the creature from which he is hiding. When he’s hidden from a creature and misses it with a ranged weapon attack, making the attack doesn’t reveal his position. Dim light doesn’t impose disadvantage on his Wisdom (Perception) checks relying on sight.

Undead Slayer: When Van Richten hits an undead with a weapon attack, the undead takes an extra 10 (3d6) damage of weapon’s type.

Cunning Action: Van Richten can use a bonus action to take the Dash, Disengage or Hide action.

Sneak Attack: When Van Richten surprises a target, has advantage on an attack roll, or an enemy is within 5 ft. of the target, Van Richten deals and extra 7 damage.

Assassin Proficiencies: Van Richten is proficient with Disguise and Poisoner’s Kits.

Assassinate: When Van Richten hits a surprised enemy, it’s automatically a critical hit. When he attacks an enemy that hasn’t yet had a turn, he gains advantage on the attack.

Channel Divinity: Turn Undead: Undead within 30 ft. of Van Richten must make a Wisdom saving throw. If the creature fails its saving throw, they are turned for 1 minute or until they take damage. A turned creature must spend its turns trying to move as far away from him as it can, and it can’t willingly move to a space within 30 ft. of him. It also can’t take reactions. For its action, it can use only the Dash action or try to escape from an effect that prevents it from moving. If there’s nowhere to move, the creature can use the Dodge action. Undead with CR 1 or less are automatically destroyed on a failed save.

Preserve Life: As an action, Van Richten can distribute 45 hit points. This feature can restore a creature to no more than half of its hit point maximum and has no effect on an undead or construct.

Multiattack: Van Richten makes two attacks with his sword cane or light crossbow.

Sword Cane: Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 6 (1d6 +2) bludgeon damage (wooden cane) or piercing damage (silvered sword).

Light Crossbow: Ranged Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, range 80/320 ft., one target. Hit: 7 (1d8 +2) piercing damage.

Healer: As an action, Van Richten can spend one use of a Healer’s Kit to tend to a creature and restore 1d6 +4 hit points to it, plus additional hit points equal to the creature’s maximum number of Hit Dice. The creature can’t regain hit points from this feat again until it finishes a short or long rest.

REACTIONS:

Final Ward: Van Richten has a permanent glyph of warding tattooed on his neck that activates when he’s bitten there and chooses to say “Erasmus, I’m coming home” in Celestial. All targets in a 20 ft. radius must make a Dexterity saving throw or take 5d8 +5 radiant damage on a failed save or half as much (rounded up) on a successful one. Van Richten automatically fails the save and is disintegrated along with all of the items on his person.

RICTAVIO:

Several months ago a colorfully dressed half-elf bard came to Barovia in a carnival wagon, with a pet monkey on his shoulder. He took over an abandoned tower on Lake Baratok before rolling into town of Vallaki several months later. Claiming to be a carnival ringmaster in search of new actors, he began regaling locals with tales of distant lands.

MONSTER HUNTER:

The half-elf ringmaster is, in fact, the legendary human monster hunter named Rudolph Van Richten. Van Richten’s tale is a sad one. A scholar and doctor from a land called Darkon, he married his childhood sweetheart, Ingrid and together they had a son, Erasmus. When he was fourteen, Erasmus was stolen away by Vistani and sold to a vampire named Baron Metus to be used as a companion. By the time Van Richten found his son, it was too late: the Baron had already transformed Erasmus into a vampire spawn. Erasmus begged his father to end his suffering, which Van Richten did by pounding a wooden stake through his son’s chest. Baron Metus avenged that death by killing Van Richten’s wife, and Van Richten has lived with the horror of his family’s destruction ever since. After destroying Baron Metus in turn, Van Richten sought revenge against the Vistani and took up a life of hunting evil monsters.

THE WAITING GAME:

Van Richten isn’t a young man anymore. He knows his road is coming to an end, but his work isn’t done. He has come to Barovia to kill Strahd Von Zarovich, the greatest vampire of them all. Van Richten has studied Strahd for years and knows he can’t hope to best the vampire in a straight-up confrontation: he must wait for the right moment to strike. He has good evidence to suggest that Strahd periodically hibernates in his coffin, sometimes for years, when all is quite in the realm. While he bides his time, Van Richten hides in plain sight with the aid of a hat of disguise, his thoughts protected by a ring of mind shielding. He is trying to learn more about the Keepers of the Feather—a society of wereravens that oppose Strahd—while trying not to expose the secret society to their mutual enemy. He thinks the wereravens might prove helpful when the time comes. Van Richten also wants to take out as many of Strahd’s spies as he can, starting with the Vistani.

MAN WITH A PLAN:

Van Richten doesn’t know that his former protégé, a good-aligned Vistani named Ezmerelda d’Avenir, has come to Barovia looking for him. He taught her many of his monster-hunting techniques, but she doesn’t know all of his tricks and disguises. So far, their paths haven’t crossed. In the event that Van Richten becomes aware of Ezmerelda’s presence, he does his utmost to protect her without putting his own plans in jeopardy. If he can manipulate a party of adventurers into keeping an eye on her, he will do so.

VAN RICHTEN WORKS ALONE:

A curse placed on him long ago by a Vistani seer brings doom to those he befriends (see ‘Role Playing Notes’ for details). Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure. Consequently, if he thinks he’s in danger of being unmasked, he retreats to the Tower of Khazan (chapter 11) or some other quiet corner of Strahd’s domain to plan further.

TRAITS:

Ideal. “Evil cannot go unchallenged.”

Bond. “To protect those I love, I must keep them distant and hidden from my enemies.”

Flaw. “I am cursed. Thus, I will never have peace.”

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

A CURSED MAN:

Van Richten suffers a curse bestowed on him by a Vistani:

Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws.

Its effect on him can best be summarized with this statement: "Van Richten Dies Last." This curse is both a boon and a bane to him. The curse is a large part of why he has lived so long--how he has accumulated so much experience and expertise. He is cursed to always see his friends and allies die--which means he has to live long enough to see it happen.

For a long time, he was unaware of the exact nature of the curse on him, but he is apparently aware of it now.

• Van Richten feels guilty. For decades he fought alongside others with monsters, completely unaware that he was a doombringer among them. Now that he knows, he is burdened by all the deaths he feels that his presence caused.

• Van Richten isolates himself. He doesn't let people get close to him for fear that his curse will take them out.

• If Van Richten is traveling with the party, he has excellent odds of surviving--if someone is going to die in the party, it'll be someone other than him.

• Van Richten's curse should have a tangible impact if he’s traveling with the party: he is a doombringer of the highest order. His mere presence among the party should invite tragedy and disaster.

The Tragedy of Ezmerelda and Van Richten. In the backstory that created Ezmerelda d’Avenir (Appendix D: Monsters and NPCs pages 230-231), there's a tragedy in there: Van Richten's curse could have been lifted years ago.

By Ravenloft Lore, the strongest of curses laid down by a Vistani can only be lifted by the Vistani who placed it, or a blood relative of that Vistani. Van Richten's curse was a Death Curse laid on him by Ezmerelda's mother. Only Ezmerelda has the ability to revoke the curse. But here's the problem...
Ezmerelda is Vistani...by nature; they are secretive about their abilities. Beyond that, Van Richten doesn't trust Vistani and likely commanded Ezmerelda to not use her Vistani abilities in his presence. As a result, Van Richten doesn't know how Vistani curses work--he doesn't know that they can be revoked by a blood relative of the one who laid it. He's a Cleric, he has undoubtedly tried remove curse on himself and it failed. As far as he knows, the curse is permanent.
Van Richten is also secretive and, as mentioned, doesn't trust the Vistani. He kept Ezmerelda at arm's length as best he could both because he couldn't trust her, but also to try to protect her from the curse...and even if he was aware of the curse when they traveled together, he never told her about it.

If either one of them had been less secretive, more open, his curse would have been revoked a long time ago.

If the players want to help Van Richten break the curse, here's the backstory:

The story of Ezmerelda and Van Richten's history was written in the Van Richten's Journal (Appendix F: Handouts pages 254-255). It involves him destroying Ezmerelda's caravan while she was very, very young. She survived the undead assault and later got picked up by another caravan of Vistani (it was actually the Zarovan tribe--Madam Eva's caravan). She originally wanted revenge on Van Richten, but time with Eva (and the presence of the most powerful Vistani of them all) showed her the tragedy of what had happened from an outside perspective. Ezmerelda realized that the whole thing was a horrible tragedy and wrongs had been committed on both sides. She, thus, set out to try to find Van Richten and try to make things right...though Eva never told her about the curse her mother had laid on Van Richten.

Van Richten and Ezmerelda must travel to the place the curse was first laid...a small clearing in the forests of Barovia where the ruins of Ezmerelda's caravan still lie. Both must verbally acknowledge the wrong that had been done and verbally forgive one another for it...then the remains of Ezmerelda's caravan must be burned.

THE DISGUISE:

Van Richten got the idea for “Rictavio” from his exposure to Ezmerelda and her occasional methods for blending in when going somewhere that didn't like Vistani. In short: "Sometimes the best disguise is being the most obvious thing in the room." As mentioned above, Ezmerelda has never encountered the Rictavio disguise and Van Richten isn't familiar with any of the disguises Ezmerelda is currently using.

It is a rather perfect disguise. Van Richten is known as a grim and serious individual, a dour old man who roves the world slaying monsters. “Rictavio” is a flamboyant fop who tells ludicrous stories, commits crimes against music, and is constantly trying to recruit people to his Circus of Wonders. He should be portrayed as extremely over the top and completely harmless. It should be very jarring to your players if he drops the act and reveals who he truly is.
Furthermore, Rictavio knows that even if someone suspects he's hiding something, they are extremely unlikely to guess the truth. If a player rolls well on Insight against him and figures out he's full of crap, that only tells them that he's lying about something...not what he is lying about. And his response is to just carry on and ignore accusations. Sure, the PCs may figure out that he's full of it (his stories are obvious fabrications) but he just carries right along, sticking to his guns even though the players know it’s a load of BS.

The players should have a hard time to get a serious read on Rictavio's personality. He strikes them as so straight forward--a carnie who is spinning tall tales for amusement. So they shouldn’t suspect that he's any more than what he appears to be.

A HARD MAN TO PIN DOWN:

Van Richten is a man with a plan for killing Strahd Von Zarovich, and it's a plan that plays well to his aged capabilities: "wait til Strahd takes a long nap, then stake him in his sleep." Of anyone in the valley, Van Richten knows how deadly Strahd is. He has fought elder vampires before and Strahd is the greatest of them all. He may very well believe that trying to fight him head on is pure folly, but he’s the one most capable of doing so.

It's important to note: Most of the "Destined Allies" the party can draw from Madame Eva’s Tarokka card reading have notes about how the PCs can get that individual to join them. Van Richten has no such notes. Instead, it says this...

Van Richten works alone. [...] Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure.

Van Richten is aware of Madame Eva but (unlike many others in the valley) he won't immediately cave to her prophecies, drop everything he has been working on, and throw his lot in with the PCs. Here are a few important things to keep in mind if the party is trying to recruit him...

• Van Richten is quite certain that if he drops his disguise, Strahd will find him and set out to kill him. (This is one of Strahd's Primary Goals as listed in Chapter 1)

• Van Richten's disguise is magically augmented. As long as the party can't get his hat off, they cannot prove that he’s not a carnie ringmaster

• Van Richten's disguise is only useful against Strahd as long as no one knows who he really is. The ring of mind shielding only works on him...it doesn't work on the PCs. He knows that if anyone else finds out, Strahd can charm them, read their mind or otherwise extract that information from them.

• Van Richten is fully aware of his curse. He will avoid physically joining up with the party for fear that he will get them all killed.

• Van Richten does not talk about his curse. He knows well the bravery of adventurers and that telling them about his curse tends to result in responses like "Oh, you don't need to worry about us, we're strong!" followed shortly by ":dying noises:." Rebuffing their advances without mentioning the curse is much more effective at getting them to stay away from him so his curse doesn't kill them.

• Even if Van Richten consents to offer them aid, it should be indirect as much as possible. He has his plan, he's set in his ways, and he’s not going to go gallivanting off with a bunch of young adventurers. And, he should stay in character as much as possible...blowing his cover will only bring Strahd down on him AND the PCs.

Ideally, even if the party can convince him to help...his help should primarily take the form of a surprisingly knowledgeable carnival ringmaster who is "certainly not going to go out and fight monsters with you. I'm a ringmaster, not an adventurer!"

He may lend the party his carnival wagon to travel around in (once he finds somewhere else to stash his saber-toothed tiger that has been trained to hunt Vistani, or he may lend them the tiger), give them helpful advice--possibly using ravens to stay in touch over long-distance if the PCs make friends with the Keepers of the Feather, and provide the sort of support that a Carnie could offer. But, it should take rather extreme circumstances for him to actually be honest with the PCs...and they may have to do something about his curse before he'll actually travel with them.

GETTING HIM TO JOIN UP:

Van Richten wants to stay under cover...so how does the party get him to change his mind?

Easy: Ruin his plan.

If Van Richten's cover is blown, his plan is a wash. The whole plan depends on his identity staying a secret until Strahd goes into hibernation. If Strahd identifies Van Richten before then, he will try to kill him and Van Richten is pretty sure he can't take Strahd in a straight-up fight. Thus...if Van Richten’s cover is blown, he is stuck with two bad choices: Either he tries to keep going it alone, possibly getting killed by Strahd, and fails his “final mission,” or he accepts the risk to the PCs and joins them to try to take Strahd down directly. A few example ways to blow his cover...

• Knock his hat off. A hat of disguise only works as long as it stays on your head, so if something happens that knocks his hat off; “Rictavio” is replaced by Van Richten.

• Let the Tyger Tyger event happen (chapter 5). When Rictavio flees to the Tower of Khazan, he's inside an antimagic field and cannot disguise himself.

• Even if Van Richten is distorting his voice, if the PCs have already befriended Ezmerelda, she may still recognize it...even if what she recognizes is the cadence his voice adopts when he's explaining something.

ABILITY LOADOUT:

Van Richten is a Cleric...and his listed prepared spells speaks more of a support caster than a monster hunter who has gone solo. But, because he's a Cleric, he can swap out his prepared spells at will to any other spells on the Cleric list. Here are a few notes on spells for him to use...

• Dawn creates sunlight. If he can lock a vampire down within the area of effect, they will be dust in short order.

• Dispel Evil and Good breaks a vampire's charm. However...things can't really leave Barovia, so the dismissal part of that spell won't be terribly effective here.

• Geas is useful when he needs to find something. For example, capture a werewolf then place a geas on it to lead them to the den.

• Lesser and Greater Restoration are enormously useful, as is remove curse.

• Guiding Bolt is a great weapon against Vampires. Shuts down their regeneration, and gives the next attack advantage.

• Hallow: If Van Richten can get his hands on the material components for this, he can create holy ground to help protect the PCs. Create a bubble of hallowed ground around the antimagic field that covers the Tower of Khazan....talk about a fortress. Sure, you'll have a bubble of non-hallowed ground where the antimagic field zone is...but the territory around the tower itself will be holy ground.

• Given his skill at predicting his foes...dropping sanctuary on a creature they are about to attack can completely trash their attempts.

• Spirit Guardians is another spell that is just....awesome.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Appearances==
===[[Campaign Setting]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[Ravenloft: Realm of Terror]]
**[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting (Box)]]

===[[Modules]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[The Nightmare Lands (Boxed Set)]] (referenced only)
**[[Chilling Tales]]
**[[Dungeon Magazine #55]]: [[The Sea Wolf]]
**[[Bleak House: The Death of Rudolph Van Richten]]
*[[4th Edition]]
**[[Dragon magazine #416 (Online)]]: [[Strahd and Van Richten]]
*[[5th Edition]]
**[[Curse of Strahd]]
**[[Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft]]

===[[Novels]], stories===

*[[Tales of Ravenloft]]: [[The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]
*[[I, Strahd: The War Against Azalin]]

==Authored:==

* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Witches (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Witches]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Demons]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]]''

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Article)

2022-02-02T20:50:17Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* Appearances */

DR. RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN

Medium humanoid (human), Lawful Good

Armor Class: 17 (half plate of flowing sanctity)

Hit Points: 77 (14d8 +14)

Speed: 30 ft.

Strength: 9 (-1)

Dexterity: 13 (+1)

Constitution: 13 (+1)

Intelligence: 17 (+3)

Wisdom: 18 (+4)

Charisma: 16 (+3)

Saving Throws: Con +5, Wis +8, Cha +7

Skills: Arcana +7, Deception +7, Insight +12,
Investigation +7, Medicine +8, Perception +12,
Religion +6, Sleight of Hand +4

Condition Immunities: charmed

Senses: darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 22

Languages: Abyssal, Celestial, Common, Draconic, Dwarvish, Elvish, Gundarak, Infernal, Sylvan

Challenge: 9 (5,000 XP)

SPECIAL EQUIPMENT:

In addition to his +1 sword cane and light crossbow, Van Richten wears a hat of disguise, goggles of night, and a ring of mind shielding, and he carries a spell scroll of raise dead.

Half Plate of Flowing Sanctity +1 mithril half plate. Once a day, a flask of water placed in the belt of armor becomes holy water.

ACTIONS:

Spellcasting: Van Richter is a 9th level Cleric of Helm, 1st level Wizard. His spellcasting ability is Wisdom (save DC 15, +7 to hit with spell attacks). Van Richten has the following Cleric and Wizard spells prepared:

Cantrips (at will): light, mage hand, mending, minor illusion, prestidigitation, sacred flame, thaumaturgy, toll the dead

1st level (4 slots): alarm, bless, cure wounds, detect evil and good, feather fall, find familiar, healing word, identify, protection from evil and good, shield, sleep

2nd level (3 slots): augury, beacon of hope, lesser restoration, protection from poison, silence, spiritual weapon warding bond, zone of truth

3rd level (3 slots): glyph of warding, magic circle, mass healing word, revivify, speak with dead, spirit guardians

4th level (3 slots): death ward, freedom of movement

5th level (3 slots): dawn, greater restoration, mass cure wounds, raise dead

Skulker: Van Richten can hide when he is lightly obscured from the creature from which he is hiding. When he’s hidden from a creature and misses it with a ranged weapon attack, making the attack doesn’t reveal his position. Dim light doesn’t impose disadvantage on his Wisdom (Perception) checks relying on sight.

Undead Slayer: When Van Richten hits an undead with a weapon attack, the undead takes an extra 10 (3d6) damage of weapon’s type.

Cunning Action: Van Richten can use a bonus action to take the Dash, Disengage or Hide action.

Sneak Attack: When Van Richten surprises a target, has advantage on an attack roll, or an enemy is within 5 ft. of the target, Van Richten deals and extra 7 damage.

Assassin Proficiencies: Van Richten is proficient with Disguise and Poisoner’s Kits.

Assassinate: When Van Richten hits a surprised enemy, it’s automatically a critical hit. When he attacks an enemy that hasn’t yet had a turn, he gains advantage on the attack.

Channel Divinity: Turn Undead: Undead within 30 ft. of Van Richten must make a Wisdom saving throw. If the creature fails its saving throw, they are turned for 1 minute or until they take damage. A turned creature must spend its turns trying to move as far away from him as it can, and it can’t willingly move to a space within 30 ft. of him. It also can’t take reactions. For its action, it can use only the Dash action or try to escape from an effect that prevents it from moving. If there’s nowhere to move, the creature can use the Dodge action. Undead with CR 1 or less are automatically destroyed on a failed save.

Preserve Life: As an action, Van Richten can distribute 45 hit points. This feature can restore a creature to no more than half of its hit point maximum and has no effect on an undead or construct.

Multiattack: Van Richten makes two attacks with his sword cane or light crossbow.

Sword Cane: Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 6 (1d6 +2) bludgeon damage (wooden cane) or piercing damage (silvered sword).

Light Crossbow: Ranged Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, range 80/320 ft., one target. Hit: 7 (1d8 +2) piercing damage.

Healer: As an action, Van Richten can spend one use of a Healer’s Kit to tend to a creature and restore 1d6 +4 hit points to it, plus additional hit points equal to the creature’s maximum number of Hit Dice. The creature can’t regain hit points from this feat again until it finishes a short or long rest.

REACTIONS:

Final Ward: Van Richten has a permanent glyph of warding tattooed on his neck that activates when he’s bitten there and chooses to say “Erasmus, I’m coming home” in Celestial. All targets in a 20 ft. radius must make a Dexterity saving throw or take 5d8 +5 radiant damage on a failed save or half as much (rounded up) on a successful one. Van Richten automatically fails the save and is disintegrated along with all of the items on his person.

RICTAVIO:

Several months ago a colorfully dressed half-elf bard came to Barovia in a carnival wagon, with a pet monkey on his shoulder. He took over an abandoned tower on Lake Baratok before rolling into town of Vallaki several months later. Claiming to be a carnival ringmaster in search of new actors, he began regaling locals with tales of distant lands.

MONSTER HUNTER:

The half-elf ringmaster is, in fact, the legendary human monster hunter named Rudolph Van Richten. Van Richten’s tale is a sad one. A scholar and doctor from a land called Darkon, he married his childhood sweetheart, Ingrid and together they had a son, Erasmus. When he was fourteen, Erasmus was stolen away by Vistani and sold to a vampire named Baron Metus to be used as a companion. By the time Van Richten found his son, it was too late: the Baron had already transformed Erasmus into a vampire spawn. Erasmus begged his father to end his suffering, which Van Richten did by pounding a wooden stake through his son’s chest. Baron Metus avenged that death by killing Van Richten’s wife, and Van Richten has lived with the horror of his family’s destruction ever since. After destroying Baron Metus in turn, Van Richten sought revenge against the Vistani and took up a life of hunting evil monsters.

THE WAITING GAME:

Van Richten isn’t a young man anymore. He knows his road is coming to an end, but his work isn’t done. He has come to Barovia to kill Strahd Von Zarovich, the greatest vampire of them all. Van Richten has studied Strahd for years and knows he can’t hope to best the vampire in a straight-up confrontation: he must wait for the right moment to strike. He has good evidence to suggest that Strahd periodically hibernates in his coffin, sometimes for years, when all is quite in the realm. While he bides his time, Van Richten hides in plain sight with the aid of a hat of disguise, his thoughts protected by a ring of mind shielding. He is trying to learn more about the Keepers of the Feather—a society of wereravens that oppose Strahd—while trying not to expose the secret society to their mutual enemy. He thinks the wereravens might prove helpful when the time comes. Van Richten also wants to take out as many of Strahd’s spies as he can, starting with the Vistani.

MAN WITH A PLAN:

Van Richten doesn’t know that his former protégé, a good-aligned Vistani named Ezmerelda d’Avenir, has come to Barovia looking for him. He taught her many of his monster-hunting techniques, but she doesn’t know all of his tricks and disguises. So far, their paths haven’t crossed. In the event that Van Richten becomes aware of Ezmerelda’s presence, he does his utmost to protect her without putting his own plans in jeopardy. If he can manipulate a party of adventurers into keeping an eye on her, he will do so.

VAN RICHTEN WORKS ALONE:

A curse placed on him long ago by a Vistani seer brings doom to those he befriends (see ‘Role Playing Notes’ for details). Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure. Consequently, if he thinks he’s in danger of being unmasked, he retreats to the Tower of Khazan (chapter 11) or some other quiet corner of Strahd’s domain to plan further.

TRAITS:

Ideal. “Evil cannot go unchallenged.”

Bond. “To protect those I love, I must keep them distant and hidden from my enemies.”

Flaw. “I am cursed. Thus, I will never have peace.”

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

A CURSED MAN:

Van Richten suffers a curse bestowed on him by a Vistani:

Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws.

Its effect on him can best be summarized with this statement: "Van Richten Dies Last." This curse is both a boon and a bane to him. The curse is a large part of why he has lived so long--how he has accumulated so much experience and expertise. He is cursed to always see his friends and allies die--which means he has to live long enough to see it happen.

For a long time, he was unaware of the exact nature of the curse on him, but he is apparently aware of it now.

• Van Richten feels guilty. For decades he fought alongside others with monsters, completely unaware that he was a doombringer among them. Now that he knows, he is burdened by all the deaths he feels that his presence caused.

• Van Richten isolates himself. He doesn't let people get close to him for fear that his curse will take them out.

• If Van Richten is traveling with the party, he has excellent odds of surviving--if someone is going to die in the party, it'll be someone other than him.

• Van Richten's curse should have a tangible impact if he’s traveling with the party: he is a doombringer of the highest order. His mere presence among the party should invite tragedy and disaster.

The Tragedy of Ezmerelda and Van Richten. In the backstory that created Ezmerelda d’Avenir (Appendix D: Monsters and NPCs pages 230-231), there's a tragedy in there: Van Richten's curse could have been lifted years ago.

By Ravenloft Lore, the strongest of curses laid down by a Vistani can only be lifted by the Vistani who placed it, or a blood relative of that Vistani. Van Richten's curse was a Death Curse laid on him by Ezmerelda's mother. Only Ezmerelda has the ability to revoke the curse. But here's the problem...
Ezmerelda is Vistani...by nature; they are secretive about their abilities. Beyond that, Van Richten doesn't trust Vistani and likely commanded Ezmerelda to not use her Vistani abilities in his presence. As a result, Van Richten doesn't know how Vistani curses work--he doesn't know that they can be revoked by a blood relative of the one who laid it. He's a Cleric, he has undoubtedly tried remove curse on himself and it failed. As far as he knows, the curse is permanent.
Van Richten is also secretive and, as mentioned, doesn't trust the Vistani. He kept Ezmerelda at arm's length as best he could both because he couldn't trust her, but also to try to protect her from the curse...and even if he was aware of the curse when they traveled together, he never told her about it.

If either one of them had been less secretive, more open, his curse would have been revoked a long time ago.

If the players want to help Van Richten break the curse, here's the backstory:

The story of Ezmerelda and Van Richten's history was written in the Van Richten's Journal (Appendix F: Handouts pages 254-255). It involves him destroying Ezmerelda's caravan while she was very, very young. She survived the undead assault and later got picked up by another caravan of Vistani (it was actually the Zarovan tribe--Madam Eva's caravan). She originally wanted revenge on Van Richten, but time with Eva (and the presence of the most powerful Vistani of them all) showed her the tragedy of what had happened from an outside perspective. Ezmerelda realized that the whole thing was a horrible tragedy and wrongs had been committed on both sides. She, thus, set out to try to find Van Richten and try to make things right...though Eva never told her about the curse her mother had laid on Van Richten.

Van Richten and Ezmerelda must travel to the place the curse was first laid...a small clearing in the forests of Barovia where the ruins of Ezmerelda's caravan still lie. Both must verbally acknowledge the wrong that had been done and verbally forgive one another for it...then the remains of Ezmerelda's caravan must be burned.

THE DISGUISE:

Van Richten got the idea for “Rictavio” from his exposure to Ezmerelda and her occasional methods for blending in when going somewhere that didn't like Vistani. In short: "Sometimes the best disguise is being the most obvious thing in the room." As mentioned above, Ezmerelda has never encountered the Rictavio disguise and Van Richten isn't familiar with any of the disguises Ezmerelda is currently using.

It is a rather perfect disguise. Van Richten is known as a grim and serious individual, a dour old man who roves the world slaying monsters. “Rictavio” is a flamboyant fop who tells ludicrous stories, commits crimes against music, and is constantly trying to recruit people to his Circus of Wonders. He should be portrayed as extremely over the top and completely harmless. It should be very jarring to your players if he drops the act and reveals who he truly is.
Furthermore, Rictavio knows that even if someone suspects he's hiding something, they are extremely unlikely to guess the truth. If a player rolls well on Insight against him and figures out he's full of crap, that only tells them that he's lying about something...not what he is lying about. And his response is to just carry on and ignore accusations. Sure, the PCs may figure out that he's full of it (his stories are obvious fabrications) but he just carries right along, sticking to his guns even though the players know it’s a load of BS.

The players should have a hard time to get a serious read on Rictavio's personality. He strikes them as so straight forward--a carnie who is spinning tall tales for amusement. So they shouldn’t suspect that he's any more than what he appears to be.

A HARD MAN TO PIN DOWN:

Van Richten is a man with a plan for killing Strahd Von Zarovich, and it's a plan that plays well to his aged capabilities: "wait til Strahd takes a long nap, then stake him in his sleep." Of anyone in the valley, Van Richten knows how deadly Strahd is. He has fought elder vampires before and Strahd is the greatest of them all. He may very well believe that trying to fight him head on is pure folly, but he’s the one most capable of doing so.

It's important to note: Most of the "Destined Allies" the party can draw from Madame Eva’s Tarokka card reading have notes about how the PCs can get that individual to join them. Van Richten has no such notes. Instead, it says this...

Van Richten works alone. [...] Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure.

Van Richten is aware of Madame Eva but (unlike many others in the valley) he won't immediately cave to her prophecies, drop everything he has been working on, and throw his lot in with the PCs. Here are a few important things to keep in mind if the party is trying to recruit him...

• Van Richten is quite certain that if he drops his disguise, Strahd will find him and set out to kill him. (This is one of Strahd's Primary Goals as listed in Chapter 1)

• Van Richten's disguise is magically augmented. As long as the party can't get his hat off, they cannot prove that he’s not a carnie ringmaster

• Van Richten's disguise is only useful against Strahd as long as no one knows who he really is. The ring of mind shielding only works on him...it doesn't work on the PCs. He knows that if anyone else finds out, Strahd can charm them, read their mind or otherwise extract that information from them.

• Van Richten is fully aware of his curse. He will avoid physically joining up with the party for fear that he will get them all killed.

• Van Richten does not talk about his curse. He knows well the bravery of adventurers and that telling them about his curse tends to result in responses like "Oh, you don't need to worry about us, we're strong!" followed shortly by ":dying noises:." Rebuffing their advances without mentioning the curse is much more effective at getting them to stay away from him so his curse doesn't kill them.

• Even if Van Richten consents to offer them aid, it should be indirect as much as possible. He has his plan, he's set in his ways, and he’s not going to go gallivanting off with a bunch of young adventurers. And, he should stay in character as much as possible...blowing his cover will only bring Strahd down on him AND the PCs.

Ideally, even if the party can convince him to help...his help should primarily take the form of a surprisingly knowledgeable carnival ringmaster who is "certainly not going to go out and fight monsters with you. I'm a ringmaster, not an adventurer!"

He may lend the party his carnival wagon to travel around in (once he finds somewhere else to stash his saber-toothed tiger that has been trained to hunt Vistani, or he may lend them the tiger), give them helpful advice--possibly using ravens to stay in touch over long-distance if the PCs make friends with the Keepers of the Feather, and provide the sort of support that a Carnie could offer. But, it should take rather extreme circumstances for him to actually be honest with the PCs...and they may have to do something about his curse before he'll actually travel with them.

GETTING HIM TO JOIN UP:

Van Richten wants to stay under cover...so how does the party get him to change his mind?

Easy: Ruin his plan.

If Van Richten's cover is blown, his plan is a wash. The whole plan depends on his identity staying a secret until Strahd goes into hibernation. If Strahd identifies Van Richten before then, he will try to kill him and Van Richten is pretty sure he can't take Strahd in a straight-up fight. Thus...if Van Richten’s cover is blown, he is stuck with two bad choices: Either he tries to keep going it alone, possibly getting killed by Strahd, and fails his “final mission,” or he accepts the risk to the PCs and joins them to try to take Strahd down directly. A few example ways to blow his cover...

• Knock his hat off. A hat of disguise only works as long as it stays on your head, so if something happens that knocks his hat off; “Rictavio” is replaced by Van Richten.

• Let the Tyger Tyger event happen (chapter 5). When Rictavio flees to the Tower of Khazan, he's inside an antimagic field and cannot disguise himself.

• Even if Van Richten is distorting his voice, if the PCs have already befriended Ezmerelda, she may still recognize it...even if what she recognizes is the cadence his voice adopts when he's explaining something.

ABILITY LOADOUT:

Van Richten is a Cleric...and his listed prepared spells speaks more of a support caster than a monster hunter who has gone solo. But, because he's a Cleric, he can swap out his prepared spells at will to any other spells on the Cleric list. Here are a few notes on spells for him to use...

• Dawn creates sunlight. If he can lock a vampire down within the area of effect, they will be dust in short order.

• Dispel Evil and Good breaks a vampire's charm. However...things can't really leave Barovia, so the dismissal part of that spell won't be terribly effective here.

• Geas is useful when he needs to find something. For example, capture a werewolf then place a geas on it to lead them to the den.

• Lesser and Greater Restoration are enormously useful, as is remove curse.

• Guiding Bolt is a great weapon against Vampires. Shuts down their regeneration, and gives the next attack advantage.

• Hallow: If Van Richten can get his hands on the material components for this, he can create holy ground to help protect the PCs. Create a bubble of hallowed ground around the antimagic field that covers the Tower of Khazan....talk about a fortress. Sure, you'll have a bubble of non-hallowed ground where the antimagic field zone is...but the territory around the tower itself will be holy ground.

• Given his skill at predicting his foes...dropping sanctuary on a creature they are about to attack can completely trash their attempts.

• Spirit Guardians is another spell that is just....awesome.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Appearances==
===[[Campaign Setting]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[Ravenloft: Realm of Terror]]
**[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting (Box)]]

===[[Modules]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[The Nightmare Lands (Boxed Set)]] (referenced only)
**[[Chilling Tales]]
**[[Dungeon Magazine #55]]: [[The Sea Wolf]]
**[[Bleak House: The Death of Rudolph Van Richten]]
*[[4th Edition]]
**[[Dragon magazine #416 (Online)]]: [[Strahd and Van Richten]]
*[[5th Edition]]
**[[Curse of Strahd]]
**[[Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft]]

===[[Novels]], stories===

*[[Tales of Ravenloft]]: [[The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]
*[[I, Strahd: The War Against Azalin]]

==Authored:==

* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Witches (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Witches]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Demons]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]]''

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (NPC)

2022-02-02T12:47:15Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* Authored: */

[[File:Original VR.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
[[File:Rudolph van richten.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten and [[Strahd]] by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
{{canon}}
'''Dr. Rudolph Van Richten''' is the greatest monster hunter that has ever lived and the most well-known hero of the Lands of the Mists.

==History==
He was born in [[Rivalis]] in [[Darkon]] in [[671 BC]]. He took [[medicine]] at the [[University of Il Aluk]], completing his four or five year program of study in [[693 BC]]. This humble man was spurred into a life of monster hunting when his son [[Erasmus van Richten]] was kidnapped by the [[Radanavich clan]] and sold to [[Baron Metus]]. Metus turned Erasmus into a [[vampire groom]] and Van Richten was forced to slay his son. In revenge, Metus killed Rudolph's wife, [[Ingrid van Richten]]. Van Richten eventually slew Metus, and then, with the help of [[Azalin]], the entire [[Radanavich tribe]].

Until his disappearance in [[750 BC]], he resided in [[Mordentshire]], where he ran an [[Van Richten's Herbalist Shop|herbalist shop]], as well as wrote several of his famous [[Van Richten's Guides]], and mentored [[The Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]], who regarded him as an uncle and took up his work.

==In [[Curse of Strahd]]==
Dr. van Richten makes a notable appearance in the [[5th Edition]] [[module]], [[Curse of Strahd]], though not in his [[famous]] persona as the monster hunter and [[writer]] of the [[Van Richten's Guides]] he is notable for in previous Ravenloft products. Instead, he adopts the guise of [[Rictavio]], a traveling [[half-elf]] [[bard]], [[storyteller]], and [[ringmaster]] gathering stories and watching out for talent. In reality he is gathering formation and waiting for an optimal time to strike at [[Strahd]], preferably when the vampire lord is in [[hibernation]]. Unlike other versions of van Richten, the Curse of Strahd van Richten is a [[loner]] because he knows the full extent of his [[curse]].<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> For more details, see [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Curse of Strahd)]]

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Appearances==
===[[Campaign Setting]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[Ravenloft: Realm of Terror]]
**[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting (Box)]]

===[[Modules]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[The Nightmare Lands (Boxed Set)]] (referenced only)
**[[Chilling Tales]]
**[[Dungeon Magazine #55]]: [[The Sea Wolf]]
**[[Bleak House: The Death of Rudolph Van Richten]]

===[[Novels]], stories===

*[[Tales of Ravenloft]]: [[The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]
*[[I, Strahd: The War Against Azalin]]

==Authored:==

* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Witches (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Witches]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Demons]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]]''

Credited for marketing purposes with:
* ''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Mists (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Mists]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead]]''

==[[Associate of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]==

==Chronology==

[[671 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten born<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, son of Otto and Mrs. Van Richten
 
{{Spec|[[678 BC]] - Rudolph’s sister [[Maria Van Richten]] born.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 18 "Speculation based on BH. We only know that she is younger than Rudolph."</ref>
 

[[679 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten sent to boarding school in [[Nartok]]. A childhood friend is [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]].<ref name="VRMHCII p.25-26">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 25-26</ref>

[[680 BC]] - [[Casimir (of Richten Haus)|Casimir]] (not to be confused with [[Casimir Lukas|Harkon Lukas’ son]]) starts working at Richten Haus as the gate keeper.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 6">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 6</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[683 BC]] - The servants of [[Richten Haus]] are all killed while the family is away one day. (summer)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.18: "Speculation based on [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] pg. 15, 24: I’m going on the hunch that VR grows younger until he reaches the age he was at when this event occurred"</ref>
 

[[685 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten meets [[Robert Tatenna]], a fellow student at boarding school. (fall)<ref name="CT p.14">[[Chilling Tales]] p.14</ref>

[[688 BC]] - The [[The Crimson Death Epidemic | Crimson Death]] spreads across Darkon (winter); it claims Van Richten’s great aunt Helga, despite his efforts; Rudolph is even more driven into his medical studies.<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[689 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten attends the [[University of Il Aluk]]. While there, he meets a fellow student, [[Dr. Harmon Ruscheider]]. (fall)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]] pg. 15"</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[691 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten marries his childhood sweetheart, [[Ingrid van Richten|Ingrid]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "[[Realm of Terror]]; [[VRGtV]]: Give VR a good respectable year between their marriage and birth of Erasmus in 692"</ref>
 

[[692 BC]] - Rudolph and Ingrid Van Richten's son [[Erasmus van Richten|Erasmus]] is born.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]] p. 4; [[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 8, "fourteen summers" before [[706 BC]]</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[693 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten finishes his studies; opens his practice back home in [[Rivalis]].}},<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VR’s age, RoT; VRGtV; and ToDm pg. 86, which indicates it takes 4-5 years to get a medical education at the University of Il Aluk"</ref> 
 
{{Spec|693 BC - Dr. Van Richten travels to [[Lamordia]], hears of the [[Loud Man of Lamordia]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VRGtG pg. 9: “When I was young.”</ref> 

[[696 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Antonin Madren]] and becomes his mentor.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 21: "VRGttC pg. 6: Van Richten takes Madren on as a medical student, which implies Van Richten has time to offer such an education (which lasts up to 8 years), i.e., while he was still a simple doctor (693-706)."</ref>

[[706 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten suffers the wrath of the [[Radanavich clan]]; the Vistani steal his son Erasmus; they sell Erasmus to [[Baron Metus]]<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, a vampire from [[Richemulot]]; with the help of an amused [[Azalin]], Van Richten wipes out all but one member of the Radanavich caravan<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]</ref>; [[Madame Radanavich]] [[curse | curses]] Van Richten<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, although he doesn’t realize it until the end of his career.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

[[706 BC]] Van Richten puts his Erasmus, now a vampire, out of his misery, but in spite [[Baron Metus]] tears [[Ingrid van Richten]] to pieces; Dr. Van Richten destroys Baron Metus, starting his career of hunting evil. Unable to live with the memories in [[Richten Haus]], Van Richten moves to [[Corvia]].<ref name="VRA p. 5">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 5</ref>

[[707 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten researches vampires, and meets [[Aimon Davidovitch]], a fellow scholar of the arcane.<ref> from [[JWM Timeline]] p.22: "[[VRGtF]] pg. 4: VR knew him for “some 30-odd years”]</ref>

[[710 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten encounters his first werebeast near [[Varithne]], a small village in northern [[Darkon]]. Dr. Van Richten starts hunting werebeasts as well<ref name="VRMHC p. 109-110">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 109-110</ref>

[[711 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Gedlan Ironheart]], a fearless [[dwarven]] [[innkeeper]] in [[Corvia]]. Gedlan becomes a frequent hunting companion.<ref name="Bleah House p. 11">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p.11</ref>

[[712 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets the mage [[Shauten]]; they bond when they are attacked by one of Azalin's patrols. Shauten opens Van Richten's eyes to the existence of the [[Lich]].<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref>

[[713 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten is visited by the dying Dr. Ruscheider, who tells Rudolph all he can about several months spent as a lich's captive; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting liches.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p.111-112</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[714 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten receives a visit from his childhood friend, [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]], who is now a ghostly slave to Azalin; Dr. Van Richten learns the terrible truth about [[Azalin Rex]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on [[VRGtG]] pg. 22, [[VRMHCII]] pg. 24</ref>
 

{{Spec|714 BC - Dr. Van Richten moves to [[Mordentshire]], sensing it is politically unsafe for him to remain in [[Darkon]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on VRGttL pg. 22</ref>
 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[716 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 3 n1">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade after her death, but [[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[718 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and [[Shauten]] battle a creature they believe to be a priestly [[lich]]; it is actually Van Richten's first [[ancient dead]]}}.<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] "Speculation based on VRGAD pg. 5: “Some years ago,” and other markers. It happened after VR started hunting liches, but before he started hunting ghosts. (The latter conclusion taken from numerous references to Claudia in this Guide"</ref>
 
[[724 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten battles the [[Bog Monster of Hroth]], and meets [[Jameld of Hroth|Jameld]]. This is also Van Richten's first visit to both [[Kartakass]] and [[Sithicus]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p.153</ref> 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[726 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decade n1">[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades after her death but[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade</ref> 

{{Spec|726 BC - Dr. Van Richten visits [[Sanguinia]] with [[George Weathermay]] and [[Arametrius]]; they meet [[Claudia DeShanes]]; Claudia becomes Rudolph’s assistant, and it seems he had certain unspoken feelings for her.}}<ref>Speculation from JWM Timeline p.28: "Since Arametrius is probably [[Athasian]], Van Richten may have recently visited [[Kalidnay]] and encountered [[Ahmose Tanit]]. [VRGtG pg. 73. This is the earliest possible date for this event (due to George’s inclusion, and we know from this source and BH that VR starts hunting ghosts one year after this event. That leaves only 9 years between VR starting to hunt and writing his Guide on the subject. I chose to go with this date to keep as wide a margin of opportunity as possible.]"</ref>
 

[[727 BC]] - [[Merilee Markuza]], the Child [[Vampire]], kills Claudia. Van Richten pursues the creature relentlessly, but loses her in [[Lamordia]].<ref name="Darklords p. 63">[[Darklords]] p. 63</ref>

727 BC - While hunting the Child Vampire, Van Richten witnesses the [[Thundering Carriage]]; Van Richten decides he must put an end to these ghostly horrors, too.<ref name="Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts p. 6">[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 6</ref>

[[728 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten defeats the [[Phantom Army]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 91</ref>

[[729 BC]] - The fiend [[Elsepeth]] enters Ravenloft via [[transposition]] in a small village outside [[Stangengrad]], near the [[Grashen Falls]] (sept)<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.28: "[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] pg. 14: the diary is dated “twelve years ago.”</ref>

[[730 BC]] - {{Spec|[[Gedlan Ironheart]] killed while battling evil spirits.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: "VRGtG pg. 23: Gedlan is referred to as “Geddar” in this book. The date is an estimate based on the 727-736 available time span."</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] leaves [[Borca]], having lurked there for years.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] p. 66</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] writes to Van Richten about the death of Madren’s sister.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[734 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] shows up on Van Richten's doorstep, and gives the good doctor his notes; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting the [[Created]].}}<ref>JWM Timeline p. 30: "VRGttC pg. 6: Estimate. “Years” after Madren wrote about his sister’s death"</ref> 

[[735 BC] - Dr. Van Richten is forced to kill his old friend [[Shauten]] in self-defense, when Shauten tries to sacrifice Rudolph in a bid for [[lichdom]]<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref><ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>. {{Spec|This "near-miss" may have inspired Van Richten to start recording his collected knowledge for heroes to come.}}<ref>JWM Timeline: "Speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6"</ref>

735 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''.<ref name="RLCS p.18">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.18</ref><ref name="RLPHB p.20">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.20</ref>

[[736 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''.

[[737 BC]] - The [[Vistana]] [[Cyrilla]]'s niece [[Vassa]] is [[kidnapped]] near [[Corvia]].<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 20: The golem appeared “the following year” after Vaasa’s soul is taken."</ref>

737 BC - [[Vassa]] returns as a [[clay golem]]; Cyrilla writes to Dr. Van Richten.<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 19 "just last year"</ref>

737 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''.

[[738 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''.

[[738 BC]] [[Emil Bollenbach]] engineers the [[kidnapping]] of Dr. Rudolph van Richten to the end of seizing his [[brain]] for [[transplantation]] into a super-golem. fortunately, several of Van Richten's friends intercede to thwart Dr. Bollenbach.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 33: "[[Children of the Night: The Created]] pg. 50; CT pg. 32 places this adventure 8 years after Emil’s disappearance (i.e., 746), but the dating used in CotN:C fits VR’s chronology better.</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] goes to [[Nartok]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 67-68">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.67-68</ref>

[[739 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and the adventuring band known as [[the Hand (Adventurer Band)|the Hand]] hunt and destroy [[the Gibbering Golem]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 265-276">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.265-276</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]] publishes ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''. This act earns him considerable ire from [[Agatha Clairmont]], whom sees it as an instruction manual to building [[dread golem]]s just much as it is hunting them.<ref name="Van Richten's Arsenal p. 149">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p. 149</ref>

[[740 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]'' (early spring).

740 BC - Dr. Van Richten inherits the [[library (Aimon Davidovitch)]] of [[Aimon Davidovitch]]. Dr. Van Richten starts studying tomes. (Sept)<ref>JWM Timeline p. 35 "Extrapolated from VRGtF pg. 4"</ref>

[[741 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]], [[Davvyd]], [[Samuel]] and [[Dr. Ottelie Farringer]] battle the fiend [[Drigor]]. Only Dr. van Richten survives. (Feb.)<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 79-85">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p. 79-85</ref>

741 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]]''.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Book)]] p.4</ref>

741 BC - [[Van Richten]] stumbles into the clutches of [[the nameless Amnizu]] and [[the nameless Barbazu]] infesting [[Chateaufaux]]. He is captured. However, he manages to join with some [[adventurer]]s to route the [[devil]]s from the town.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.72-73; Note that the encounter with these [[fiend]]s doesn't appear in the original uncompiled Van Richten's Guide to Fiends. Therefore, the encounter with the [[Fiends of Chateaufaux]] took place after took place after the first VRGtF was published.</ref><ref>[[Gazetteer III]] p.30-31, "just over 15 years ago"</ref>

741 BC<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> - Dr. Van Richten is [[depressed]]; he consults with the [[diviner]], [[Inarin Alster]]; Rudolph realizes he had been laboring under a [[curse]] all these years; Dr. Van Richten spends a year with [[Arturi Radanavich]] studying the Vistani.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]] p.5-7; 87-89</ref>

[[742 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten writes his ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]'' and retires.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> (Oct.)

[[750 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten dies in [[Richten Haus|Bleak House]] in the fight against [[Madame Radanavich]]<ref>[[Domains of Dread]] p. 17, as told in [[Bleak House]], particularly [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 58-63</ref> Meanwhile, all that is known to most, including the [[Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]] is that he [[disappeared]].<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

{{ref}}

[[category:Character]] [[category:NPC]]
[[category:2nd Edition Character]]
[[category:3rd Edition Character]]
[[category:4th Edition Character]]
[[category:5th Edition Character]]
[[category:Abused]]
[[category:Betrayed]]
[[Category:Cursed]]
[[category:Cursed by the Vistani]]
[[Category:Darkonian]]
[[Category:Demonologist]]
[[category:Energy Drained]]
[[Category:Filicide]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Rivalis]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Nartok]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Forest of Shadows]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Darkon]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordentshire]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordent]]
[[Category:Former Patients of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Dominia]]
[[Category:Former Medical Student]]
[[Category:Former Student of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[category:Gaslighted]]
[[category:Giogoto]]
[[Category:Ghost]]
[[Category:Graduate of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Graduate]]
[[Category:Herbalist]]
[[Category:Human]]
[[category:healer]]
[[category:Hero]]
[[Category:Hunter Of Monsters]]
[[Category:Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[category:Intellectual]]
[[Category:Kidnapped]]
[[category:Killer]]
[[category:Lorist]]
[[Category:Male]]
[[category:Mass Murderer]]
[[category:Medical Doctor]]
[[category:Medical Professional]]
[[category:Mentor]]
[[category:Murderer]]
[[Category:Necrologist]]
[[category:Old]]
[[Category:Planar Mechanic]]
[[category:Polymath]]
[[category:Posthumous Character]]
[[category:Potential Darklord]]
[[Category:Proprietor]]
[[category:Professional Killer]]
[[category:Punished]]
[[category:Ravenloft Lorist]]
[[Category:Ravenloft Loremaster]]
[[category:Redeemed]]
[[category:Reformed]]
[[category:Repentant]]
[[category:Researcher]]
[[category:Retired]]
[[Category:Rogue]]
[[category:Sage]]
[[category:Seduced]]
[[Category:Stasis]]
[[category:Tempted]]
[[category:Transgressed]]
[[category:Transgressor]]
[[Category:Van Richten Family]]
[[category:Victim of Medical Malpractice]]
[[Category:Victim of the van Richten Curse]]
[[category:Victimized]]
[[Category:Widowed]]
[[Category:writer]]
[[category:Births in 671 BC]]
[[category:Deaths in 750 BC]]
<references/>

==Data from the Ravenloft Catalogue==



{|
|-valign="top"
|[[Image:rldb_npc.jpg]]
|[[Image:rldb_primary.gif]]
|
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' 
''[[Bleak House]]''
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_art.gif]]
|
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - p4 
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - cover, p4 
''[[Bleak House:Homecoming]]'' - p4,p16 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - p7,8 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p92 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - p114 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 5,11 
''[[The Created]]'' - p13 
''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]'' - p5
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_stats.gif]]
|
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - pp4-5 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p91 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 3
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_desc.gif]]
|
''[[Ravenloft Third Edition]]'' - pp14,17-18,27,176 
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - throughout 
''[[Bleak House]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to The Created]]'' - throughout 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]'' - throughout 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - pp91-93 
''[[Tales of Ravenloft: The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]'' - pp1-17 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - pp 2-3 
''[[Heroes of Light]]'' - p64 
''[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]]'' - pp1-4, pp9-13, pp304-310
|-valign="top"
|}

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (NPC)

2022-02-02T12:42:25Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* Authored: */

[[File:Original VR.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
[[File:Rudolph van richten.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten and [[Strahd]] by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
{{canon}}
'''Dr. Rudolph Van Richten''' is the greatest monster hunter that has ever lived and the most well-known hero of the Lands of the Mists.

==History==
He was born in [[Rivalis]] in [[Darkon]] in [[671 BC]]. He took [[medicine]] at the [[University of Il Aluk]], completing his four or five year program of study in [[693 BC]]. This humble man was spurred into a life of monster hunting when his son [[Erasmus van Richten]] was kidnapped by the [[Radanavich clan]] and sold to [[Baron Metus]]. Metus turned Erasmus into a [[vampire groom]] and Van Richten was forced to slay his son. In revenge, Metus killed Rudolph's wife, [[Ingrid van Richten]]. Van Richten eventually slew Metus, and then, with the help of [[Azalin]], the entire [[Radanavich tribe]].

Until his disappearance in [[750 BC]], he resided in [[Mordentshire]], where he ran an [[Van Richten's Herbalist Shop|herbalist shop]], as well as wrote several of his famous [[Van Richten's Guides]], and mentored [[The Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]], who regarded him as an uncle and took up his work.

==In [[Curse of Strahd]]==
Dr. van Richten makes a notable appearance in the [[5th Edition]] [[module]], [[Curse of Strahd]], though not in his [[famous]] persona as the monster hunter and [[writer]] of the [[Van Richten's Guides]] he is notable for in previous Ravenloft products. Instead, he adopts the guise of [[Rictavio]], a traveling [[half-elf]] [[bard]], [[storyteller]], and [[ringmaster]] gathering stories and watching out for talent. In reality he is gathering formation and waiting for an optimal time to strike at [[Strahd]], preferably when the vampire lord is in [[hibernation]]. Unlike other versions of van Richten, the Curse of Strahd van Richten is a [[loner]] because he knows the full extent of his [[curse]].<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> For more details, see [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Curse of Strahd)]]

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Appearances==
===[[Campaign Setting]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[Ravenloft: Realm of Terror]]
**[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting (Box)]]

===[[Modules]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[The Nightmare Lands (Boxed Set)]] (referenced only)
**[[Chilling Tales]]
**[[Dungeon Magazine #55]]: [[The Sea Wolf]]
**[[Bleak House: The Death of Rudolph Van Richten]]

===[[Novels]], stories===

*[[Tales of Ravenloft]]: [[The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]
*[[I, Strahd: The War Against Azalin]]

==Authored:==

* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Witches (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Witches]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]]''

Credited for marketing purposes with:
* ''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Mists (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Mists]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead]]''

==[[Associate of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]==

==Chronology==

[[671 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten born<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, son of Otto and Mrs. Van Richten
 
{{Spec|[[678 BC]] - Rudolph’s sister [[Maria Van Richten]] born.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 18 "Speculation based on BH. We only know that she is younger than Rudolph."</ref>
 

[[679 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten sent to boarding school in [[Nartok]]. A childhood friend is [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]].<ref name="VRMHCII p.25-26">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 25-26</ref>

[[680 BC]] - [[Casimir (of Richten Haus)|Casimir]] (not to be confused with [[Casimir Lukas|Harkon Lukas’ son]]) starts working at Richten Haus as the gate keeper.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 6">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 6</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[683 BC]] - The servants of [[Richten Haus]] are all killed while the family is away one day. (summer)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.18: "Speculation based on [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] pg. 15, 24: I’m going on the hunch that VR grows younger until he reaches the age he was at when this event occurred"</ref>
 

[[685 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten meets [[Robert Tatenna]], a fellow student at boarding school. (fall)<ref name="CT p.14">[[Chilling Tales]] p.14</ref>

[[688 BC]] - The [[The Crimson Death Epidemic | Crimson Death]] spreads across Darkon (winter); it claims Van Richten’s great aunt Helga, despite his efforts; Rudolph is even more driven into his medical studies.<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[689 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten attends the [[University of Il Aluk]]. While there, he meets a fellow student, [[Dr. Harmon Ruscheider]]. (fall)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]] pg. 15"</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[691 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten marries his childhood sweetheart, [[Ingrid van Richten|Ingrid]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "[[Realm of Terror]]; [[VRGtV]]: Give VR a good respectable year between their marriage and birth of Erasmus in 692"</ref>
 

[[692 BC]] - Rudolph and Ingrid Van Richten's son [[Erasmus van Richten|Erasmus]] is born.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]] p. 4; [[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 8, "fourteen summers" before [[706 BC]]</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[693 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten finishes his studies; opens his practice back home in [[Rivalis]].}},<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VR’s age, RoT; VRGtV; and ToDm pg. 86, which indicates it takes 4-5 years to get a medical education at the University of Il Aluk"</ref> 
 
{{Spec|693 BC - Dr. Van Richten travels to [[Lamordia]], hears of the [[Loud Man of Lamordia]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VRGtG pg. 9: “When I was young.”</ref> 

[[696 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Antonin Madren]] and becomes his mentor.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 21: "VRGttC pg. 6: Van Richten takes Madren on as a medical student, which implies Van Richten has time to offer such an education (which lasts up to 8 years), i.e., while he was still a simple doctor (693-706)."</ref>

[[706 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten suffers the wrath of the [[Radanavich clan]]; the Vistani steal his son Erasmus; they sell Erasmus to [[Baron Metus]]<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, a vampire from [[Richemulot]]; with the help of an amused [[Azalin]], Van Richten wipes out all but one member of the Radanavich caravan<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]</ref>; [[Madame Radanavich]] [[curse | curses]] Van Richten<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, although he doesn’t realize it until the end of his career.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

[[706 BC]] Van Richten puts his Erasmus, now a vampire, out of his misery, but in spite [[Baron Metus]] tears [[Ingrid van Richten]] to pieces; Dr. Van Richten destroys Baron Metus, starting his career of hunting evil. Unable to live with the memories in [[Richten Haus]], Van Richten moves to [[Corvia]].<ref name="VRA p. 5">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 5</ref>

[[707 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten researches vampires, and meets [[Aimon Davidovitch]], a fellow scholar of the arcane.<ref> from [[JWM Timeline]] p.22: "[[VRGtF]] pg. 4: VR knew him for “some 30-odd years”]</ref>

[[710 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten encounters his first werebeast near [[Varithne]], a small village in northern [[Darkon]]. Dr. Van Richten starts hunting werebeasts as well<ref name="VRMHC p. 109-110">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 109-110</ref>

[[711 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Gedlan Ironheart]], a fearless [[dwarven]] [[innkeeper]] in [[Corvia]]. Gedlan becomes a frequent hunting companion.<ref name="Bleah House p. 11">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p.11</ref>

[[712 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets the mage [[Shauten]]; they bond when they are attacked by one of Azalin's patrols. Shauten opens Van Richten's eyes to the existence of the [[Lich]].<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref>

[[713 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten is visited by the dying Dr. Ruscheider, who tells Rudolph all he can about several months spent as a lich's captive; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting liches.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p.111-112</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[714 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten receives a visit from his childhood friend, [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]], who is now a ghostly slave to Azalin; Dr. Van Richten learns the terrible truth about [[Azalin Rex]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on [[VRGtG]] pg. 22, [[VRMHCII]] pg. 24</ref>
 

{{Spec|714 BC - Dr. Van Richten moves to [[Mordentshire]], sensing it is politically unsafe for him to remain in [[Darkon]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on VRGttL pg. 22</ref>
 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[716 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 3 n1">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade after her death, but [[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[718 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and [[Shauten]] battle a creature they believe to be a priestly [[lich]]; it is actually Van Richten's first [[ancient dead]]}}.<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] "Speculation based on VRGAD pg. 5: “Some years ago,” and other markers. It happened after VR started hunting liches, but before he started hunting ghosts. (The latter conclusion taken from numerous references to Claudia in this Guide"</ref>
 
[[724 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten battles the [[Bog Monster of Hroth]], and meets [[Jameld of Hroth|Jameld]]. This is also Van Richten's first visit to both [[Kartakass]] and [[Sithicus]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p.153</ref> 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[726 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decade n1">[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades after her death but[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade</ref> 

{{Spec|726 BC - Dr. Van Richten visits [[Sanguinia]] with [[George Weathermay]] and [[Arametrius]]; they meet [[Claudia DeShanes]]; Claudia becomes Rudolph’s assistant, and it seems he had certain unspoken feelings for her.}}<ref>Speculation from JWM Timeline p.28: "Since Arametrius is probably [[Athasian]], Van Richten may have recently visited [[Kalidnay]] and encountered [[Ahmose Tanit]]. [VRGtG pg. 73. This is the earliest possible date for this event (due to George’s inclusion, and we know from this source and BH that VR starts hunting ghosts one year after this event. That leaves only 9 years between VR starting to hunt and writing his Guide on the subject. I chose to go with this date to keep as wide a margin of opportunity as possible.]"</ref>
 

[[727 BC]] - [[Merilee Markuza]], the Child [[Vampire]], kills Claudia. Van Richten pursues the creature relentlessly, but loses her in [[Lamordia]].<ref name="Darklords p. 63">[[Darklords]] p. 63</ref>

727 BC - While hunting the Child Vampire, Van Richten witnesses the [[Thundering Carriage]]; Van Richten decides he must put an end to these ghostly horrors, too.<ref name="Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts p. 6">[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 6</ref>

[[728 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten defeats the [[Phantom Army]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 91</ref>

[[729 BC]] - The fiend [[Elsepeth]] enters Ravenloft via [[transposition]] in a small village outside [[Stangengrad]], near the [[Grashen Falls]] (sept)<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.28: "[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] pg. 14: the diary is dated “twelve years ago.”</ref>

[[730 BC]] - {{Spec|[[Gedlan Ironheart]] killed while battling evil spirits.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: "VRGtG pg. 23: Gedlan is referred to as “Geddar” in this book. The date is an estimate based on the 727-736 available time span."</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] leaves [[Borca]], having lurked there for years.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] p. 66</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] writes to Van Richten about the death of Madren’s sister.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[734 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] shows up on Van Richten's doorstep, and gives the good doctor his notes; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting the [[Created]].}}<ref>JWM Timeline p. 30: "VRGttC pg. 6: Estimate. “Years” after Madren wrote about his sister’s death"</ref> 

[[735 BC] - Dr. Van Richten is forced to kill his old friend [[Shauten]] in self-defense, when Shauten tries to sacrifice Rudolph in a bid for [[lichdom]]<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref><ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>. {{Spec|This "near-miss" may have inspired Van Richten to start recording his collected knowledge for heroes to come.}}<ref>JWM Timeline: "Speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6"</ref>

735 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''.<ref name="RLCS p.18">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.18</ref><ref name="RLPHB p.20">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.20</ref>

[[736 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''.

[[737 BC]] - The [[Vistana]] [[Cyrilla]]'s niece [[Vassa]] is [[kidnapped]] near [[Corvia]].<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 20: The golem appeared “the following year” after Vaasa’s soul is taken."</ref>

737 BC - [[Vassa]] returns as a [[clay golem]]; Cyrilla writes to Dr. Van Richten.<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 19 "just last year"</ref>

737 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''.

[[738 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''.

[[738 BC]] [[Emil Bollenbach]] engineers the [[kidnapping]] of Dr. Rudolph van Richten to the end of seizing his [[brain]] for [[transplantation]] into a super-golem. fortunately, several of Van Richten's friends intercede to thwart Dr. Bollenbach.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 33: "[[Children of the Night: The Created]] pg. 50; CT pg. 32 places this adventure 8 years after Emil’s disappearance (i.e., 746), but the dating used in CotN:C fits VR’s chronology better.</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] goes to [[Nartok]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 67-68">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.67-68</ref>

[[739 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and the adventuring band known as [[the Hand (Adventurer Band)|the Hand]] hunt and destroy [[the Gibbering Golem]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 265-276">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.265-276</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]] publishes ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''. This act earns him considerable ire from [[Agatha Clairmont]], whom sees it as an instruction manual to building [[dread golem]]s just much as it is hunting them.<ref name="Van Richten's Arsenal p. 149">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p. 149</ref>

[[740 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]'' (early spring).

740 BC - Dr. Van Richten inherits the [[library (Aimon Davidovitch)]] of [[Aimon Davidovitch]]. Dr. Van Richten starts studying tomes. (Sept)<ref>JWM Timeline p. 35 "Extrapolated from VRGtF pg. 4"</ref>

[[741 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]], [[Davvyd]], [[Samuel]] and [[Dr. Ottelie Farringer]] battle the fiend [[Drigor]]. Only Dr. van Richten survives. (Feb.)<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 79-85">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p. 79-85</ref>

741 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]]''.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Book)]] p.4</ref>

741 BC - [[Van Richten]] stumbles into the clutches of [[the nameless Amnizu]] and [[the nameless Barbazu]] infesting [[Chateaufaux]]. He is captured. However, he manages to join with some [[adventurer]]s to route the [[devil]]s from the town.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.72-73; Note that the encounter with these [[fiend]]s doesn't appear in the original uncompiled Van Richten's Guide to Fiends. Therefore, the encounter with the [[Fiends of Chateaufaux]] took place after took place after the first VRGtF was published.</ref><ref>[[Gazetteer III]] p.30-31, "just over 15 years ago"</ref>

741 BC<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> - Dr. Van Richten is [[depressed]]; he consults with the [[diviner]], [[Inarin Alster]]; Rudolph realizes he had been laboring under a [[curse]] all these years; Dr. Van Richten spends a year with [[Arturi Radanavich]] studying the Vistani.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]] p.5-7; 87-89</ref>

[[742 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten writes his ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]'' and retires.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> (Oct.)

[[750 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten dies in [[Richten Haus|Bleak House]] in the fight against [[Madame Radanavich]]<ref>[[Domains of Dread]] p. 17, as told in [[Bleak House]], particularly [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 58-63</ref> Meanwhile, all that is known to most, including the [[Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]] is that he [[disappeared]].<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

{{ref}}

[[category:Character]] [[category:NPC]]
[[category:2nd Edition Character]]
[[category:3rd Edition Character]]
[[category:4th Edition Character]]
[[category:5th Edition Character]]
[[category:Abused]]
[[category:Betrayed]]
[[Category:Cursed]]
[[category:Cursed by the Vistani]]
[[Category:Darkonian]]
[[Category:Demonologist]]
[[category:Energy Drained]]
[[Category:Filicide]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Rivalis]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Nartok]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Forest of Shadows]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Darkon]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordentshire]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordent]]
[[Category:Former Patients of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Dominia]]
[[Category:Former Medical Student]]
[[Category:Former Student of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[category:Gaslighted]]
[[category:Giogoto]]
[[Category:Ghost]]
[[Category:Graduate of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Graduate]]
[[Category:Herbalist]]
[[Category:Human]]
[[category:healer]]
[[category:Hero]]
[[Category:Hunter Of Monsters]]
[[Category:Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[category:Intellectual]]
[[Category:Kidnapped]]
[[category:Killer]]
[[category:Lorist]]
[[Category:Male]]
[[category:Mass Murderer]]
[[category:Medical Doctor]]
[[category:Medical Professional]]
[[category:Mentor]]
[[category:Murderer]]
[[Category:Necrologist]]
[[category:Old]]
[[Category:Planar Mechanic]]
[[category:Polymath]]
[[category:Posthumous Character]]
[[category:Potential Darklord]]
[[Category:Proprietor]]
[[category:Professional Killer]]
[[category:Punished]]
[[category:Ravenloft Lorist]]
[[Category:Ravenloft Loremaster]]
[[category:Redeemed]]
[[category:Reformed]]
[[category:Repentant]]
[[category:Researcher]]
[[category:Retired]]
[[Category:Rogue]]
[[category:Sage]]
[[category:Seduced]]
[[Category:Stasis]]
[[category:Tempted]]
[[category:Transgressed]]
[[category:Transgressor]]
[[Category:Van Richten Family]]
[[category:Victim of Medical Malpractice]]
[[Category:Victim of the van Richten Curse]]
[[category:Victimized]]
[[Category:Widowed]]
[[Category:writer]]
[[category:Births in 671 BC]]
[[category:Deaths in 750 BC]]
<references/>

==Data from the Ravenloft Catalogue==



{|
|-valign="top"
|[[Image:rldb_npc.jpg]]
|[[Image:rldb_primary.gif]]
|
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' 
''[[Bleak House]]''
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_art.gif]]
|
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - p4 
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - cover, p4 
''[[Bleak House:Homecoming]]'' - p4,p16 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - p7,8 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p92 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - p114 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 5,11 
''[[The Created]]'' - p13 
''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]'' - p5
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_stats.gif]]
|
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - pp4-5 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p91 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 3
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_desc.gif]]
|
''[[Ravenloft Third Edition]]'' - pp14,17-18,27,176 
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - throughout 
''[[Bleak House]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to The Created]]'' - throughout 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]'' - throughout 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - pp91-93 
''[[Tales of Ravenloft: The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]'' - pp1-17 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - pp 2-3 
''[[Heroes of Light]]'' - p64 
''[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]]'' - pp1-4, pp9-13, pp304-310
|-valign="top"
|}

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (NPC)

2022-02-02T12:29:56Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* Authored: */

[[File:Original VR.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
[[File:Rudolph van richten.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten and [[Strahd]] by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
{{canon}}
'''Dr. Rudolph Van Richten''' is the greatest monster hunter that has ever lived and the most well-known hero of the Lands of the Mists.

==History==
He was born in [[Rivalis]] in [[Darkon]] in [[671 BC]]. He took [[medicine]] at the [[University of Il Aluk]], completing his four or five year program of study in [[693 BC]]. This humble man was spurred into a life of monster hunting when his son [[Erasmus van Richten]] was kidnapped by the [[Radanavich clan]] and sold to [[Baron Metus]]. Metus turned Erasmus into a [[vampire groom]] and Van Richten was forced to slay his son. In revenge, Metus killed Rudolph's wife, [[Ingrid van Richten]]. Van Richten eventually slew Metus, and then, with the help of [[Azalin]], the entire [[Radanavich tribe]].

Until his disappearance in [[750 BC]], he resided in [[Mordentshire]], where he ran an [[Van Richten's Herbalist Shop|herbalist shop]], as well as wrote several of his famous [[Van Richten's Guides]], and mentored [[The Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]], who regarded him as an uncle and took up his work.

==In [[Curse of Strahd]]==
Dr. van Richten makes a notable appearance in the [[5th Edition]] [[module]], [[Curse of Strahd]], though not in his [[famous]] persona as the monster hunter and [[writer]] of the [[Van Richten's Guides]] he is notable for in previous Ravenloft products. Instead, he adopts the guise of [[Rictavio]], a traveling [[half-elf]] [[bard]], [[storyteller]], and [[ringmaster]] gathering stories and watching out for talent. In reality he is gathering formation and waiting for an optimal time to strike at [[Strahd]], preferably when the vampire lord is in [[hibernation]]. Unlike other versions of van Richten, the Curse of Strahd van Richten is a [[loner]] because he knows the full extent of his [[curse]].<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> For more details, see [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Curse of Strahd)]]

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Appearances==
===[[Campaign Setting]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[Ravenloft: Realm of Terror]]
**[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting (Box)]]

===[[Modules]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[The Nightmare Lands (Boxed Set)]] (referenced only)
**[[Chilling Tales]]
**[[Dungeon Magazine #55]]: [[The Sea Wolf]]
**[[Bleak House: The Death of Rudolph Van Richten]]

===[[Novels]], stories===

*[[Tales of Ravenloft]]: [[The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]
*[[I, Strahd: The War Against Azalin]]

==Authored:==

* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Demons]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Witches (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Witches]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]]''

Credited for marketing purposes with:
* ''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Mists (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Mists]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead]]''

==[[Associate of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]==

==Chronology==

[[671 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten born<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, son of Otto and Mrs. Van Richten
 
{{Spec|[[678 BC]] - Rudolph’s sister [[Maria Van Richten]] born.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 18 "Speculation based on BH. We only know that she is younger than Rudolph."</ref>
 

[[679 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten sent to boarding school in [[Nartok]]. A childhood friend is [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]].<ref name="VRMHCII p.25-26">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 25-26</ref>

[[680 BC]] - [[Casimir (of Richten Haus)|Casimir]] (not to be confused with [[Casimir Lukas|Harkon Lukas’ son]]) starts working at Richten Haus as the gate keeper.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 6">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 6</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[683 BC]] - The servants of [[Richten Haus]] are all killed while the family is away one day. (summer)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.18: "Speculation based on [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] pg. 15, 24: I’m going on the hunch that VR grows younger until he reaches the age he was at when this event occurred"</ref>
 

[[685 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten meets [[Robert Tatenna]], a fellow student at boarding school. (fall)<ref name="CT p.14">[[Chilling Tales]] p.14</ref>

[[688 BC]] - The [[The Crimson Death Epidemic | Crimson Death]] spreads across Darkon (winter); it claims Van Richten’s great aunt Helga, despite his efforts; Rudolph is even more driven into his medical studies.<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[689 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten attends the [[University of Il Aluk]]. While there, he meets a fellow student, [[Dr. Harmon Ruscheider]]. (fall)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]] pg. 15"</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[691 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten marries his childhood sweetheart, [[Ingrid van Richten|Ingrid]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "[[Realm of Terror]]; [[VRGtV]]: Give VR a good respectable year between their marriage and birth of Erasmus in 692"</ref>
 

[[692 BC]] - Rudolph and Ingrid Van Richten's son [[Erasmus van Richten|Erasmus]] is born.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]] p. 4; [[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 8, "fourteen summers" before [[706 BC]]</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[693 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten finishes his studies; opens his practice back home in [[Rivalis]].}},<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VR’s age, RoT; VRGtV; and ToDm pg. 86, which indicates it takes 4-5 years to get a medical education at the University of Il Aluk"</ref> 
 
{{Spec|693 BC - Dr. Van Richten travels to [[Lamordia]], hears of the [[Loud Man of Lamordia]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VRGtG pg. 9: “When I was young.”</ref> 

[[696 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Antonin Madren]] and becomes his mentor.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 21: "VRGttC pg. 6: Van Richten takes Madren on as a medical student, which implies Van Richten has time to offer such an education (which lasts up to 8 years), i.e., while he was still a simple doctor (693-706)."</ref>

[[706 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten suffers the wrath of the [[Radanavich clan]]; the Vistani steal his son Erasmus; they sell Erasmus to [[Baron Metus]]<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, a vampire from [[Richemulot]]; with the help of an amused [[Azalin]], Van Richten wipes out all but one member of the Radanavich caravan<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]</ref>; [[Madame Radanavich]] [[curse | curses]] Van Richten<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, although he doesn’t realize it until the end of his career.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

[[706 BC]] Van Richten puts his Erasmus, now a vampire, out of his misery, but in spite [[Baron Metus]] tears [[Ingrid van Richten]] to pieces; Dr. Van Richten destroys Baron Metus, starting his career of hunting evil. Unable to live with the memories in [[Richten Haus]], Van Richten moves to [[Corvia]].<ref name="VRA p. 5">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 5</ref>

[[707 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten researches vampires, and meets [[Aimon Davidovitch]], a fellow scholar of the arcane.<ref> from [[JWM Timeline]] p.22: "[[VRGtF]] pg. 4: VR knew him for “some 30-odd years”]</ref>

[[710 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten encounters his first werebeast near [[Varithne]], a small village in northern [[Darkon]]. Dr. Van Richten starts hunting werebeasts as well<ref name="VRMHC p. 109-110">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 109-110</ref>

[[711 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Gedlan Ironheart]], a fearless [[dwarven]] [[innkeeper]] in [[Corvia]]. Gedlan becomes a frequent hunting companion.<ref name="Bleah House p. 11">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p.11</ref>

[[712 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets the mage [[Shauten]]; they bond when they are attacked by one of Azalin's patrols. Shauten opens Van Richten's eyes to the existence of the [[Lich]].<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref>

[[713 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten is visited by the dying Dr. Ruscheider, who tells Rudolph all he can about several months spent as a lich's captive; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting liches.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p.111-112</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[714 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten receives a visit from his childhood friend, [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]], who is now a ghostly slave to Azalin; Dr. Van Richten learns the terrible truth about [[Azalin Rex]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on [[VRGtG]] pg. 22, [[VRMHCII]] pg. 24</ref>
 

{{Spec|714 BC - Dr. Van Richten moves to [[Mordentshire]], sensing it is politically unsafe for him to remain in [[Darkon]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on VRGttL pg. 22</ref>
 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[716 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 3 n1">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade after her death, but [[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[718 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and [[Shauten]] battle a creature they believe to be a priestly [[lich]]; it is actually Van Richten's first [[ancient dead]]}}.<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] "Speculation based on VRGAD pg. 5: “Some years ago,” and other markers. It happened after VR started hunting liches, but before he started hunting ghosts. (The latter conclusion taken from numerous references to Claudia in this Guide"</ref>
 
[[724 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten battles the [[Bog Monster of Hroth]], and meets [[Jameld of Hroth|Jameld]]. This is also Van Richten's first visit to both [[Kartakass]] and [[Sithicus]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p.153</ref> 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[726 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decade n1">[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades after her death but[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade</ref> 

{{Spec|726 BC - Dr. Van Richten visits [[Sanguinia]] with [[George Weathermay]] and [[Arametrius]]; they meet [[Claudia DeShanes]]; Claudia becomes Rudolph’s assistant, and it seems he had certain unspoken feelings for her.}}<ref>Speculation from JWM Timeline p.28: "Since Arametrius is probably [[Athasian]], Van Richten may have recently visited [[Kalidnay]] and encountered [[Ahmose Tanit]]. [VRGtG pg. 73. This is the earliest possible date for this event (due to George’s inclusion, and we know from this source and BH that VR starts hunting ghosts one year after this event. That leaves only 9 years between VR starting to hunt and writing his Guide on the subject. I chose to go with this date to keep as wide a margin of opportunity as possible.]"</ref>
 

[[727 BC]] - [[Merilee Markuza]], the Child [[Vampire]], kills Claudia. Van Richten pursues the creature relentlessly, but loses her in [[Lamordia]].<ref name="Darklords p. 63">[[Darklords]] p. 63</ref>

727 BC - While hunting the Child Vampire, Van Richten witnesses the [[Thundering Carriage]]; Van Richten decides he must put an end to these ghostly horrors, too.<ref name="Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts p. 6">[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 6</ref>

[[728 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten defeats the [[Phantom Army]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 91</ref>

[[729 BC]] - The fiend [[Elsepeth]] enters Ravenloft via [[transposition]] in a small village outside [[Stangengrad]], near the [[Grashen Falls]] (sept)<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.28: "[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] pg. 14: the diary is dated “twelve years ago.”</ref>

[[730 BC]] - {{Spec|[[Gedlan Ironheart]] killed while battling evil spirits.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: "VRGtG pg. 23: Gedlan is referred to as “Geddar” in this book. The date is an estimate based on the 727-736 available time span."</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] leaves [[Borca]], having lurked there for years.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] p. 66</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] writes to Van Richten about the death of Madren’s sister.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[734 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] shows up on Van Richten's doorstep, and gives the good doctor his notes; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting the [[Created]].}}<ref>JWM Timeline p. 30: "VRGttC pg. 6: Estimate. “Years” after Madren wrote about his sister’s death"</ref> 

[[735 BC] - Dr. Van Richten is forced to kill his old friend [[Shauten]] in self-defense, when Shauten tries to sacrifice Rudolph in a bid for [[lichdom]]<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref><ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>. {{Spec|This "near-miss" may have inspired Van Richten to start recording his collected knowledge for heroes to come.}}<ref>JWM Timeline: "Speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6"</ref>

735 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''.<ref name="RLCS p.18">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.18</ref><ref name="RLPHB p.20">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.20</ref>

[[736 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''.

[[737 BC]] - The [[Vistana]] [[Cyrilla]]'s niece [[Vassa]] is [[kidnapped]] near [[Corvia]].<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 20: The golem appeared “the following year” after Vaasa’s soul is taken."</ref>

737 BC - [[Vassa]] returns as a [[clay golem]]; Cyrilla writes to Dr. Van Richten.<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 19 "just last year"</ref>

737 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''.

[[738 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''.

[[738 BC]] [[Emil Bollenbach]] engineers the [[kidnapping]] of Dr. Rudolph van Richten to the end of seizing his [[brain]] for [[transplantation]] into a super-golem. fortunately, several of Van Richten's friends intercede to thwart Dr. Bollenbach.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 33: "[[Children of the Night: The Created]] pg. 50; CT pg. 32 places this adventure 8 years after Emil’s disappearance (i.e., 746), but the dating used in CotN:C fits VR’s chronology better.</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] goes to [[Nartok]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 67-68">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.67-68</ref>

[[739 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and the adventuring band known as [[the Hand (Adventurer Band)|the Hand]] hunt and destroy [[the Gibbering Golem]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 265-276">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.265-276</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]] publishes ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''. This act earns him considerable ire from [[Agatha Clairmont]], whom sees it as an instruction manual to building [[dread golem]]s just much as it is hunting them.<ref name="Van Richten's Arsenal p. 149">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p. 149</ref>

[[740 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]'' (early spring).

740 BC - Dr. Van Richten inherits the [[library (Aimon Davidovitch)]] of [[Aimon Davidovitch]]. Dr. Van Richten starts studying tomes. (Sept)<ref>JWM Timeline p. 35 "Extrapolated from VRGtF pg. 4"</ref>

[[741 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]], [[Davvyd]], [[Samuel]] and [[Dr. Ottelie Farringer]] battle the fiend [[Drigor]]. Only Dr. van Richten survives. (Feb.)<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 79-85">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p. 79-85</ref>

741 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]]''.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Book)]] p.4</ref>

741 BC - [[Van Richten]] stumbles into the clutches of [[the nameless Amnizu]] and [[the nameless Barbazu]] infesting [[Chateaufaux]]. He is captured. However, he manages to join with some [[adventurer]]s to route the [[devil]]s from the town.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.72-73; Note that the encounter with these [[fiend]]s doesn't appear in the original uncompiled Van Richten's Guide to Fiends. Therefore, the encounter with the [[Fiends of Chateaufaux]] took place after took place after the first VRGtF was published.</ref><ref>[[Gazetteer III]] p.30-31, "just over 15 years ago"</ref>

741 BC<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> - Dr. Van Richten is [[depressed]]; he consults with the [[diviner]], [[Inarin Alster]]; Rudolph realizes he had been laboring under a [[curse]] all these years; Dr. Van Richten spends a year with [[Arturi Radanavich]] studying the Vistani.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]] p.5-7; 87-89</ref>

[[742 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten writes his ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]'' and retires.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> (Oct.)

[[750 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten dies in [[Richten Haus|Bleak House]] in the fight against [[Madame Radanavich]]<ref>[[Domains of Dread]] p. 17, as told in [[Bleak House]], particularly [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 58-63</ref> Meanwhile, all that is known to most, including the [[Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]] is that he [[disappeared]].<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

{{ref}}

[[category:Character]] [[category:NPC]]
[[category:2nd Edition Character]]
[[category:3rd Edition Character]]
[[category:4th Edition Character]]
[[category:5th Edition Character]]
[[category:Abused]]
[[category:Betrayed]]
[[Category:Cursed]]
[[category:Cursed by the Vistani]]
[[Category:Darkonian]]
[[Category:Demonologist]]
[[category:Energy Drained]]
[[Category:Filicide]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Rivalis]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Nartok]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Forest of Shadows]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Darkon]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordentshire]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordent]]
[[Category:Former Patients of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Dominia]]
[[Category:Former Medical Student]]
[[Category:Former Student of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[category:Gaslighted]]
[[category:Giogoto]]
[[Category:Ghost]]
[[Category:Graduate of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Graduate]]
[[Category:Herbalist]]
[[Category:Human]]
[[category:healer]]
[[category:Hero]]
[[Category:Hunter Of Monsters]]
[[Category:Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[category:Intellectual]]
[[Category:Kidnapped]]
[[category:Killer]]
[[category:Lorist]]
[[Category:Male]]
[[category:Mass Murderer]]
[[category:Medical Doctor]]
[[category:Medical Professional]]
[[category:Mentor]]
[[category:Murderer]]
[[Category:Necrologist]]
[[category:Old]]
[[Category:Planar Mechanic]]
[[category:Polymath]]
[[category:Posthumous Character]]
[[category:Potential Darklord]]
[[Category:Proprietor]]
[[category:Professional Killer]]
[[category:Punished]]
[[category:Ravenloft Lorist]]
[[Category:Ravenloft Loremaster]]
[[category:Redeemed]]
[[category:Reformed]]
[[category:Repentant]]
[[category:Researcher]]
[[category:Retired]]
[[Category:Rogue]]
[[category:Sage]]
[[category:Seduced]]
[[Category:Stasis]]
[[category:Tempted]]
[[category:Transgressed]]
[[category:Transgressor]]
[[Category:Van Richten Family]]
[[category:Victim of Medical Malpractice]]
[[Category:Victim of the van Richten Curse]]
[[category:Victimized]]
[[Category:Widowed]]
[[Category:writer]]
[[category:Births in 671 BC]]
[[category:Deaths in 750 BC]]
<references/>

==Data from the Ravenloft Catalogue==



{|
|-valign="top"
|[[Image:rldb_npc.jpg]]
|[[Image:rldb_primary.gif]]
|
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' 
''[[Bleak House]]''
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_art.gif]]
|
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - p4 
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - cover, p4 
''[[Bleak House:Homecoming]]'' - p4,p16 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - p7,8 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p92 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - p114 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 5,11 
''[[The Created]]'' - p13 
''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]'' - p5
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_stats.gif]]
|
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - pp4-5 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p91 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 3
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_desc.gif]]
|
''[[Ravenloft Third Edition]]'' - pp14,17-18,27,176 
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - throughout 
''[[Bleak House]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to The Created]]'' - throughout 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]'' - throughout 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - pp91-93 
''[[Tales of Ravenloft: The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]'' - pp1-17 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - pp 2-3 
''[[Heroes of Light]]'' - p64 
''[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]]'' - pp1-4, pp9-13, pp304-310
|-valign="top"
|}

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (NPC)

2022-02-02T12:29:22Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* Authored: */

[[File:Original VR.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
[[File:Rudolph van richten.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten and [[Strahd]] by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
{{canon}}
'''Dr. Rudolph Van Richten''' is the greatest monster hunter that has ever lived and the most well-known hero of the Lands of the Mists.

==History==
He was born in [[Rivalis]] in [[Darkon]] in [[671 BC]]. He took [[medicine]] at the [[University of Il Aluk]], completing his four or five year program of study in [[693 BC]]. This humble man was spurred into a life of monster hunting when his son [[Erasmus van Richten]] was kidnapped by the [[Radanavich clan]] and sold to [[Baron Metus]]. Metus turned Erasmus into a [[vampire groom]] and Van Richten was forced to slay his son. In revenge, Metus killed Rudolph's wife, [[Ingrid van Richten]]. Van Richten eventually slew Metus, and then, with the help of [[Azalin]], the entire [[Radanavich tribe]].

Until his disappearance in [[750 BC]], he resided in [[Mordentshire]], where he ran an [[Van Richten's Herbalist Shop|herbalist shop]], as well as wrote several of his famous [[Van Richten's Guides]], and mentored [[The Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]], who regarded him as an uncle and took up his work.

==In [[Curse of Strahd]]==
Dr. van Richten makes a notable appearance in the [[5th Edition]] [[module]], [[Curse of Strahd]], though not in his [[famous]] persona as the monster hunter and [[writer]] of the [[Van Richten's Guides]] he is notable for in previous Ravenloft products. Instead, he adopts the guise of [[Rictavio]], a traveling [[half-elf]] [[bard]], [[storyteller]], and [[ringmaster]] gathering stories and watching out for talent. In reality he is gathering formation and waiting for an optimal time to strike at [[Strahd]], preferably when the vampire lord is in [[hibernation]]. Unlike other versions of van Richten, the Curse of Strahd van Richten is a [[loner]] because he knows the full extent of his [[curse]].<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> For more details, see [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Curse of Strahd)]]

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Appearances==
===[[Campaign Setting]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[Ravenloft: Realm of Terror]]
**[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting (Box)]]

===[[Modules]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[The Nightmare Lands (Boxed Set)]] (referenced only)
**[[Chilling Tales]]
**[[Dungeon Magazine #55]]: [[The Sea Wolf]]
**[[Bleak House: The Death of Rudolph Van Richten]]

===[[Novels]], stories===

*[[Tales of Ravenloft]]: [[The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]
*[[I, Strahd: The War Against Azalin]]

==Authored:==

* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Witches (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Witches]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]]''

Credited for marketing purposes with:
* ''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Mists (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Mists]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead]]''

==[[Associate of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]==

==Chronology==

[[671 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten born<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, son of Otto and Mrs. Van Richten
 
{{Spec|[[678 BC]] - Rudolph’s sister [[Maria Van Richten]] born.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 18 "Speculation based on BH. We only know that she is younger than Rudolph."</ref>
 

[[679 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten sent to boarding school in [[Nartok]]. A childhood friend is [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]].<ref name="VRMHCII p.25-26">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 25-26</ref>

[[680 BC]] - [[Casimir (of Richten Haus)|Casimir]] (not to be confused with [[Casimir Lukas|Harkon Lukas’ son]]) starts working at Richten Haus as the gate keeper.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 6">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 6</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[683 BC]] - The servants of [[Richten Haus]] are all killed while the family is away one day. (summer)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.18: "Speculation based on [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] pg. 15, 24: I’m going on the hunch that VR grows younger until he reaches the age he was at when this event occurred"</ref>
 

[[685 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten meets [[Robert Tatenna]], a fellow student at boarding school. (fall)<ref name="CT p.14">[[Chilling Tales]] p.14</ref>

[[688 BC]] - The [[The Crimson Death Epidemic | Crimson Death]] spreads across Darkon (winter); it claims Van Richten’s great aunt Helga, despite his efforts; Rudolph is even more driven into his medical studies.<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[689 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten attends the [[University of Il Aluk]]. While there, he meets a fellow student, [[Dr. Harmon Ruscheider]]. (fall)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]] pg. 15"</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[691 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten marries his childhood sweetheart, [[Ingrid van Richten|Ingrid]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "[[Realm of Terror]]; [[VRGtV]]: Give VR a good respectable year between their marriage and birth of Erasmus in 692"</ref>
 

[[692 BC]] - Rudolph and Ingrid Van Richten's son [[Erasmus van Richten|Erasmus]] is born.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]] p. 4; [[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 8, "fourteen summers" before [[706 BC]]</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[693 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten finishes his studies; opens his practice back home in [[Rivalis]].}},<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VR’s age, RoT; VRGtV; and ToDm pg. 86, which indicates it takes 4-5 years to get a medical education at the University of Il Aluk"</ref> 
 
{{Spec|693 BC - Dr. Van Richten travels to [[Lamordia]], hears of the [[Loud Man of Lamordia]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VRGtG pg. 9: “When I was young.”</ref> 

[[696 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Antonin Madren]] and becomes his mentor.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 21: "VRGttC pg. 6: Van Richten takes Madren on as a medical student, which implies Van Richten has time to offer such an education (which lasts up to 8 years), i.e., while he was still a simple doctor (693-706)."</ref>

[[706 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten suffers the wrath of the [[Radanavich clan]]; the Vistani steal his son Erasmus; they sell Erasmus to [[Baron Metus]]<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, a vampire from [[Richemulot]]; with the help of an amused [[Azalin]], Van Richten wipes out all but one member of the Radanavich caravan<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]</ref>; [[Madame Radanavich]] [[curse | curses]] Van Richten<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, although he doesn’t realize it until the end of his career.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

[[706 BC]] Van Richten puts his Erasmus, now a vampire, out of his misery, but in spite [[Baron Metus]] tears [[Ingrid van Richten]] to pieces; Dr. Van Richten destroys Baron Metus, starting his career of hunting evil. Unable to live with the memories in [[Richten Haus]], Van Richten moves to [[Corvia]].<ref name="VRA p. 5">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 5</ref>

[[707 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten researches vampires, and meets [[Aimon Davidovitch]], a fellow scholar of the arcane.<ref> from [[JWM Timeline]] p.22: "[[VRGtF]] pg. 4: VR knew him for “some 30-odd years”]</ref>

[[710 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten encounters his first werebeast near [[Varithne]], a small village in northern [[Darkon]]. Dr. Van Richten starts hunting werebeasts as well<ref name="VRMHC p. 109-110">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 109-110</ref>

[[711 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Gedlan Ironheart]], a fearless [[dwarven]] [[innkeeper]] in [[Corvia]]. Gedlan becomes a frequent hunting companion.<ref name="Bleah House p. 11">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p.11</ref>

[[712 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets the mage [[Shauten]]; they bond when they are attacked by one of Azalin's patrols. Shauten opens Van Richten's eyes to the existence of the [[Lich]].<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref>

[[713 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten is visited by the dying Dr. Ruscheider, who tells Rudolph all he can about several months spent as a lich's captive; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting liches.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p.111-112</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[714 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten receives a visit from his childhood friend, [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]], who is now a ghostly slave to Azalin; Dr. Van Richten learns the terrible truth about [[Azalin Rex]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on [[VRGtG]] pg. 22, [[VRMHCII]] pg. 24</ref>
 

{{Spec|714 BC - Dr. Van Richten moves to [[Mordentshire]], sensing it is politically unsafe for him to remain in [[Darkon]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on VRGttL pg. 22</ref>
 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[716 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 3 n1">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade after her death, but [[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[718 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and [[Shauten]] battle a creature they believe to be a priestly [[lich]]; it is actually Van Richten's first [[ancient dead]]}}.<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] "Speculation based on VRGAD pg. 5: “Some years ago,” and other markers. It happened after VR started hunting liches, but before he started hunting ghosts. (The latter conclusion taken from numerous references to Claudia in this Guide"</ref>
 
[[724 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten battles the [[Bog Monster of Hroth]], and meets [[Jameld of Hroth|Jameld]]. This is also Van Richten's first visit to both [[Kartakass]] and [[Sithicus]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p.153</ref> 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[726 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decade n1">[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades after her death but[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade</ref> 

{{Spec|726 BC - Dr. Van Richten visits [[Sanguinia]] with [[George Weathermay]] and [[Arametrius]]; they meet [[Claudia DeShanes]]; Claudia becomes Rudolph’s assistant, and it seems he had certain unspoken feelings for her.}}<ref>Speculation from JWM Timeline p.28: "Since Arametrius is probably [[Athasian]], Van Richten may have recently visited [[Kalidnay]] and encountered [[Ahmose Tanit]]. [VRGtG pg. 73. This is the earliest possible date for this event (due to George’s inclusion, and we know from this source and BH that VR starts hunting ghosts one year after this event. That leaves only 9 years between VR starting to hunt and writing his Guide on the subject. I chose to go with this date to keep as wide a margin of opportunity as possible.]"</ref>
 

[[727 BC]] - [[Merilee Markuza]], the Child [[Vampire]], kills Claudia. Van Richten pursues the creature relentlessly, but loses her in [[Lamordia]].<ref name="Darklords p. 63">[[Darklords]] p. 63</ref>

727 BC - While hunting the Child Vampire, Van Richten witnesses the [[Thundering Carriage]]; Van Richten decides he must put an end to these ghostly horrors, too.<ref name="Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts p. 6">[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 6</ref>

[[728 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten defeats the [[Phantom Army]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 91</ref>

[[729 BC]] - The fiend [[Elsepeth]] enters Ravenloft via [[transposition]] in a small village outside [[Stangengrad]], near the [[Grashen Falls]] (sept)<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.28: "[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] pg. 14: the diary is dated “twelve years ago.”</ref>

[[730 BC]] - {{Spec|[[Gedlan Ironheart]] killed while battling evil spirits.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: "VRGtG pg. 23: Gedlan is referred to as “Geddar” in this book. The date is an estimate based on the 727-736 available time span."</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] leaves [[Borca]], having lurked there for years.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] p. 66</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] writes to Van Richten about the death of Madren’s sister.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[734 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] shows up on Van Richten's doorstep, and gives the good doctor his notes; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting the [[Created]].}}<ref>JWM Timeline p. 30: "VRGttC pg. 6: Estimate. “Years” after Madren wrote about his sister’s death"</ref> 

[[735 BC] - Dr. Van Richten is forced to kill his old friend [[Shauten]] in self-defense, when Shauten tries to sacrifice Rudolph in a bid for [[lichdom]]<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref><ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>. {{Spec|This "near-miss" may have inspired Van Richten to start recording his collected knowledge for heroes to come.}}<ref>JWM Timeline: "Speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6"</ref>

735 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''.<ref name="RLCS p.18">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.18</ref><ref name="RLPHB p.20">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.20</ref>

[[736 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''.

[[737 BC]] - The [[Vistana]] [[Cyrilla]]'s niece [[Vassa]] is [[kidnapped]] near [[Corvia]].<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 20: The golem appeared “the following year” after Vaasa’s soul is taken."</ref>

737 BC - [[Vassa]] returns as a [[clay golem]]; Cyrilla writes to Dr. Van Richten.<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 19 "just last year"</ref>

737 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''.

[[738 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''.

[[738 BC]] [[Emil Bollenbach]] engineers the [[kidnapping]] of Dr. Rudolph van Richten to the end of seizing his [[brain]] for [[transplantation]] into a super-golem. fortunately, several of Van Richten's friends intercede to thwart Dr. Bollenbach.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 33: "[[Children of the Night: The Created]] pg. 50; CT pg. 32 places this adventure 8 years after Emil’s disappearance (i.e., 746), but the dating used in CotN:C fits VR’s chronology better.</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] goes to [[Nartok]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 67-68">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.67-68</ref>

[[739 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and the adventuring band known as [[the Hand (Adventurer Band)|the Hand]] hunt and destroy [[the Gibbering Golem]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 265-276">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.265-276</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]] publishes ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''. This act earns him considerable ire from [[Agatha Clairmont]], whom sees it as an instruction manual to building [[dread golem]]s just much as it is hunting them.<ref name="Van Richten's Arsenal p. 149">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p. 149</ref>

[[740 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]'' (early spring).

740 BC - Dr. Van Richten inherits the [[library (Aimon Davidovitch)]] of [[Aimon Davidovitch]]. Dr. Van Richten starts studying tomes. (Sept)<ref>JWM Timeline p. 35 "Extrapolated from VRGtF pg. 4"</ref>

[[741 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]], [[Davvyd]], [[Samuel]] and [[Dr. Ottelie Farringer]] battle the fiend [[Drigor]]. Only Dr. van Richten survives. (Feb.)<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 79-85">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p. 79-85</ref>

741 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]]''.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Book)]] p.4</ref>

741 BC - [[Van Richten]] stumbles into the clutches of [[the nameless Amnizu]] and [[the nameless Barbazu]] infesting [[Chateaufaux]]. He is captured. However, he manages to join with some [[adventurer]]s to route the [[devil]]s from the town.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.72-73; Note that the encounter with these [[fiend]]s doesn't appear in the original uncompiled Van Richten's Guide to Fiends. Therefore, the encounter with the [[Fiends of Chateaufaux]] took place after took place after the first VRGtF was published.</ref><ref>[[Gazetteer III]] p.30-31, "just over 15 years ago"</ref>

741 BC<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> - Dr. Van Richten is [[depressed]]; he consults with the [[diviner]], [[Inarin Alster]]; Rudolph realizes he had been laboring under a [[curse]] all these years; Dr. Van Richten spends a year with [[Arturi Radanavich]] studying the Vistani.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]] p.5-7; 87-89</ref>

[[742 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten writes his ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]'' and retires.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> (Oct.)

[[750 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten dies in [[Richten Haus|Bleak House]] in the fight against [[Madame Radanavich]]<ref>[[Domains of Dread]] p. 17, as told in [[Bleak House]], particularly [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 58-63</ref> Meanwhile, all that is known to most, including the [[Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]] is that he [[disappeared]].<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

{{ref}}

[[category:Character]] [[category:NPC]]
[[category:2nd Edition Character]]
[[category:3rd Edition Character]]
[[category:4th Edition Character]]
[[category:5th Edition Character]]
[[category:Abused]]
[[category:Betrayed]]
[[Category:Cursed]]
[[category:Cursed by the Vistani]]
[[Category:Darkonian]]
[[Category:Demonologist]]
[[category:Energy Drained]]
[[Category:Filicide]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Rivalis]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Nartok]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Forest of Shadows]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Darkon]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordentshire]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordent]]
[[Category:Former Patients of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Dominia]]
[[Category:Former Medical Student]]
[[Category:Former Student of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[category:Gaslighted]]
[[category:Giogoto]]
[[Category:Ghost]]
[[Category:Graduate of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Graduate]]
[[Category:Herbalist]]
[[Category:Human]]
[[category:healer]]
[[category:Hero]]
[[Category:Hunter Of Monsters]]
[[Category:Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[category:Intellectual]]
[[Category:Kidnapped]]
[[category:Killer]]
[[category:Lorist]]
[[Category:Male]]
[[category:Mass Murderer]]
[[category:Medical Doctor]]
[[category:Medical Professional]]
[[category:Mentor]]
[[category:Murderer]]
[[Category:Necrologist]]
[[category:Old]]
[[Category:Planar Mechanic]]
[[category:Polymath]]
[[category:Posthumous Character]]
[[category:Potential Darklord]]
[[Category:Proprietor]]
[[category:Professional Killer]]
[[category:Punished]]
[[category:Ravenloft Lorist]]
[[Category:Ravenloft Loremaster]]
[[category:Redeemed]]
[[category:Reformed]]
[[category:Repentant]]
[[category:Researcher]]
[[category:Retired]]
[[Category:Rogue]]
[[category:Sage]]
[[category:Seduced]]
[[Category:Stasis]]
[[category:Tempted]]
[[category:Transgressed]]
[[category:Transgressor]]
[[Category:Van Richten Family]]
[[category:Victim of Medical Malpractice]]
[[Category:Victim of the van Richten Curse]]
[[category:Victimized]]
[[Category:Widowed]]
[[Category:writer]]
[[category:Births in 671 BC]]
[[category:Deaths in 750 BC]]
<references/>

==Data from the Ravenloft Catalogue==



{|
|-valign="top"
|[[Image:rldb_npc.jpg]]
|[[Image:rldb_primary.gif]]
|
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' 
''[[Bleak House]]''
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_art.gif]]
|
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - p4 
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - cover, p4 
''[[Bleak House:Homecoming]]'' - p4,p16 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - p7,8 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p92 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - p114 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 5,11 
''[[The Created]]'' - p13 
''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]'' - p5
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_stats.gif]]
|
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - pp4-5 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p91 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 3
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_desc.gif]]
|
''[[Ravenloft Third Edition]]'' - pp14,17-18,27,176 
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - throughout 
''[[Bleak House]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to The Created]]'' - throughout 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]'' - throughout 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - pp91-93 
''[[Tales of Ravenloft: The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]'' - pp1-17 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - pp 2-3 
''[[Heroes of Light]]'' - p64 
''[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]]'' - pp1-4, pp9-13, pp304-310
|-valign="top"
|}

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Article)

2022-01-30T16:23:47Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* Novels, stories */

DR. RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN

Medium humanoid (human), Lawful Good

Armor Class: 17 (half plate of flowing sanctity)

Hit Points: 77 (14d8 +14)

Speed: 30 ft.

Strength: 9 (-1)

Dexterity: 13 (+1)

Constitution: 13 (+1)

Intelligence: 17 (+3)

Wisdom: 18 (+4)

Charisma: 16 (+3)

Saving Throws: Con +5, Wis +8, Cha +7

Skills: Arcana +7, Deception +7, Insight +12,
Investigation +7, Medicine +8, Perception +12,
Religion +6, Sleight of Hand +4

Condition Immunities: charmed

Senses: darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 22

Languages: Abyssal, Celestial, Common, Draconic, Dwarvish, Elvish, Gundarak, Infernal, Sylvan

Challenge: 9 (5,000 XP)

SPECIAL EQUIPMENT:

In addition to his +1 sword cane and light crossbow, Van Richten wears a hat of disguise, goggles of night, and a ring of mind shielding, and he carries a spell scroll of raise dead.

Half Plate of Flowing Sanctity +1 mithril half plate. Once a day, a flask of water placed in the belt of armor becomes holy water.

ACTIONS:

Spellcasting: Van Richter is a 9th level Cleric of Helm, 1st level Wizard. His spellcasting ability is Wisdom (save DC 15, +7 to hit with spell attacks). Van Richten has the following Cleric and Wizard spells prepared:

Cantrips (at will): light, mage hand, mending, minor illusion, prestidigitation, sacred flame, thaumaturgy, toll the dead

1st level (4 slots): alarm, bless, cure wounds, detect evil and good, feather fall, find familiar, healing word, identify, protection from evil and good, shield, sleep

2nd level (3 slots): augury, beacon of hope, lesser restoration, protection from poison, silence, spiritual weapon warding bond, zone of truth

3rd level (3 slots): glyph of warding, magic circle, mass healing word, revivify, speak with dead, spirit guardians

4th level (3 slots): death ward, freedom of movement

5th level (3 slots): dawn, greater restoration, mass cure wounds, raise dead

Skulker: Van Richten can hide when he is lightly obscured from the creature from which he is hiding. When he’s hidden from a creature and misses it with a ranged weapon attack, making the attack doesn’t reveal his position. Dim light doesn’t impose disadvantage on his Wisdom (Perception) checks relying on sight.

Undead Slayer: When Van Richten hits an undead with a weapon attack, the undead takes an extra 10 (3d6) damage of weapon’s type.

Cunning Action: Van Richten can use a bonus action to take the Dash, Disengage or Hide action.

Sneak Attack: When Van Richten surprises a target, has advantage on an attack roll, or an enemy is within 5 ft. of the target, Van Richten deals and extra 7 damage.

Assassin Proficiencies: Van Richten is proficient with Disguise and Poisoner’s Kits.

Assassinate: When Van Richten hits a surprised enemy, it’s automatically a critical hit. When he attacks an enemy that hasn’t yet had a turn, he gains advantage on the attack.

Channel Divinity: Turn Undead: Undead within 30 ft. of Van Richten must make a Wisdom saving throw. If the creature fails its saving throw, they are turned for 1 minute or until they take damage. A turned creature must spend its turns trying to move as far away from him as it can, and it can’t willingly move to a space within 30 ft. of him. It also can’t take reactions. For its action, it can use only the Dash action or try to escape from an effect that prevents it from moving. If there’s nowhere to move, the creature can use the Dodge action. Undead with CR 1 or less are automatically destroyed on a failed save.

Preserve Life: As an action, Van Richten can distribute 45 hit points. This feature can restore a creature to no more than half of its hit point maximum and has no effect on an undead or construct.

Multiattack: Van Richten makes two attacks with his sword cane or light crossbow.

Sword Cane: Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 6 (1d6 +2) bludgeon damage (wooden cane) or piercing damage (silvered sword).

Light Crossbow: Ranged Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, range 80/320 ft., one target. Hit: 7 (1d8 +2) piercing damage.

Healer: As an action, Van Richten can spend one use of a Healer’s Kit to tend to a creature and restore 1d6 +4 hit points to it, plus additional hit points equal to the creature’s maximum number of Hit Dice. The creature can’t regain hit points from this feat again until it finishes a short or long rest.

REACTIONS:

Final Ward: Van Richten has a permanent glyph of warding tattooed on his neck that activates when he’s bitten there and chooses to say “Erasmus, I’m coming home” in Celestial. All targets in a 20 ft. radius must make a Dexterity saving throw or take 5d8 +5 radiant damage on a failed save or half as much (rounded up) on a successful one. Van Richten automatically fails the save and is disintegrated along with all of the items on his person.

RICTAVIO:

Several months ago a colorfully dressed half-elf bard came to Barovia in a carnival wagon, with a pet monkey on his shoulder. He took over an abandoned tower on Lake Baratok before rolling into town of Vallaki several months later. Claiming to be a carnival ringmaster in search of new actors, he began regaling locals with tales of distant lands.

MONSTER HUNTER:

The half-elf ringmaster is, in fact, the legendary human monster hunter named Rudolph Van Richten. Van Richten’s tale is a sad one. A scholar and doctor from a land called Darkon, he married his childhood sweetheart, Ingrid and together they had a son, Erasmus. When he was fourteen, Erasmus was stolen away by Vistani and sold to a vampire named Baron Metus to be used as a companion. By the time Van Richten found his son, it was too late: the Baron had already transformed Erasmus into a vampire spawn. Erasmus begged his father to end his suffering, which Van Richten did by pounding a wooden stake through his son’s chest. Baron Metus avenged that death by killing Van Richten’s wife, and Van Richten has lived with the horror of his family’s destruction ever since. After destroying Baron Metus in turn, Van Richten sought revenge against the Vistani and took up a life of hunting evil monsters.

THE WAITING GAME:

Van Richten isn’t a young man anymore. He knows his road is coming to an end, but his work isn’t done. He has come to Barovia to kill Strahd Von Zarovich, the greatest vampire of them all. Van Richten has studied Strahd for years and knows he can’t hope to best the vampire in a straight-up confrontation: he must wait for the right moment to strike. He has good evidence to suggest that Strahd periodically hibernates in his coffin, sometimes for years, when all is quite in the realm. While he bides his time, Van Richten hides in plain sight with the aid of a hat of disguise, his thoughts protected by a ring of mind shielding. He is trying to learn more about the Keepers of the Feather—a society of wereravens that oppose Strahd—while trying not to expose the secret society to their mutual enemy. He thinks the wereravens might prove helpful when the time comes. Van Richten also wants to take out as many of Strahd’s spies as he can, starting with the Vistani.

MAN WITH A PLAN:

Van Richten doesn’t know that his former protégé, a good-aligned Vistani named Ezmerelda d’Avenir, has come to Barovia looking for him. He taught her many of his monster-hunting techniques, but she doesn’t know all of his tricks and disguises. So far, their paths haven’t crossed. In the event that Van Richten becomes aware of Ezmerelda’s presence, he does his utmost to protect her without putting his own plans in jeopardy. If he can manipulate a party of adventurers into keeping an eye on her, he will do so.

VAN RICHTEN WORKS ALONE:

A curse placed on him long ago by a Vistani seer brings doom to those he befriends (see ‘Role Playing Notes’ for details). Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure. Consequently, if he thinks he’s in danger of being unmasked, he retreats to the Tower of Khazan (chapter 11) or some other quiet corner of Strahd’s domain to plan further.

TRAITS:

Ideal. “Evil cannot go unchallenged.”

Bond. “To protect those I love, I must keep them distant and hidden from my enemies.”

Flaw. “I am cursed. Thus, I will never have peace.”

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

A CURSED MAN:

Van Richten suffers a curse bestowed on him by a Vistani:

Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws.

Its effect on him can best be summarized with this statement: "Van Richten Dies Last." This curse is both a boon and a bane to him. The curse is a large part of why he has lived so long--how he has accumulated so much experience and expertise. He is cursed to always see his friends and allies die--which means he has to live long enough to see it happen.

For a long time, he was unaware of the exact nature of the curse on him, but he is apparently aware of it now.

• Van Richten feels guilty. For decades he fought alongside others with monsters, completely unaware that he was a doombringer among them. Now that he knows, he is burdened by all the deaths he feels that his presence caused.

• Van Richten isolates himself. He doesn't let people get close to him for fear that his curse will take them out.

• If Van Richten is traveling with the party, he has excellent odds of surviving--if someone is going to die in the party, it'll be someone other than him.

• Van Richten's curse should have a tangible impact if he’s traveling with the party: he is a doombringer of the highest order. His mere presence among the party should invite tragedy and disaster.

The Tragedy of Ezmerelda and Van Richten. In the backstory that created Ezmerelda d’Avenir (Appendix D: Monsters and NPCs pages 230-231), there's a tragedy in there: Van Richten's curse could have been lifted years ago.

By Ravenloft Lore, the strongest of curses laid down by a Vistani can only be lifted by the Vistani who placed it, or a blood relative of that Vistani. Van Richten's curse was a Death Curse laid on him by Ezmerelda's mother. Only Ezmerelda has the ability to revoke the curse. But here's the problem...
Ezmerelda is Vistani...by nature; they are secretive about their abilities. Beyond that, Van Richten doesn't trust Vistani and likely commanded Ezmerelda to not use her Vistani abilities in his presence. As a result, Van Richten doesn't know how Vistani curses work--he doesn't know that they can be revoked by a blood relative of the one who laid it. He's a Cleric, he has undoubtedly tried remove curse on himself and it failed. As far as he knows, the curse is permanent.
Van Richten is also secretive and, as mentioned, doesn't trust the Vistani. He kept Ezmerelda at arm's length as best he could both because he couldn't trust her, but also to try to protect her from the curse...and even if he was aware of the curse when they traveled together, he never told her about it.

If either one of them had been less secretive, more open, his curse would have been revoked a long time ago.

If the players want to help Van Richten break the curse, here's the backstory:

The story of Ezmerelda and Van Richten's history was written in the Van Richten's Journal (Appendix F: Handouts pages 254-255). It involves him destroying Ezmerelda's caravan while she was very, very young. She survived the undead assault and later got picked up by another caravan of Vistani (it was actually the Zarovan tribe--Madam Eva's caravan). She originally wanted revenge on Van Richten, but time with Eva (and the presence of the most powerful Vistani of them all) showed her the tragedy of what had happened from an outside perspective. Ezmerelda realized that the whole thing was a horrible tragedy and wrongs had been committed on both sides. She, thus, set out to try to find Van Richten and try to make things right...though Eva never told her about the curse her mother had laid on Van Richten.

Van Richten and Ezmerelda must travel to the place the curse was first laid...a small clearing in the forests of Barovia where the ruins of Ezmerelda's caravan still lie. Both must verbally acknowledge the wrong that had been done and verbally forgive one another for it...then the remains of Ezmerelda's caravan must be burned.

THE DISGUISE:

Van Richten got the idea for “Rictavio” from his exposure to Ezmerelda and her occasional methods for blending in when going somewhere that didn't like Vistani. In short: "Sometimes the best disguise is being the most obvious thing in the room." As mentioned above, Ezmerelda has never encountered the Rictavio disguise and Van Richten isn't familiar with any of the disguises Ezmerelda is currently using.

It is a rather perfect disguise. Van Richten is known as a grim and serious individual, a dour old man who roves the world slaying monsters. “Rictavio” is a flamboyant fop who tells ludicrous stories, commits crimes against music, and is constantly trying to recruit people to his Circus of Wonders. He should be portrayed as extremely over the top and completely harmless. It should be very jarring to your players if he drops the act and reveals who he truly is.
Furthermore, Rictavio knows that even if someone suspects he's hiding something, they are extremely unlikely to guess the truth. If a player rolls well on Insight against him and figures out he's full of crap, that only tells them that he's lying about something...not what he is lying about. And his response is to just carry on and ignore accusations. Sure, the PCs may figure out that he's full of it (his stories are obvious fabrications) but he just carries right along, sticking to his guns even though the players know it’s a load of BS.

The players should have a hard time to get a serious read on Rictavio's personality. He strikes them as so straight forward--a carnie who is spinning tall tales for amusement. So they shouldn’t suspect that he's any more than what he appears to be.

A HARD MAN TO PIN DOWN:

Van Richten is a man with a plan for killing Strahd Von Zarovich, and it's a plan that plays well to his aged capabilities: "wait til Strahd takes a long nap, then stake him in his sleep." Of anyone in the valley, Van Richten knows how deadly Strahd is. He has fought elder vampires before and Strahd is the greatest of them all. He may very well believe that trying to fight him head on is pure folly, but he’s the one most capable of doing so.

It's important to note: Most of the "Destined Allies" the party can draw from Madame Eva’s Tarokka card reading have notes about how the PCs can get that individual to join them. Van Richten has no such notes. Instead, it says this...

Van Richten works alone. [...] Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure.

Van Richten is aware of Madame Eva but (unlike many others in the valley) he won't immediately cave to her prophecies, drop everything he has been working on, and throw his lot in with the PCs. Here are a few important things to keep in mind if the party is trying to recruit him...

• Van Richten is quite certain that if he drops his disguise, Strahd will find him and set out to kill him. (This is one of Strahd's Primary Goals as listed in Chapter 1)

• Van Richten's disguise is magically augmented. As long as the party can't get his hat off, they cannot prove that he’s not a carnie ringmaster

• Van Richten's disguise is only useful against Strahd as long as no one knows who he really is. The ring of mind shielding only works on him...it doesn't work on the PCs. He knows that if anyone else finds out, Strahd can charm them, read their mind or otherwise extract that information from them.

• Van Richten is fully aware of his curse. He will avoid physically joining up with the party for fear that he will get them all killed.

• Van Richten does not talk about his curse. He knows well the bravery of adventurers and that telling them about his curse tends to result in responses like "Oh, you don't need to worry about us, we're strong!" followed shortly by ":dying noises:." Rebuffing their advances without mentioning the curse is much more effective at getting them to stay away from him so his curse doesn't kill them.

• Even if Van Richten consents to offer them aid, it should be indirect as much as possible. He has his plan, he's set in his ways, and he’s not going to go gallivanting off with a bunch of young adventurers. And, he should stay in character as much as possible...blowing his cover will only bring Strahd down on him AND the PCs.

Ideally, even if the party can convince him to help...his help should primarily take the form of a surprisingly knowledgeable carnival ringmaster who is "certainly not going to go out and fight monsters with you. I'm a ringmaster, not an adventurer!"

He may lend the party his carnival wagon to travel around in (once he finds somewhere else to stash his saber-toothed tiger that has been trained to hunt Vistani, or he may lend them the tiger), give them helpful advice--possibly using ravens to stay in touch over long-distance if the PCs make friends with the Keepers of the Feather, and provide the sort of support that a Carnie could offer. But, it should take rather extreme circumstances for him to actually be honest with the PCs...and they may have to do something about his curse before he'll actually travel with them.

GETTING HIM TO JOIN UP:

Van Richten wants to stay under cover...so how does the party get him to change his mind?

Easy: Ruin his plan.

If Van Richten's cover is blown, his plan is a wash. The whole plan depends on his identity staying a secret until Strahd goes into hibernation. If Strahd identifies Van Richten before then, he will try to kill him and Van Richten is pretty sure he can't take Strahd in a straight-up fight. Thus...if Van Richten’s cover is blown, he is stuck with two bad choices: Either he tries to keep going it alone, possibly getting killed by Strahd, and fails his “final mission,” or he accepts the risk to the PCs and joins them to try to take Strahd down directly. A few example ways to blow his cover...

• Knock his hat off. A hat of disguise only works as long as it stays on your head, so if something happens that knocks his hat off; “Rictavio” is replaced by Van Richten.

• Let the Tyger Tyger event happen (chapter 5). When Rictavio flees to the Tower of Khazan, he's inside an antimagic field and cannot disguise himself.

• Even if Van Richten is distorting his voice, if the PCs have already befriended Ezmerelda, she may still recognize it...even if what she recognizes is the cadence his voice adopts when he's explaining something.

ABILITY LOADOUT:

Van Richten is a Cleric...and his listed prepared spells speaks more of a support caster than a monster hunter who has gone solo. But, because he's a Cleric, he can swap out his prepared spells at will to any other spells on the Cleric list. Here are a few notes on spells for him to use...

• Dawn creates sunlight. If he can lock a vampire down within the area of effect, they will be dust in short order.

• Dispel Evil and Good breaks a vampire's charm. However...things can't really leave Barovia, so the dismissal part of that spell won't be terribly effective here.

• Geas is useful when he needs to find something. For example, capture a werewolf then place a geas on it to lead them to the den.

• Lesser and Greater Restoration are enormously useful, as is remove curse.

• Guiding Bolt is a great weapon against Vampires. Shuts down their regeneration, and gives the next attack advantage.

• Hallow: If Van Richten can get his hands on the material components for this, he can create holy ground to help protect the PCs. Create a bubble of hallowed ground around the antimagic field that covers the Tower of Khazan....talk about a fortress. Sure, you'll have a bubble of non-hallowed ground where the antimagic field zone is...but the territory around the tower itself will be holy ground.

• Given his skill at predicting his foes...dropping sanctuary on a creature they are about to attack can completely trash their attempts.

• Spirit Guardians is another spell that is just....awesome.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Appearances==
===[[Campaign Setting]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[Ravenloft: Realm of Terror]]
**[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting (Box)]]

===[[Modules]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[The Nightmare Lands (Boxed Set)]] (referenced only)
**[[Chilling Tales]]
**[[Dungeon Magazine #55]]: [[The Sea Wolf]]
**[[Bleak House: The Death of Rudolph Van Richten]]
*[[4th Edition]]
**[[Dragon magazine #416 (Online)]]: [[Strahd and Van Richten]]
*[[5th Edition]]
**[[Curse of Strahd]]
**[[Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft]]

===[[Novels]], stories===

*[[Tales of Ravenloft]]: [[The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]
*[[I, Strahd: The War Against Azalin]]

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (NPC)

2022-01-30T16:22:28Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* Novels, stories */

[[File:Original VR.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
[[File:Rudolph van richten.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten and [[Strahd]] by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
{{canon}}
'''Dr. Rudolph Van Richten''' is the greatest monster hunter that has ever lived and the most well-known hero of the Lands of the Mists.

==History==
He was born in [[Rivalis]] in [[Darkon]] in [[671 BC]]. He took [[medicine]] at the [[University of Il Aluk]], completing his four or five year program of study in [[693 BC]]. This humble man was spurred into a life of monster hunting when his son [[Erasmus van Richten]] was kidnapped by the [[Radanavich clan]] and sold to [[Baron Metus]]. Metus turned Erasmus into a [[vampire groom]] and Van Richten was forced to slay his son. In revenge, Metus killed Rudolph's wife, [[Ingrid van Richten]]. Van Richten eventually slew Metus, and then, with the help of [[Azalin]], the entire [[Radanavich tribe]].

Until his disappearance in [[750 BC]], he resided in [[Mordentshire]], where he ran an [[Van Richten's Herbalist Shop|herbalist shop]], as well as wrote several of his famous [[Van Richten's Guides]], and mentored [[The Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]], who regarded him as an uncle and took up his work.

==In [[Curse of Strahd]]==
Dr. van Richten makes a notable appearance in the [[5th Edition]] [[module]], [[Curse of Strahd]], though not in his [[famous]] persona as the monster hunter and [[writer]] of the [[Van Richten's Guides]] he is notable for in previous Ravenloft products. Instead, he adopts the guise of [[Rictavio]], a traveling [[half-elf]] [[bard]], [[storyteller]], and [[ringmaster]] gathering stories and watching out for talent. In reality he is gathering formation and waiting for an optimal time to strike at [[Strahd]], preferably when the vampire lord is in [[hibernation]]. Unlike other versions of van Richten, the Curse of Strahd van Richten is a [[loner]] because he knows the full extent of his [[curse]].<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> For more details, see [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Curse of Strahd)]]

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Appearances==
===[[Campaign Setting]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[Ravenloft: Realm of Terror]]
**[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting (Box)]]

===[[Modules]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[The Nightmare Lands (Boxed Set)]] (referenced only)
**[[Chilling Tales]]
**[[Dungeon Magazine #55]]: [[The Sea Wolf]]
**[[Bleak House: The Death of Rudolph Van Richten]]

===[[Novels]], stories===

*[[Tales of Ravenloft]]: [[The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]
*[[I, Strahd: The War Against Azalin]]

==Authored:==
* ''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Demons]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Witches (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Witches]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]''

Credited for marketing purposes with:
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Mists (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Mists]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]]''

==[[Associate of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]==

==Chronology==

[[671 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten born<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, son of Otto and Mrs. Van Richten
 
{{Spec|[[678 BC]] - Rudolph’s sister [[Maria Van Richten]] born.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 18 "Speculation based on BH. We only know that she is younger than Rudolph."</ref>
 

[[679 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten sent to boarding school in [[Nartok]]. A childhood friend is [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]].<ref name="VRMHCII p.25-26">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 25-26</ref>

[[680 BC]] - [[Casimir (of Richten Haus)|Casimir]] (not to be confused with [[Casimir Lukas|Harkon Lukas’ son]]) starts working at Richten Haus as the gate keeper.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 6">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 6</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[683 BC]] - The servants of [[Richten Haus]] are all killed while the family is away one day. (summer)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.18: "Speculation based on [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] pg. 15, 24: I’m going on the hunch that VR grows younger until he reaches the age he was at when this event occurred"</ref>
 

[[685 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten meets [[Robert Tatenna]], a fellow student at boarding school. (fall)<ref name="CT p.14">[[Chilling Tales]] p.14</ref>

[[688 BC]] - The [[The Crimson Death Epidemic | Crimson Death]] spreads across Darkon (winter); it claims Van Richten’s great aunt Helga, despite his efforts; Rudolph is even more driven into his medical studies.<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[689 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten attends the [[University of Il Aluk]]. While there, he meets a fellow student, [[Dr. Harmon Ruscheider]]. (fall)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]] pg. 15"</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[691 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten marries his childhood sweetheart, [[Ingrid van Richten|Ingrid]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "[[Realm of Terror]]; [[VRGtV]]: Give VR a good respectable year between their marriage and birth of Erasmus in 692"</ref>
 

[[692 BC]] - Rudolph and Ingrid Van Richten's son [[Erasmus van Richten|Erasmus]] is born.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]] p. 4; [[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 8, "fourteen summers" before [[706 BC]]</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[693 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten finishes his studies; opens his practice back home in [[Rivalis]].}},<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VR’s age, RoT; VRGtV; and ToDm pg. 86, which indicates it takes 4-5 years to get a medical education at the University of Il Aluk"</ref> 
 
{{Spec|693 BC - Dr. Van Richten travels to [[Lamordia]], hears of the [[Loud Man of Lamordia]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VRGtG pg. 9: “When I was young.”</ref> 

[[696 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Antonin Madren]] and becomes his mentor.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 21: "VRGttC pg. 6: Van Richten takes Madren on as a medical student, which implies Van Richten has time to offer such an education (which lasts up to 8 years), i.e., while he was still a simple doctor (693-706)."</ref>

[[706 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten suffers the wrath of the [[Radanavich clan]]; the Vistani steal his son Erasmus; they sell Erasmus to [[Baron Metus]]<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, a vampire from [[Richemulot]]; with the help of an amused [[Azalin]], Van Richten wipes out all but one member of the Radanavich caravan<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]</ref>; [[Madame Radanavich]] [[curse | curses]] Van Richten<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, although he doesn’t realize it until the end of his career.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

[[706 BC]] Van Richten puts his Erasmus, now a vampire, out of his misery, but in spite [[Baron Metus]] tears [[Ingrid van Richten]] to pieces; Dr. Van Richten destroys Baron Metus, starting his career of hunting evil. Unable to live with the memories in [[Richten Haus]], Van Richten moves to [[Corvia]].<ref name="VRA p. 5">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 5</ref>

[[707 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten researches vampires, and meets [[Aimon Davidovitch]], a fellow scholar of the arcane.<ref> from [[JWM Timeline]] p.22: "[[VRGtF]] pg. 4: VR knew him for “some 30-odd years”]</ref>

[[710 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten encounters his first werebeast near [[Varithne]], a small village in northern [[Darkon]]. Dr. Van Richten starts hunting werebeasts as well<ref name="VRMHC p. 109-110">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 109-110</ref>

[[711 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Gedlan Ironheart]], a fearless [[dwarven]] [[innkeeper]] in [[Corvia]]. Gedlan becomes a frequent hunting companion.<ref name="Bleah House p. 11">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p.11</ref>

[[712 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets the mage [[Shauten]]; they bond when they are attacked by one of Azalin's patrols. Shauten opens Van Richten's eyes to the existence of the [[Lich]].<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref>

[[713 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten is visited by the dying Dr. Ruscheider, who tells Rudolph all he can about several months spent as a lich's captive; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting liches.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p.111-112</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[714 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten receives a visit from his childhood friend, [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]], who is now a ghostly slave to Azalin; Dr. Van Richten learns the terrible truth about [[Azalin Rex]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on [[VRGtG]] pg. 22, [[VRMHCII]] pg. 24</ref>
 

{{Spec|714 BC - Dr. Van Richten moves to [[Mordentshire]], sensing it is politically unsafe for him to remain in [[Darkon]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on VRGttL pg. 22</ref>
 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[716 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 3 n1">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade after her death, but [[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[718 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and [[Shauten]] battle a creature they believe to be a priestly [[lich]]; it is actually Van Richten's first [[ancient dead]]}}.<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] "Speculation based on VRGAD pg. 5: “Some years ago,” and other markers. It happened after VR started hunting liches, but before he started hunting ghosts. (The latter conclusion taken from numerous references to Claudia in this Guide"</ref>
 
[[724 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten battles the [[Bog Monster of Hroth]], and meets [[Jameld of Hroth|Jameld]]. This is also Van Richten's first visit to both [[Kartakass]] and [[Sithicus]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p.153</ref> 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[726 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decade n1">[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades after her death but[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade</ref> 

{{Spec|726 BC - Dr. Van Richten visits [[Sanguinia]] with [[George Weathermay]] and [[Arametrius]]; they meet [[Claudia DeShanes]]; Claudia becomes Rudolph’s assistant, and it seems he had certain unspoken feelings for her.}}<ref>Speculation from JWM Timeline p.28: "Since Arametrius is probably [[Athasian]], Van Richten may have recently visited [[Kalidnay]] and encountered [[Ahmose Tanit]]. [VRGtG pg. 73. This is the earliest possible date for this event (due to George’s inclusion, and we know from this source and BH that VR starts hunting ghosts one year after this event. That leaves only 9 years between VR starting to hunt and writing his Guide on the subject. I chose to go with this date to keep as wide a margin of opportunity as possible.]"</ref>
 

[[727 BC]] - [[Merilee Markuza]], the Child [[Vampire]], kills Claudia. Van Richten pursues the creature relentlessly, but loses her in [[Lamordia]].<ref name="Darklords p. 63">[[Darklords]] p. 63</ref>

727 BC - While hunting the Child Vampire, Van Richten witnesses the [[Thundering Carriage]]; Van Richten decides he must put an end to these ghostly horrors, too.<ref name="Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts p. 6">[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 6</ref>

[[728 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten defeats the [[Phantom Army]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 91</ref>

[[729 BC]] - The fiend [[Elsepeth]] enters Ravenloft via [[transposition]] in a small village outside [[Stangengrad]], near the [[Grashen Falls]] (sept)<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.28: "[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] pg. 14: the diary is dated “twelve years ago.”</ref>

[[730 BC]] - {{Spec|[[Gedlan Ironheart]] killed while battling evil spirits.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: "VRGtG pg. 23: Gedlan is referred to as “Geddar” in this book. The date is an estimate based on the 727-736 available time span."</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] leaves [[Borca]], having lurked there for years.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] p. 66</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] writes to Van Richten about the death of Madren’s sister.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[734 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] shows up on Van Richten's doorstep, and gives the good doctor his notes; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting the [[Created]].}}<ref>JWM Timeline p. 30: "VRGttC pg. 6: Estimate. “Years” after Madren wrote about his sister’s death"</ref> 

[[735 BC] - Dr. Van Richten is forced to kill his old friend [[Shauten]] in self-defense, when Shauten tries to sacrifice Rudolph in a bid for [[lichdom]]<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref><ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>. {{Spec|This "near-miss" may have inspired Van Richten to start recording his collected knowledge for heroes to come.}}<ref>JWM Timeline: "Speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6"</ref>

735 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''.<ref name="RLCS p.18">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.18</ref><ref name="RLPHB p.20">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.20</ref>

[[736 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''.

[[737 BC]] - The [[Vistana]] [[Cyrilla]]'s niece [[Vassa]] is [[kidnapped]] near [[Corvia]].<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 20: The golem appeared “the following year” after Vaasa’s soul is taken."</ref>

737 BC - [[Vassa]] returns as a [[clay golem]]; Cyrilla writes to Dr. Van Richten.<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 19 "just last year"</ref>

737 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''.

[[738 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''.

[[738 BC]] [[Emil Bollenbach]] engineers the [[kidnapping]] of Dr. Rudolph van Richten to the end of seizing his [[brain]] for [[transplantation]] into a super-golem. fortunately, several of Van Richten's friends intercede to thwart Dr. Bollenbach.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 33: "[[Children of the Night: The Created]] pg. 50; CT pg. 32 places this adventure 8 years after Emil’s disappearance (i.e., 746), but the dating used in CotN:C fits VR’s chronology better.</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] goes to [[Nartok]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 67-68">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.67-68</ref>

[[739 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and the adventuring band known as [[the Hand (Adventurer Band)|the Hand]] hunt and destroy [[the Gibbering Golem]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 265-276">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.265-276</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]] publishes ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''. This act earns him considerable ire from [[Agatha Clairmont]], whom sees it as an instruction manual to building [[dread golem]]s just much as it is hunting them.<ref name="Van Richten's Arsenal p. 149">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p. 149</ref>

[[740 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]'' (early spring).

740 BC - Dr. Van Richten inherits the [[library (Aimon Davidovitch)]] of [[Aimon Davidovitch]]. Dr. Van Richten starts studying tomes. (Sept)<ref>JWM Timeline p. 35 "Extrapolated from VRGtF pg. 4"</ref>

[[741 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]], [[Davvyd]], [[Samuel]] and [[Dr. Ottelie Farringer]] battle the fiend [[Drigor]]. Only Dr. van Richten survives. (Feb.)<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 79-85">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p. 79-85</ref>

741 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]]''.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Book)]] p.4</ref>

741 BC - [[Van Richten]] stumbles into the clutches of [[the nameless Amnizu]] and [[the nameless Barbazu]] infesting [[Chateaufaux]]. He is captured. However, he manages to join with some [[adventurer]]s to route the [[devil]]s from the town.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.72-73; Note that the encounter with these [[fiend]]s doesn't appear in the original uncompiled Van Richten's Guide to Fiends. Therefore, the encounter with the [[Fiends of Chateaufaux]] took place after took place after the first VRGtF was published.</ref><ref>[[Gazetteer III]] p.30-31, "just over 15 years ago"</ref>

741 BC<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> - Dr. Van Richten is [[depressed]]; he consults with the [[diviner]], [[Inarin Alster]]; Rudolph realizes he had been laboring under a [[curse]] all these years; Dr. Van Richten spends a year with [[Arturi Radanavich]] studying the Vistani.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]] p.5-7; 87-89</ref>

[[742 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten writes his ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]'' and retires.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> (Oct.)

[[750 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten dies in [[Richten Haus|Bleak House]] in the fight against [[Madame Radanavich]]<ref>[[Domains of Dread]] p. 17, as told in [[Bleak House]], particularly [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 58-63</ref> Meanwhile, all that is known to most, including the [[Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]] is that he [[disappeared]].<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

{{ref}}

[[category:Character]] [[category:NPC]]
[[category:2nd Edition Character]]
[[category:3rd Edition Character]]
[[category:4th Edition Character]]
[[category:5th Edition Character]]
[[category:Abused]]
[[category:Betrayed]]
[[Category:Cursed]]
[[category:Cursed by the Vistani]]
[[Category:Darkonian]]
[[Category:Demonologist]]
[[category:Energy Drained]]
[[Category:Filicide]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Rivalis]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Nartok]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Forest of Shadows]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Darkon]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordentshire]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordent]]
[[Category:Former Patients of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Dominia]]
[[Category:Former Medical Student]]
[[Category:Former Student of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[category:Gaslighted]]
[[category:Giogoto]]
[[Category:Ghost]]
[[Category:Graduate of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Graduate]]
[[Category:Herbalist]]
[[Category:Human]]
[[category:healer]]
[[category:Hero]]
[[Category:Hunter Of Monsters]]
[[Category:Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[category:Intellectual]]
[[Category:Kidnapped]]
[[category:Killer]]
[[category:Lorist]]
[[Category:Male]]
[[category:Mass Murderer]]
[[category:Medical Doctor]]
[[category:Medical Professional]]
[[category:Mentor]]
[[category:Murderer]]
[[Category:Necrologist]]
[[category:Old]]
[[Category:Planar Mechanic]]
[[category:Polymath]]
[[category:Posthumous Character]]
[[category:Potential Darklord]]
[[Category:Proprietor]]
[[category:Professional Killer]]
[[category:Punished]]
[[category:Ravenloft Lorist]]
[[Category:Ravenloft Loremaster]]
[[category:Redeemed]]
[[category:Reformed]]
[[category:Repentant]]
[[category:Researcher]]
[[category:Retired]]
[[Category:Rogue]]
[[category:Sage]]
[[category:Seduced]]
[[Category:Stasis]]
[[category:Tempted]]
[[category:Transgressed]]
[[category:Transgressor]]
[[Category:Van Richten Family]]
[[category:Victim of Medical Malpractice]]
[[Category:Victim of the van Richten Curse]]
[[category:Victimized]]
[[Category:Widowed]]
[[Category:writer]]
[[category:Births in 671 BC]]
[[category:Deaths in 750 BC]]
<references/>

==Data from the Ravenloft Catalogue==



{|
|-valign="top"
|[[Image:rldb_npc.jpg]]
|[[Image:rldb_primary.gif]]
|
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' 
''[[Bleak House]]''
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_art.gif]]
|
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - p4 
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - cover, p4 
''[[Bleak House:Homecoming]]'' - p4,p16 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - p7,8 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p92 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - p114 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 5,11 
''[[The Created]]'' - p13 
''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]'' - p5
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_stats.gif]]
|
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - pp4-5 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p91 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 3
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_desc.gif]]
|
''[[Ravenloft Third Edition]]'' - pp14,17-18,27,176 
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - throughout 
''[[Bleak House]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to The Created]]'' - throughout 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]'' - throughout 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - pp91-93 
''[[Tales of Ravenloft: The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]'' - pp1-17 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - pp 2-3 
''[[Heroes of Light]]'' - p64 
''[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]]'' - pp1-4, pp9-13, pp304-310
|-valign="top"
|}

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (NPC)

2022-01-30T16:19:17Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* Appearances */

[[File:Original VR.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
[[File:Rudolph van richten.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten and [[Strahd]] by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
{{canon}}
'''Dr. Rudolph Van Richten''' is the greatest monster hunter that has ever lived and the most well-known hero of the Lands of the Mists.

==History==
He was born in [[Rivalis]] in [[Darkon]] in [[671 BC]]. He took [[medicine]] at the [[University of Il Aluk]], completing his four or five year program of study in [[693 BC]]. This humble man was spurred into a life of monster hunting when his son [[Erasmus van Richten]] was kidnapped by the [[Radanavich clan]] and sold to [[Baron Metus]]. Metus turned Erasmus into a [[vampire groom]] and Van Richten was forced to slay his son. In revenge, Metus killed Rudolph's wife, [[Ingrid van Richten]]. Van Richten eventually slew Metus, and then, with the help of [[Azalin]], the entire [[Radanavich tribe]].

Until his disappearance in [[750 BC]], he resided in [[Mordentshire]], where he ran an [[Van Richten's Herbalist Shop|herbalist shop]], as well as wrote several of his famous [[Van Richten's Guides]], and mentored [[The Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]], who regarded him as an uncle and took up his work.

==In [[Curse of Strahd]]==
Dr. van Richten makes a notable appearance in the [[5th Edition]] [[module]], [[Curse of Strahd]], though not in his [[famous]] persona as the monster hunter and [[writer]] of the [[Van Richten's Guides]] he is notable for in previous Ravenloft products. Instead, he adopts the guise of [[Rictavio]], a traveling [[half-elf]] [[bard]], [[storyteller]], and [[ringmaster]] gathering stories and watching out for talent. In reality he is gathering formation and waiting for an optimal time to strike at [[Strahd]], preferably when the vampire lord is in [[hibernation]]. Unlike other versions of van Richten, the Curse of Strahd van Richten is a [[loner]] because he knows the full extent of his [[curse]].<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> For more details, see [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Curse of Strahd)]]

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Appearances==
===[[Campaign Setting]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[Ravenloft: Realm of Terror]]
**[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting (Box)]]

===[[Modules]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[The Nightmare Lands (Boxed Set)]] (referenced only)
**[[Chilling Tales]]
**[[Dungeon Magazine #55]]: [[The Sea Wolf]]
**[[Bleak House: The Death of Rudolph Van Richten]]

===[[Novels]], stories===

*[[Tales of Ravenloft]]: [[The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]

==Authored:==
* ''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Demons]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Witches (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Witches]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]''

Credited for marketing purposes with:
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Mists (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Mists]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]]''

==[[Associate of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]==

==Chronology==

[[671 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten born<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, son of Otto and Mrs. Van Richten
 
{{Spec|[[678 BC]] - Rudolph’s sister [[Maria Van Richten]] born.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 18 "Speculation based on BH. We only know that she is younger than Rudolph."</ref>
 

[[679 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten sent to boarding school in [[Nartok]]. A childhood friend is [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]].<ref name="VRMHCII p.25-26">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 25-26</ref>

[[680 BC]] - [[Casimir (of Richten Haus)|Casimir]] (not to be confused with [[Casimir Lukas|Harkon Lukas’ son]]) starts working at Richten Haus as the gate keeper.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 6">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 6</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[683 BC]] - The servants of [[Richten Haus]] are all killed while the family is away one day. (summer)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.18: "Speculation based on [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] pg. 15, 24: I’m going on the hunch that VR grows younger until he reaches the age he was at when this event occurred"</ref>
 

[[685 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten meets [[Robert Tatenna]], a fellow student at boarding school. (fall)<ref name="CT p.14">[[Chilling Tales]] p.14</ref>

[[688 BC]] - The [[The Crimson Death Epidemic | Crimson Death]] spreads across Darkon (winter); it claims Van Richten’s great aunt Helga, despite his efforts; Rudolph is even more driven into his medical studies.<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[689 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten attends the [[University of Il Aluk]]. While there, he meets a fellow student, [[Dr. Harmon Ruscheider]]. (fall)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]] pg. 15"</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[691 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten marries his childhood sweetheart, [[Ingrid van Richten|Ingrid]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "[[Realm of Terror]]; [[VRGtV]]: Give VR a good respectable year between their marriage and birth of Erasmus in 692"</ref>
 

[[692 BC]] - Rudolph and Ingrid Van Richten's son [[Erasmus van Richten|Erasmus]] is born.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]] p. 4; [[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 8, "fourteen summers" before [[706 BC]]</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[693 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten finishes his studies; opens his practice back home in [[Rivalis]].}},<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VR’s age, RoT; VRGtV; and ToDm pg. 86, which indicates it takes 4-5 years to get a medical education at the University of Il Aluk"</ref> 
 
{{Spec|693 BC - Dr. Van Richten travels to [[Lamordia]], hears of the [[Loud Man of Lamordia]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VRGtG pg. 9: “When I was young.”</ref> 

[[696 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Antonin Madren]] and becomes his mentor.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 21: "VRGttC pg. 6: Van Richten takes Madren on as a medical student, which implies Van Richten has time to offer such an education (which lasts up to 8 years), i.e., while he was still a simple doctor (693-706)."</ref>

[[706 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten suffers the wrath of the [[Radanavich clan]]; the Vistani steal his son Erasmus; they sell Erasmus to [[Baron Metus]]<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, a vampire from [[Richemulot]]; with the help of an amused [[Azalin]], Van Richten wipes out all but one member of the Radanavich caravan<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]</ref>; [[Madame Radanavich]] [[curse | curses]] Van Richten<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, although he doesn’t realize it until the end of his career.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

[[706 BC]] Van Richten puts his Erasmus, now a vampire, out of his misery, but in spite [[Baron Metus]] tears [[Ingrid van Richten]] to pieces; Dr. Van Richten destroys Baron Metus, starting his career of hunting evil. Unable to live with the memories in [[Richten Haus]], Van Richten moves to [[Corvia]].<ref name="VRA p. 5">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 5</ref>

[[707 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten researches vampires, and meets [[Aimon Davidovitch]], a fellow scholar of the arcane.<ref> from [[JWM Timeline]] p.22: "[[VRGtF]] pg. 4: VR knew him for “some 30-odd years”]</ref>

[[710 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten encounters his first werebeast near [[Varithne]], a small village in northern [[Darkon]]. Dr. Van Richten starts hunting werebeasts as well<ref name="VRMHC p. 109-110">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 109-110</ref>

[[711 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Gedlan Ironheart]], a fearless [[dwarven]] [[innkeeper]] in [[Corvia]]. Gedlan becomes a frequent hunting companion.<ref name="Bleah House p. 11">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p.11</ref>

[[712 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets the mage [[Shauten]]; they bond when they are attacked by one of Azalin's patrols. Shauten opens Van Richten's eyes to the existence of the [[Lich]].<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref>

[[713 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten is visited by the dying Dr. Ruscheider, who tells Rudolph all he can about several months spent as a lich's captive; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting liches.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p.111-112</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[714 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten receives a visit from his childhood friend, [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]], who is now a ghostly slave to Azalin; Dr. Van Richten learns the terrible truth about [[Azalin Rex]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on [[VRGtG]] pg. 22, [[VRMHCII]] pg. 24</ref>
 

{{Spec|714 BC - Dr. Van Richten moves to [[Mordentshire]], sensing it is politically unsafe for him to remain in [[Darkon]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on VRGttL pg. 22</ref>
 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[716 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 3 n1">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade after her death, but [[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[718 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and [[Shauten]] battle a creature they believe to be a priestly [[lich]]; it is actually Van Richten's first [[ancient dead]]}}.<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] "Speculation based on VRGAD pg. 5: “Some years ago,” and other markers. It happened after VR started hunting liches, but before he started hunting ghosts. (The latter conclusion taken from numerous references to Claudia in this Guide"</ref>
 
[[724 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten battles the [[Bog Monster of Hroth]], and meets [[Jameld of Hroth|Jameld]]. This is also Van Richten's first visit to both [[Kartakass]] and [[Sithicus]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p.153</ref> 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[726 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decade n1">[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades after her death but[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade</ref> 

{{Spec|726 BC - Dr. Van Richten visits [[Sanguinia]] with [[George Weathermay]] and [[Arametrius]]; they meet [[Claudia DeShanes]]; Claudia becomes Rudolph’s assistant, and it seems he had certain unspoken feelings for her.}}<ref>Speculation from JWM Timeline p.28: "Since Arametrius is probably [[Athasian]], Van Richten may have recently visited [[Kalidnay]] and encountered [[Ahmose Tanit]]. [VRGtG pg. 73. This is the earliest possible date for this event (due to George’s inclusion, and we know from this source and BH that VR starts hunting ghosts one year after this event. That leaves only 9 years between VR starting to hunt and writing his Guide on the subject. I chose to go with this date to keep as wide a margin of opportunity as possible.]"</ref>
 

[[727 BC]] - [[Merilee Markuza]], the Child [[Vampire]], kills Claudia. Van Richten pursues the creature relentlessly, but loses her in [[Lamordia]].<ref name="Darklords p. 63">[[Darklords]] p. 63</ref>

727 BC - While hunting the Child Vampire, Van Richten witnesses the [[Thundering Carriage]]; Van Richten decides he must put an end to these ghostly horrors, too.<ref name="Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts p. 6">[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 6</ref>

[[728 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten defeats the [[Phantom Army]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 91</ref>

[[729 BC]] - The fiend [[Elsepeth]] enters Ravenloft via [[transposition]] in a small village outside [[Stangengrad]], near the [[Grashen Falls]] (sept)<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.28: "[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] pg. 14: the diary is dated “twelve years ago.”</ref>

[[730 BC]] - {{Spec|[[Gedlan Ironheart]] killed while battling evil spirits.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: "VRGtG pg. 23: Gedlan is referred to as “Geddar” in this book. The date is an estimate based on the 727-736 available time span."</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] leaves [[Borca]], having lurked there for years.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] p. 66</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] writes to Van Richten about the death of Madren’s sister.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[734 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] shows up on Van Richten's doorstep, and gives the good doctor his notes; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting the [[Created]].}}<ref>JWM Timeline p. 30: "VRGttC pg. 6: Estimate. “Years” after Madren wrote about his sister’s death"</ref> 

[[735 BC] - Dr. Van Richten is forced to kill his old friend [[Shauten]] in self-defense, when Shauten tries to sacrifice Rudolph in a bid for [[lichdom]]<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref><ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>. {{Spec|This "near-miss" may have inspired Van Richten to start recording his collected knowledge for heroes to come.}}<ref>JWM Timeline: "Speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6"</ref>

735 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''.<ref name="RLCS p.18">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.18</ref><ref name="RLPHB p.20">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.20</ref>

[[736 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''.

[[737 BC]] - The [[Vistana]] [[Cyrilla]]'s niece [[Vassa]] is [[kidnapped]] near [[Corvia]].<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 20: The golem appeared “the following year” after Vaasa’s soul is taken."</ref>

737 BC - [[Vassa]] returns as a [[clay golem]]; Cyrilla writes to Dr. Van Richten.<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 19 "just last year"</ref>

737 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''.

[[738 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''.

[[738 BC]] [[Emil Bollenbach]] engineers the [[kidnapping]] of Dr. Rudolph van Richten to the end of seizing his [[brain]] for [[transplantation]] into a super-golem. fortunately, several of Van Richten's friends intercede to thwart Dr. Bollenbach.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 33: "[[Children of the Night: The Created]] pg. 50; CT pg. 32 places this adventure 8 years after Emil’s disappearance (i.e., 746), but the dating used in CotN:C fits VR’s chronology better.</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] goes to [[Nartok]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 67-68">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.67-68</ref>

[[739 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and the adventuring band known as [[the Hand (Adventurer Band)|the Hand]] hunt and destroy [[the Gibbering Golem]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 265-276">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.265-276</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]] publishes ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''. This act earns him considerable ire from [[Agatha Clairmont]], whom sees it as an instruction manual to building [[dread golem]]s just much as it is hunting them.<ref name="Van Richten's Arsenal p. 149">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p. 149</ref>

[[740 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]'' (early spring).

740 BC - Dr. Van Richten inherits the [[library (Aimon Davidovitch)]] of [[Aimon Davidovitch]]. Dr. Van Richten starts studying tomes. (Sept)<ref>JWM Timeline p. 35 "Extrapolated from VRGtF pg. 4"</ref>

[[741 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]], [[Davvyd]], [[Samuel]] and [[Dr. Ottelie Farringer]] battle the fiend [[Drigor]]. Only Dr. van Richten survives. (Feb.)<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 79-85">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p. 79-85</ref>

741 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]]''.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Book)]] p.4</ref>

741 BC - [[Van Richten]] stumbles into the clutches of [[the nameless Amnizu]] and [[the nameless Barbazu]] infesting [[Chateaufaux]]. He is captured. However, he manages to join with some [[adventurer]]s to route the [[devil]]s from the town.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.72-73; Note that the encounter with these [[fiend]]s doesn't appear in the original uncompiled Van Richten's Guide to Fiends. Therefore, the encounter with the [[Fiends of Chateaufaux]] took place after took place after the first VRGtF was published.</ref><ref>[[Gazetteer III]] p.30-31, "just over 15 years ago"</ref>

741 BC<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> - Dr. Van Richten is [[depressed]]; he consults with the [[diviner]], [[Inarin Alster]]; Rudolph realizes he had been laboring under a [[curse]] all these years; Dr. Van Richten spends a year with [[Arturi Radanavich]] studying the Vistani.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]] p.5-7; 87-89</ref>

[[742 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten writes his ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]'' and retires.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> (Oct.)

[[750 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten dies in [[Richten Haus|Bleak House]] in the fight against [[Madame Radanavich]]<ref>[[Domains of Dread]] p. 17, as told in [[Bleak House]], particularly [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 58-63</ref> Meanwhile, all that is known to most, including the [[Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]] is that he [[disappeared]].<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

{{ref}}

[[category:Character]] [[category:NPC]]
[[category:2nd Edition Character]]
[[category:3rd Edition Character]]
[[category:4th Edition Character]]
[[category:5th Edition Character]]
[[category:Abused]]
[[category:Betrayed]]
[[Category:Cursed]]
[[category:Cursed by the Vistani]]
[[Category:Darkonian]]
[[Category:Demonologist]]
[[category:Energy Drained]]
[[Category:Filicide]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Rivalis]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Nartok]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Forest of Shadows]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Darkon]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordentshire]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordent]]
[[Category:Former Patients of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Dominia]]
[[Category:Former Medical Student]]
[[Category:Former Student of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[category:Gaslighted]]
[[category:Giogoto]]
[[Category:Ghost]]
[[Category:Graduate of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Graduate]]
[[Category:Herbalist]]
[[Category:Human]]
[[category:healer]]
[[category:Hero]]
[[Category:Hunter Of Monsters]]
[[Category:Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[category:Intellectual]]
[[Category:Kidnapped]]
[[category:Killer]]
[[category:Lorist]]
[[Category:Male]]
[[category:Mass Murderer]]
[[category:Medical Doctor]]
[[category:Medical Professional]]
[[category:Mentor]]
[[category:Murderer]]
[[Category:Necrologist]]
[[category:Old]]
[[Category:Planar Mechanic]]
[[category:Polymath]]
[[category:Posthumous Character]]
[[category:Potential Darklord]]
[[Category:Proprietor]]
[[category:Professional Killer]]
[[category:Punished]]
[[category:Ravenloft Lorist]]
[[Category:Ravenloft Loremaster]]
[[category:Redeemed]]
[[category:Reformed]]
[[category:Repentant]]
[[category:Researcher]]
[[category:Retired]]
[[Category:Rogue]]
[[category:Sage]]
[[category:Seduced]]
[[Category:Stasis]]
[[category:Tempted]]
[[category:Transgressed]]
[[category:Transgressor]]
[[Category:Van Richten Family]]
[[category:Victim of Medical Malpractice]]
[[Category:Victim of the van Richten Curse]]
[[category:Victimized]]
[[Category:Widowed]]
[[Category:writer]]
[[category:Births in 671 BC]]
[[category:Deaths in 750 BC]]
<references/>

==Data from the Ravenloft Catalogue==



{|
|-valign="top"
|[[Image:rldb_npc.jpg]]
|[[Image:rldb_primary.gif]]
|
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' 
''[[Bleak House]]''
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_art.gif]]
|
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - p4 
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - cover, p4 
''[[Bleak House:Homecoming]]'' - p4,p16 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - p7,8 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p92 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - p114 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 5,11 
''[[The Created]]'' - p13 
''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]'' - p5
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_stats.gif]]
|
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - pp4-5 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p91 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 3
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_desc.gif]]
|
''[[Ravenloft Third Edition]]'' - pp14,17-18,27,176 
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - throughout 
''[[Bleak House]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to The Created]]'' - throughout 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]'' - throughout 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - pp91-93 
''[[Tales of Ravenloft: The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]'' - pp1-17 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - pp 2-3 
''[[Heroes of Light]]'' - p64 
''[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]]'' - pp1-4, pp9-13, pp304-310
|-valign="top"
|}

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Article)

2022-01-30T16:17:52Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* Appearances */

DR. RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN

Medium humanoid (human), Lawful Good

Armor Class: 17 (half plate of flowing sanctity)

Hit Points: 77 (14d8 +14)

Speed: 30 ft.

Strength: 9 (-1)

Dexterity: 13 (+1)

Constitution: 13 (+1)

Intelligence: 17 (+3)

Wisdom: 18 (+4)

Charisma: 16 (+3)

Saving Throws: Con +5, Wis +8, Cha +7

Skills: Arcana +7, Deception +7, Insight +12,
Investigation +7, Medicine +8, Perception +12,
Religion +6, Sleight of Hand +4

Condition Immunities: charmed

Senses: darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 22

Languages: Abyssal, Celestial, Common, Draconic, Dwarvish, Elvish, Gundarak, Infernal, Sylvan

Challenge: 9 (5,000 XP)

SPECIAL EQUIPMENT:

In addition to his +1 sword cane and light crossbow, Van Richten wears a hat of disguise, goggles of night, and a ring of mind shielding, and he carries a spell scroll of raise dead.

Half Plate of Flowing Sanctity +1 mithril half plate. Once a day, a flask of water placed in the belt of armor becomes holy water.

ACTIONS:

Spellcasting: Van Richter is a 9th level Cleric of Helm, 1st level Wizard. His spellcasting ability is Wisdom (save DC 15, +7 to hit with spell attacks). Van Richten has the following Cleric and Wizard spells prepared:

Cantrips (at will): light, mage hand, mending, minor illusion, prestidigitation, sacred flame, thaumaturgy, toll the dead

1st level (4 slots): alarm, bless, cure wounds, detect evil and good, feather fall, find familiar, healing word, identify, protection from evil and good, shield, sleep

2nd level (3 slots): augury, beacon of hope, lesser restoration, protection from poison, silence, spiritual weapon warding bond, zone of truth

3rd level (3 slots): glyph of warding, magic circle, mass healing word, revivify, speak with dead, spirit guardians

4th level (3 slots): death ward, freedom of movement

5th level (3 slots): dawn, greater restoration, mass cure wounds, raise dead

Skulker: Van Richten can hide when he is lightly obscured from the creature from which he is hiding. When he’s hidden from a creature and misses it with a ranged weapon attack, making the attack doesn’t reveal his position. Dim light doesn’t impose disadvantage on his Wisdom (Perception) checks relying on sight.

Undead Slayer: When Van Richten hits an undead with a weapon attack, the undead takes an extra 10 (3d6) damage of weapon’s type.

Cunning Action: Van Richten can use a bonus action to take the Dash, Disengage or Hide action.

Sneak Attack: When Van Richten surprises a target, has advantage on an attack roll, or an enemy is within 5 ft. of the target, Van Richten deals and extra 7 damage.

Assassin Proficiencies: Van Richten is proficient with Disguise and Poisoner’s Kits.

Assassinate: When Van Richten hits a surprised enemy, it’s automatically a critical hit. When he attacks an enemy that hasn’t yet had a turn, he gains advantage on the attack.

Channel Divinity: Turn Undead: Undead within 30 ft. of Van Richten must make a Wisdom saving throw. If the creature fails its saving throw, they are turned for 1 minute or until they take damage. A turned creature must spend its turns trying to move as far away from him as it can, and it can’t willingly move to a space within 30 ft. of him. It also can’t take reactions. For its action, it can use only the Dash action or try to escape from an effect that prevents it from moving. If there’s nowhere to move, the creature can use the Dodge action. Undead with CR 1 or less are automatically destroyed on a failed save.

Preserve Life: As an action, Van Richten can distribute 45 hit points. This feature can restore a creature to no more than half of its hit point maximum and has no effect on an undead or construct.

Multiattack: Van Richten makes two attacks with his sword cane or light crossbow.

Sword Cane: Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 6 (1d6 +2) bludgeon damage (wooden cane) or piercing damage (silvered sword).

Light Crossbow: Ranged Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, range 80/320 ft., one target. Hit: 7 (1d8 +2) piercing damage.

Healer: As an action, Van Richten can spend one use of a Healer’s Kit to tend to a creature and restore 1d6 +4 hit points to it, plus additional hit points equal to the creature’s maximum number of Hit Dice. The creature can’t regain hit points from this feat again until it finishes a short or long rest.

REACTIONS:

Final Ward: Van Richten has a permanent glyph of warding tattooed on his neck that activates when he’s bitten there and chooses to say “Erasmus, I’m coming home” in Celestial. All targets in a 20 ft. radius must make a Dexterity saving throw or take 5d8 +5 radiant damage on a failed save or half as much (rounded up) on a successful one. Van Richten automatically fails the save and is disintegrated along with all of the items on his person.

RICTAVIO:

Several months ago a colorfully dressed half-elf bard came to Barovia in a carnival wagon, with a pet monkey on his shoulder. He took over an abandoned tower on Lake Baratok before rolling into town of Vallaki several months later. Claiming to be a carnival ringmaster in search of new actors, he began regaling locals with tales of distant lands.

MONSTER HUNTER:

The half-elf ringmaster is, in fact, the legendary human monster hunter named Rudolph Van Richten. Van Richten’s tale is a sad one. A scholar and doctor from a land called Darkon, he married his childhood sweetheart, Ingrid and together they had a son, Erasmus. When he was fourteen, Erasmus was stolen away by Vistani and sold to a vampire named Baron Metus to be used as a companion. By the time Van Richten found his son, it was too late: the Baron had already transformed Erasmus into a vampire spawn. Erasmus begged his father to end his suffering, which Van Richten did by pounding a wooden stake through his son’s chest. Baron Metus avenged that death by killing Van Richten’s wife, and Van Richten has lived with the horror of his family’s destruction ever since. After destroying Baron Metus in turn, Van Richten sought revenge against the Vistani and took up a life of hunting evil monsters.

THE WAITING GAME:

Van Richten isn’t a young man anymore. He knows his road is coming to an end, but his work isn’t done. He has come to Barovia to kill Strahd Von Zarovich, the greatest vampire of them all. Van Richten has studied Strahd for years and knows he can’t hope to best the vampire in a straight-up confrontation: he must wait for the right moment to strike. He has good evidence to suggest that Strahd periodically hibernates in his coffin, sometimes for years, when all is quite in the realm. While he bides his time, Van Richten hides in plain sight with the aid of a hat of disguise, his thoughts protected by a ring of mind shielding. He is trying to learn more about the Keepers of the Feather—a society of wereravens that oppose Strahd—while trying not to expose the secret society to their mutual enemy. He thinks the wereravens might prove helpful when the time comes. Van Richten also wants to take out as many of Strahd’s spies as he can, starting with the Vistani.

MAN WITH A PLAN:

Van Richten doesn’t know that his former protégé, a good-aligned Vistani named Ezmerelda d’Avenir, has come to Barovia looking for him. He taught her many of his monster-hunting techniques, but she doesn’t know all of his tricks and disguises. So far, their paths haven’t crossed. In the event that Van Richten becomes aware of Ezmerelda’s presence, he does his utmost to protect her without putting his own plans in jeopardy. If he can manipulate a party of adventurers into keeping an eye on her, he will do so.

VAN RICHTEN WORKS ALONE:

A curse placed on him long ago by a Vistani seer brings doom to those he befriends (see ‘Role Playing Notes’ for details). Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure. Consequently, if he thinks he’s in danger of being unmasked, he retreats to the Tower of Khazan (chapter 11) or some other quiet corner of Strahd’s domain to plan further.

TRAITS:

Ideal. “Evil cannot go unchallenged.”

Bond. “To protect those I love, I must keep them distant and hidden from my enemies.”

Flaw. “I am cursed. Thus, I will never have peace.”

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

A CURSED MAN:

Van Richten suffers a curse bestowed on him by a Vistani:

Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws.

Its effect on him can best be summarized with this statement: "Van Richten Dies Last." This curse is both a boon and a bane to him. The curse is a large part of why he has lived so long--how he has accumulated so much experience and expertise. He is cursed to always see his friends and allies die--which means he has to live long enough to see it happen.

For a long time, he was unaware of the exact nature of the curse on him, but he is apparently aware of it now.

• Van Richten feels guilty. For decades he fought alongside others with monsters, completely unaware that he was a doombringer among them. Now that he knows, he is burdened by all the deaths he feels that his presence caused.

• Van Richten isolates himself. He doesn't let people get close to him for fear that his curse will take them out.

• If Van Richten is traveling with the party, he has excellent odds of surviving--if someone is going to die in the party, it'll be someone other than him.

• Van Richten's curse should have a tangible impact if he’s traveling with the party: he is a doombringer of the highest order. His mere presence among the party should invite tragedy and disaster.

The Tragedy of Ezmerelda and Van Richten. In the backstory that created Ezmerelda d’Avenir (Appendix D: Monsters and NPCs pages 230-231), there's a tragedy in there: Van Richten's curse could have been lifted years ago.

By Ravenloft Lore, the strongest of curses laid down by a Vistani can only be lifted by the Vistani who placed it, or a blood relative of that Vistani. Van Richten's curse was a Death Curse laid on him by Ezmerelda's mother. Only Ezmerelda has the ability to revoke the curse. But here's the problem...
Ezmerelda is Vistani...by nature; they are secretive about their abilities. Beyond that, Van Richten doesn't trust Vistani and likely commanded Ezmerelda to not use her Vistani abilities in his presence. As a result, Van Richten doesn't know how Vistani curses work--he doesn't know that they can be revoked by a blood relative of the one who laid it. He's a Cleric, he has undoubtedly tried remove curse on himself and it failed. As far as he knows, the curse is permanent.
Van Richten is also secretive and, as mentioned, doesn't trust the Vistani. He kept Ezmerelda at arm's length as best he could both because he couldn't trust her, but also to try to protect her from the curse...and even if he was aware of the curse when they traveled together, he never told her about it.

If either one of them had been less secretive, more open, his curse would have been revoked a long time ago.

If the players want to help Van Richten break the curse, here's the backstory:

The story of Ezmerelda and Van Richten's history was written in the Van Richten's Journal (Appendix F: Handouts pages 254-255). It involves him destroying Ezmerelda's caravan while she was very, very young. She survived the undead assault and later got picked up by another caravan of Vistani (it was actually the Zarovan tribe--Madam Eva's caravan). She originally wanted revenge on Van Richten, but time with Eva (and the presence of the most powerful Vistani of them all) showed her the tragedy of what had happened from an outside perspective. Ezmerelda realized that the whole thing was a horrible tragedy and wrongs had been committed on both sides. She, thus, set out to try to find Van Richten and try to make things right...though Eva never told her about the curse her mother had laid on Van Richten.

Van Richten and Ezmerelda must travel to the place the curse was first laid...a small clearing in the forests of Barovia where the ruins of Ezmerelda's caravan still lie. Both must verbally acknowledge the wrong that had been done and verbally forgive one another for it...then the remains of Ezmerelda's caravan must be burned.

THE DISGUISE:

Van Richten got the idea for “Rictavio” from his exposure to Ezmerelda and her occasional methods for blending in when going somewhere that didn't like Vistani. In short: "Sometimes the best disguise is being the most obvious thing in the room." As mentioned above, Ezmerelda has never encountered the Rictavio disguise and Van Richten isn't familiar with any of the disguises Ezmerelda is currently using.

It is a rather perfect disguise. Van Richten is known as a grim and serious individual, a dour old man who roves the world slaying monsters. “Rictavio” is a flamboyant fop who tells ludicrous stories, commits crimes against music, and is constantly trying to recruit people to his Circus of Wonders. He should be portrayed as extremely over the top and completely harmless. It should be very jarring to your players if he drops the act and reveals who he truly is.
Furthermore, Rictavio knows that even if someone suspects he's hiding something, they are extremely unlikely to guess the truth. If a player rolls well on Insight against him and figures out he's full of crap, that only tells them that he's lying about something...not what he is lying about. And his response is to just carry on and ignore accusations. Sure, the PCs may figure out that he's full of it (his stories are obvious fabrications) but he just carries right along, sticking to his guns even though the players know it’s a load of BS.

The players should have a hard time to get a serious read on Rictavio's personality. He strikes them as so straight forward--a carnie who is spinning tall tales for amusement. So they shouldn’t suspect that he's any more than what he appears to be.

A HARD MAN TO PIN DOWN:

Van Richten is a man with a plan for killing Strahd Von Zarovich, and it's a plan that plays well to his aged capabilities: "wait til Strahd takes a long nap, then stake him in his sleep." Of anyone in the valley, Van Richten knows how deadly Strahd is. He has fought elder vampires before and Strahd is the greatest of them all. He may very well believe that trying to fight him head on is pure folly, but he’s the one most capable of doing so.

It's important to note: Most of the "Destined Allies" the party can draw from Madame Eva’s Tarokka card reading have notes about how the PCs can get that individual to join them. Van Richten has no such notes. Instead, it says this...

Van Richten works alone. [...] Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure.

Van Richten is aware of Madame Eva but (unlike many others in the valley) he won't immediately cave to her prophecies, drop everything he has been working on, and throw his lot in with the PCs. Here are a few important things to keep in mind if the party is trying to recruit him...

• Van Richten is quite certain that if he drops his disguise, Strahd will find him and set out to kill him. (This is one of Strahd's Primary Goals as listed in Chapter 1)

• Van Richten's disguise is magically augmented. As long as the party can't get his hat off, they cannot prove that he’s not a carnie ringmaster

• Van Richten's disguise is only useful against Strahd as long as no one knows who he really is. The ring of mind shielding only works on him...it doesn't work on the PCs. He knows that if anyone else finds out, Strahd can charm them, read their mind or otherwise extract that information from them.

• Van Richten is fully aware of his curse. He will avoid physically joining up with the party for fear that he will get them all killed.

• Van Richten does not talk about his curse. He knows well the bravery of adventurers and that telling them about his curse tends to result in responses like "Oh, you don't need to worry about us, we're strong!" followed shortly by ":dying noises:." Rebuffing their advances without mentioning the curse is much more effective at getting them to stay away from him so his curse doesn't kill them.

• Even if Van Richten consents to offer them aid, it should be indirect as much as possible. He has his plan, he's set in his ways, and he’s not going to go gallivanting off with a bunch of young adventurers. And, he should stay in character as much as possible...blowing his cover will only bring Strahd down on him AND the PCs.

Ideally, even if the party can convince him to help...his help should primarily take the form of a surprisingly knowledgeable carnival ringmaster who is "certainly not going to go out and fight monsters with you. I'm a ringmaster, not an adventurer!"

He may lend the party his carnival wagon to travel around in (once he finds somewhere else to stash his saber-toothed tiger that has been trained to hunt Vistani, or he may lend them the tiger), give them helpful advice--possibly using ravens to stay in touch over long-distance if the PCs make friends with the Keepers of the Feather, and provide the sort of support that a Carnie could offer. But, it should take rather extreme circumstances for him to actually be honest with the PCs...and they may have to do something about his curse before he'll actually travel with them.

GETTING HIM TO JOIN UP:

Van Richten wants to stay under cover...so how does the party get him to change his mind?

Easy: Ruin his plan.

If Van Richten's cover is blown, his plan is a wash. The whole plan depends on his identity staying a secret until Strahd goes into hibernation. If Strahd identifies Van Richten before then, he will try to kill him and Van Richten is pretty sure he can't take Strahd in a straight-up fight. Thus...if Van Richten’s cover is blown, he is stuck with two bad choices: Either he tries to keep going it alone, possibly getting killed by Strahd, and fails his “final mission,” or he accepts the risk to the PCs and joins them to try to take Strahd down directly. A few example ways to blow his cover...

• Knock his hat off. A hat of disguise only works as long as it stays on your head, so if something happens that knocks his hat off; “Rictavio” is replaced by Van Richten.

• Let the Tyger Tyger event happen (chapter 5). When Rictavio flees to the Tower of Khazan, he's inside an antimagic field and cannot disguise himself.

• Even if Van Richten is distorting his voice, if the PCs have already befriended Ezmerelda, she may still recognize it...even if what she recognizes is the cadence his voice adopts when he's explaining something.

ABILITY LOADOUT:

Van Richten is a Cleric...and his listed prepared spells speaks more of a support caster than a monster hunter who has gone solo. But, because he's a Cleric, he can swap out his prepared spells at will to any other spells on the Cleric list. Here are a few notes on spells for him to use...

• Dawn creates sunlight. If he can lock a vampire down within the area of effect, they will be dust in short order.

• Dispel Evil and Good breaks a vampire's charm. However...things can't really leave Barovia, so the dismissal part of that spell won't be terribly effective here.

• Geas is useful when he needs to find something. For example, capture a werewolf then place a geas on it to lead them to the den.

• Lesser and Greater Restoration are enormously useful, as is remove curse.

• Guiding Bolt is a great weapon against Vampires. Shuts down their regeneration, and gives the next attack advantage.

• Hallow: If Van Richten can get his hands on the material components for this, he can create holy ground to help protect the PCs. Create a bubble of hallowed ground around the antimagic field that covers the Tower of Khazan....talk about a fortress. Sure, you'll have a bubble of non-hallowed ground where the antimagic field zone is...but the territory around the tower itself will be holy ground.

• Given his skill at predicting his foes...dropping sanctuary on a creature they are about to attack can completely trash their attempts.

• Spirit Guardians is another spell that is just....awesome.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Appearances==
===[[Campaign Setting]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[Ravenloft: Realm of Terror]]
**[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting (Box)]]

===[[Modules]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[The Nightmare Lands (Boxed Set)]] (referenced only)
**[[Chilling Tales]]
**[[Dungeon Magazine #55]]: [[The Sea Wolf]]
**[[Bleak House: The Death of Rudolph Van Richten]]
*[[4th Edition]]
**[[Dragon magazine #416 (Online)]]: [[Strahd and Van Richten]]
*[[5th Edition]]
**[[Curse of Strahd]]
**[[Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft]]

===[[Novels]], stories===

*[[Tales of Ravenloft]]: [[The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (NPC)

2022-01-29T23:51:33Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* Appearances */

[[File:Original VR.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
[[File:Rudolph van richten.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten and [[Strahd]] by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
{{canon}}
'''Dr. Rudolph Van Richten''' is the greatest monster hunter that has ever lived and the most well-known hero of the Lands of the Mists.

==History==
He was born in [[Rivalis]] in [[Darkon]] in [[671 BC]]. He took [[medicine]] at the [[University of Il Aluk]], completing his four or five year program of study in [[693 BC]]. This humble man was spurred into a life of monster hunting when his son [[Erasmus van Richten]] was kidnapped by the [[Radanavich clan]] and sold to [[Baron Metus]]. Metus turned Erasmus into a [[vampire groom]] and Van Richten was forced to slay his son. In revenge, Metus killed Rudolph's wife, [[Ingrid van Richten]]. Van Richten eventually slew Metus, and then, with the help of [[Azalin]], the entire [[Radanavich tribe]].

Until his disappearance in [[750 BC]], he resided in [[Mordentshire]], where he ran an [[Van Richten's Herbalist Shop|herbalist shop]], as well as wrote several of his famous [[Van Richten's Guides]], and mentored [[The Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]], who regarded him as an uncle and took up his work.

==In [[Curse of Strahd]]==
Dr. van Richten makes a notable appearance in the [[5th Edition]] [[module]], [[Curse of Strahd]], though not in his [[famous]] persona as the monster hunter and [[writer]] of the [[Van Richten's Guides]] he is notable for in previous Ravenloft products. Instead, he adopts the guise of [[Rictavio]], a traveling [[half-elf]] [[bard]], [[storyteller]], and [[ringmaster]] gathering stories and watching out for talent. In reality he is gathering formation and waiting for an optimal time to strike at [[Strahd]], preferably when the vampire lord is in [[hibernation]]. Unlike other versions of van Richten, the Curse of Strahd van Richten is a [[loner]] because he knows the full extent of his [[curse]].<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> For more details, see [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Curse of Strahd)]]

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Appearances==
===[[Campaign Setting]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[Ravenloft: Realm of Terror]]
**[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting (Box)]]

===[[Modules]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[The Nightmare Lands (Boxed Set)]] (referenced only)
**[[Chilling Tales]]
**[[Dungeon Magazine #55]]: [[The Sea Wolf]]
**[[Bleak House: The Death of Rudolph Van Richten]]

===[[Novels]], stories===

*[[Tales of Ravenloft]]: [[The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]
*[[Dragon magazine #416 (online)]]: [[Strahd and Van Richten]]

==Authored:==
* ''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Demons]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Witches (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Witches]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]''

Credited for marketing purposes with:
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Mists (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Mists]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]]''

==[[Associate of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]==

==Chronology==

[[671 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten born<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, son of Otto and Mrs. Van Richten
 
{{Spec|[[678 BC]] - Rudolph’s sister [[Maria Van Richten]] born.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 18 "Speculation based on BH. We only know that she is younger than Rudolph."</ref>
 

[[679 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten sent to boarding school in [[Nartok]]. A childhood friend is [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]].<ref name="VRMHCII p.25-26">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 25-26</ref>

[[680 BC]] - [[Casimir (of Richten Haus)|Casimir]] (not to be confused with [[Casimir Lukas|Harkon Lukas’ son]]) starts working at Richten Haus as the gate keeper.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 6">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 6</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[683 BC]] - The servants of [[Richten Haus]] are all killed while the family is away one day. (summer)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.18: "Speculation based on [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] pg. 15, 24: I’m going on the hunch that VR grows younger until he reaches the age he was at when this event occurred"</ref>
 

[[685 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten meets [[Robert Tatenna]], a fellow student at boarding school. (fall)<ref name="CT p.14">[[Chilling Tales]] p.14</ref>

[[688 BC]] - The [[The Crimson Death Epidemic | Crimson Death]] spreads across Darkon (winter); it claims Van Richten’s great aunt Helga, despite his efforts; Rudolph is even more driven into his medical studies.<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[689 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten attends the [[University of Il Aluk]]. While there, he meets a fellow student, [[Dr. Harmon Ruscheider]]. (fall)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]] pg. 15"</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[691 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten marries his childhood sweetheart, [[Ingrid van Richten|Ingrid]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "[[Realm of Terror]]; [[VRGtV]]: Give VR a good respectable year between their marriage and birth of Erasmus in 692"</ref>
 

[[692 BC]] - Rudolph and Ingrid Van Richten's son [[Erasmus van Richten|Erasmus]] is born.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]] p. 4; [[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 8, "fourteen summers" before [[706 BC]]</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[693 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten finishes his studies; opens his practice back home in [[Rivalis]].}},<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VR’s age, RoT; VRGtV; and ToDm pg. 86, which indicates it takes 4-5 years to get a medical education at the University of Il Aluk"</ref> 
 
{{Spec|693 BC - Dr. Van Richten travels to [[Lamordia]], hears of the [[Loud Man of Lamordia]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VRGtG pg. 9: “When I was young.”</ref> 

[[696 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Antonin Madren]] and becomes his mentor.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 21: "VRGttC pg. 6: Van Richten takes Madren on as a medical student, which implies Van Richten has time to offer such an education (which lasts up to 8 years), i.e., while he was still a simple doctor (693-706)."</ref>

[[706 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten suffers the wrath of the [[Radanavich clan]]; the Vistani steal his son Erasmus; they sell Erasmus to [[Baron Metus]]<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, a vampire from [[Richemulot]]; with the help of an amused [[Azalin]], Van Richten wipes out all but one member of the Radanavich caravan<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]</ref>; [[Madame Radanavich]] [[curse | curses]] Van Richten<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, although he doesn’t realize it until the end of his career.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

[[706 BC]] Van Richten puts his Erasmus, now a vampire, out of his misery, but in spite [[Baron Metus]] tears [[Ingrid van Richten]] to pieces; Dr. Van Richten destroys Baron Metus, starting his career of hunting evil. Unable to live with the memories in [[Richten Haus]], Van Richten moves to [[Corvia]].<ref name="VRA p. 5">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 5</ref>

[[707 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten researches vampires, and meets [[Aimon Davidovitch]], a fellow scholar of the arcane.<ref> from [[JWM Timeline]] p.22: "[[VRGtF]] pg. 4: VR knew him for “some 30-odd years”]</ref>

[[710 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten encounters his first werebeast near [[Varithne]], a small village in northern [[Darkon]]. Dr. Van Richten starts hunting werebeasts as well<ref name="VRMHC p. 109-110">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 109-110</ref>

[[711 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Gedlan Ironheart]], a fearless [[dwarven]] [[innkeeper]] in [[Corvia]]. Gedlan becomes a frequent hunting companion.<ref name="Bleah House p. 11">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p.11</ref>

[[712 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets the mage [[Shauten]]; they bond when they are attacked by one of Azalin's patrols. Shauten opens Van Richten's eyes to the existence of the [[Lich]].<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref>

[[713 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten is visited by the dying Dr. Ruscheider, who tells Rudolph all he can about several months spent as a lich's captive; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting liches.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p.111-112</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[714 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten receives a visit from his childhood friend, [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]], who is now a ghostly slave to Azalin; Dr. Van Richten learns the terrible truth about [[Azalin Rex]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on [[VRGtG]] pg. 22, [[VRMHCII]] pg. 24</ref>
 

{{Spec|714 BC - Dr. Van Richten moves to [[Mordentshire]], sensing it is politically unsafe for him to remain in [[Darkon]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on VRGttL pg. 22</ref>
 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[716 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 3 n1">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade after her death, but [[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[718 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and [[Shauten]] battle a creature they believe to be a priestly [[lich]]; it is actually Van Richten's first [[ancient dead]]}}.<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] "Speculation based on VRGAD pg. 5: “Some years ago,” and other markers. It happened after VR started hunting liches, but before he started hunting ghosts. (The latter conclusion taken from numerous references to Claudia in this Guide"</ref>
 
[[724 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten battles the [[Bog Monster of Hroth]], and meets [[Jameld of Hroth|Jameld]]. This is also Van Richten's first visit to both [[Kartakass]] and [[Sithicus]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p.153</ref> 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[726 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decade n1">[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades after her death but[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade</ref> 

{{Spec|726 BC - Dr. Van Richten visits [[Sanguinia]] with [[George Weathermay]] and [[Arametrius]]; they meet [[Claudia DeShanes]]; Claudia becomes Rudolph’s assistant, and it seems he had certain unspoken feelings for her.}}<ref>Speculation from JWM Timeline p.28: "Since Arametrius is probably [[Athasian]], Van Richten may have recently visited [[Kalidnay]] and encountered [[Ahmose Tanit]]. [VRGtG pg. 73. This is the earliest possible date for this event (due to George’s inclusion, and we know from this source and BH that VR starts hunting ghosts one year after this event. That leaves only 9 years between VR starting to hunt and writing his Guide on the subject. I chose to go with this date to keep as wide a margin of opportunity as possible.]"</ref>
 

[[727 BC]] - [[Merilee Markuza]], the Child [[Vampire]], kills Claudia. Van Richten pursues the creature relentlessly, but loses her in [[Lamordia]].<ref name="Darklords p. 63">[[Darklords]] p. 63</ref>

727 BC - While hunting the Child Vampire, Van Richten witnesses the [[Thundering Carriage]]; Van Richten decides he must put an end to these ghostly horrors, too.<ref name="Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts p. 6">[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 6</ref>

[[728 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten defeats the [[Phantom Army]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 91</ref>

[[729 BC]] - The fiend [[Elsepeth]] enters Ravenloft via [[transposition]] in a small village outside [[Stangengrad]], near the [[Grashen Falls]] (sept)<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.28: "[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] pg. 14: the diary is dated “twelve years ago.”</ref>

[[730 BC]] - {{Spec|[[Gedlan Ironheart]] killed while battling evil spirits.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: "VRGtG pg. 23: Gedlan is referred to as “Geddar” in this book. The date is an estimate based on the 727-736 available time span."</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] leaves [[Borca]], having lurked there for years.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] p. 66</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] writes to Van Richten about the death of Madren’s sister.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[734 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] shows up on Van Richten's doorstep, and gives the good doctor his notes; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting the [[Created]].}}<ref>JWM Timeline p. 30: "VRGttC pg. 6: Estimate. “Years” after Madren wrote about his sister’s death"</ref> 

[[735 BC] - Dr. Van Richten is forced to kill his old friend [[Shauten]] in self-defense, when Shauten tries to sacrifice Rudolph in a bid for [[lichdom]]<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref><ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>. {{Spec|This "near-miss" may have inspired Van Richten to start recording his collected knowledge for heroes to come.}}<ref>JWM Timeline: "Speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6"</ref>

735 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''.<ref name="RLCS p.18">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.18</ref><ref name="RLPHB p.20">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.20</ref>

[[736 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''.

[[737 BC]] - The [[Vistana]] [[Cyrilla]]'s niece [[Vassa]] is [[kidnapped]] near [[Corvia]].<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 20: The golem appeared “the following year” after Vaasa’s soul is taken."</ref>

737 BC - [[Vassa]] returns as a [[clay golem]]; Cyrilla writes to Dr. Van Richten.<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 19 "just last year"</ref>

737 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''.

[[738 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''.

[[738 BC]] [[Emil Bollenbach]] engineers the [[kidnapping]] of Dr. Rudolph van Richten to the end of seizing his [[brain]] for [[transplantation]] into a super-golem. fortunately, several of Van Richten's friends intercede to thwart Dr. Bollenbach.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 33: "[[Children of the Night: The Created]] pg. 50; CT pg. 32 places this adventure 8 years after Emil’s disappearance (i.e., 746), but the dating used in CotN:C fits VR’s chronology better.</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] goes to [[Nartok]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 67-68">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.67-68</ref>

[[739 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and the adventuring band known as [[the Hand (Adventurer Band)|the Hand]] hunt and destroy [[the Gibbering Golem]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 265-276">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.265-276</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]] publishes ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''. This act earns him considerable ire from [[Agatha Clairmont]], whom sees it as an instruction manual to building [[dread golem]]s just much as it is hunting them.<ref name="Van Richten's Arsenal p. 149">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p. 149</ref>

[[740 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]'' (early spring).

740 BC - Dr. Van Richten inherits the [[library (Aimon Davidovitch)]] of [[Aimon Davidovitch]]. Dr. Van Richten starts studying tomes. (Sept)<ref>JWM Timeline p. 35 "Extrapolated from VRGtF pg. 4"</ref>

[[741 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]], [[Davvyd]], [[Samuel]] and [[Dr. Ottelie Farringer]] battle the fiend [[Drigor]]. Only Dr. van Richten survives. (Feb.)<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 79-85">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p. 79-85</ref>

741 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]]''.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Book)]] p.4</ref>

741 BC - [[Van Richten]] stumbles into the clutches of [[the nameless Amnizu]] and [[the nameless Barbazu]] infesting [[Chateaufaux]]. He is captured. However, he manages to join with some [[adventurer]]s to route the [[devil]]s from the town.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.72-73; Note that the encounter with these [[fiend]]s doesn't appear in the original uncompiled Van Richten's Guide to Fiends. Therefore, the encounter with the [[Fiends of Chateaufaux]] took place after took place after the first VRGtF was published.</ref><ref>[[Gazetteer III]] p.30-31, "just over 15 years ago"</ref>

741 BC<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> - Dr. Van Richten is [[depressed]]; he consults with the [[diviner]], [[Inarin Alster]]; Rudolph realizes he had been laboring under a [[curse]] all these years; Dr. Van Richten spends a year with [[Arturi Radanavich]] studying the Vistani.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]] p.5-7; 87-89</ref>

[[742 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten writes his ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]'' and retires.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> (Oct.)

[[750 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten dies in [[Richten Haus|Bleak House]] in the fight against [[Madame Radanavich]]<ref>[[Domains of Dread]] p. 17, as told in [[Bleak House]], particularly [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 58-63</ref> Meanwhile, all that is known to most, including the [[Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]] is that he [[disappeared]].<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

{{ref}}

[[category:Character]] [[category:NPC]]
[[category:2nd Edition Character]]
[[category:3rd Edition Character]]
[[category:4th Edition Character]]
[[category:5th Edition Character]]
[[category:Abused]]
[[category:Betrayed]]
[[Category:Cursed]]
[[category:Cursed by the Vistani]]
[[Category:Darkonian]]
[[Category:Demonologist]]
[[category:Energy Drained]]
[[Category:Filicide]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Rivalis]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Nartok]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Forest of Shadows]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Darkon]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordentshire]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordent]]
[[Category:Former Patients of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Dominia]]
[[Category:Former Medical Student]]
[[Category:Former Student of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[category:Gaslighted]]
[[category:Giogoto]]
[[Category:Ghost]]
[[Category:Graduate of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Graduate]]
[[Category:Herbalist]]
[[Category:Human]]
[[category:healer]]
[[category:Hero]]
[[Category:Hunter Of Monsters]]
[[Category:Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[category:Intellectual]]
[[Category:Kidnapped]]
[[category:Killer]]
[[category:Lorist]]
[[Category:Male]]
[[category:Mass Murderer]]
[[category:Medical Doctor]]
[[category:Medical Professional]]
[[category:Mentor]]
[[category:Murderer]]
[[Category:Necrologist]]
[[category:Old]]
[[Category:Planar Mechanic]]
[[category:Polymath]]
[[category:Posthumous Character]]
[[category:Potential Darklord]]
[[Category:Proprietor]]
[[category:Professional Killer]]
[[category:Punished]]
[[category:Ravenloft Lorist]]
[[Category:Ravenloft Loremaster]]
[[category:Redeemed]]
[[category:Reformed]]
[[category:Repentant]]
[[category:Researcher]]
[[category:Retired]]
[[Category:Rogue]]
[[category:Sage]]
[[category:Seduced]]
[[Category:Stasis]]
[[category:Tempted]]
[[category:Transgressed]]
[[category:Transgressor]]
[[Category:Van Richten Family]]
[[category:Victim of Medical Malpractice]]
[[Category:Victim of the van Richten Curse]]
[[category:Victimized]]
[[Category:Widowed]]
[[Category:writer]]
[[category:Births in 671 BC]]
[[category:Deaths in 750 BC]]
<references/>

==Data from the Ravenloft Catalogue==



{|
|-valign="top"
|[[Image:rldb_npc.jpg]]
|[[Image:rldb_primary.gif]]
|
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' 
''[[Bleak House]]''
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_art.gif]]
|
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - p4 
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - cover, p4 
''[[Bleak House:Homecoming]]'' - p4,p16 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - p7,8 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p92 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - p114 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 5,11 
''[[The Created]]'' - p13 
''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]'' - p5
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_stats.gif]]
|
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - pp4-5 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p91 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 3
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_desc.gif]]
|
''[[Ravenloft Third Edition]]'' - pp14,17-18,27,176 
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - throughout 
''[[Bleak House]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to The Created]]'' - throughout 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]'' - throughout 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - pp91-93 
''[[Tales of Ravenloft: The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]'' - pp1-17 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - pp 2-3 
''[[Heroes of Light]]'' - p64 
''[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]]'' - pp1-4, pp9-13, pp304-310
|-valign="top"
|}

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Article)

2022-01-29T23:49:49Z

Blade Runner Rock:

DR. RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN

Medium humanoid (human), Lawful Good

Armor Class: 17 (half plate of flowing sanctity)

Hit Points: 77 (14d8 +14)

Speed: 30 ft.

Strength: 9 (-1)

Dexterity: 13 (+1)

Constitution: 13 (+1)

Intelligence: 17 (+3)

Wisdom: 18 (+4)

Charisma: 16 (+3)

Saving Throws: Con +5, Wis +8, Cha +7

Skills: Arcana +7, Deception +7, Insight +12,
Investigation +7, Medicine +8, Perception +12,
Religion +6, Sleight of Hand +4

Condition Immunities: charmed

Senses: darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 22

Languages: Abyssal, Celestial, Common, Draconic, Dwarvish, Elvish, Gundarak, Infernal, Sylvan

Challenge: 9 (5,000 XP)

SPECIAL EQUIPMENT:

In addition to his +1 sword cane and light crossbow, Van Richten wears a hat of disguise, goggles of night, and a ring of mind shielding, and he carries a spell scroll of raise dead.

Half Plate of Flowing Sanctity +1 mithril half plate. Once a day, a flask of water placed in the belt of armor becomes holy water.

ACTIONS:

Spellcasting: Van Richter is a 9th level Cleric of Helm, 1st level Wizard. His spellcasting ability is Wisdom (save DC 15, +7 to hit with spell attacks). Van Richten has the following Cleric and Wizard spells prepared:

Cantrips (at will): light, mage hand, mending, minor illusion, prestidigitation, sacred flame, thaumaturgy, toll the dead

1st level (4 slots): alarm, bless, cure wounds, detect evil and good, feather fall, find familiar, healing word, identify, protection from evil and good, shield, sleep

2nd level (3 slots): augury, beacon of hope, lesser restoration, protection from poison, silence, spiritual weapon warding bond, zone of truth

3rd level (3 slots): glyph of warding, magic circle, mass healing word, revivify, speak with dead, spirit guardians

4th level (3 slots): death ward, freedom of movement

5th level (3 slots): dawn, greater restoration, mass cure wounds, raise dead

Skulker: Van Richten can hide when he is lightly obscured from the creature from which he is hiding. When he’s hidden from a creature and misses it with a ranged weapon attack, making the attack doesn’t reveal his position. Dim light doesn’t impose disadvantage on his Wisdom (Perception) checks relying on sight.

Undead Slayer: When Van Richten hits an undead with a weapon attack, the undead takes an extra 10 (3d6) damage of weapon’s type.

Cunning Action: Van Richten can use a bonus action to take the Dash, Disengage or Hide action.

Sneak Attack: When Van Richten surprises a target, has advantage on an attack roll, or an enemy is within 5 ft. of the target, Van Richten deals and extra 7 damage.

Assassin Proficiencies: Van Richten is proficient with Disguise and Poisoner’s Kits.

Assassinate: When Van Richten hits a surprised enemy, it’s automatically a critical hit. When he attacks an enemy that hasn’t yet had a turn, he gains advantage on the attack.

Channel Divinity: Turn Undead: Undead within 30 ft. of Van Richten must make a Wisdom saving throw. If the creature fails its saving throw, they are turned for 1 minute or until they take damage. A turned creature must spend its turns trying to move as far away from him as it can, and it can’t willingly move to a space within 30 ft. of him. It also can’t take reactions. For its action, it can use only the Dash action or try to escape from an effect that prevents it from moving. If there’s nowhere to move, the creature can use the Dodge action. Undead with CR 1 or less are automatically destroyed on a failed save.

Preserve Life: As an action, Van Richten can distribute 45 hit points. This feature can restore a creature to no more than half of its hit point maximum and has no effect on an undead or construct.

Multiattack: Van Richten makes two attacks with his sword cane or light crossbow.

Sword Cane: Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 6 (1d6 +2) bludgeon damage (wooden cane) or piercing damage (silvered sword).

Light Crossbow: Ranged Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, range 80/320 ft., one target. Hit: 7 (1d8 +2) piercing damage.

Healer: As an action, Van Richten can spend one use of a Healer’s Kit to tend to a creature and restore 1d6 +4 hit points to it, plus additional hit points equal to the creature’s maximum number of Hit Dice. The creature can’t regain hit points from this feat again until it finishes a short or long rest.

REACTIONS:

Final Ward: Van Richten has a permanent glyph of warding tattooed on his neck that activates when he’s bitten there and chooses to say “Erasmus, I’m coming home” in Celestial. All targets in a 20 ft. radius must make a Dexterity saving throw or take 5d8 +5 radiant damage on a failed save or half as much (rounded up) on a successful one. Van Richten automatically fails the save and is disintegrated along with all of the items on his person.

RICTAVIO:

Several months ago a colorfully dressed half-elf bard came to Barovia in a carnival wagon, with a pet monkey on his shoulder. He took over an abandoned tower on Lake Baratok before rolling into town of Vallaki several months later. Claiming to be a carnival ringmaster in search of new actors, he began regaling locals with tales of distant lands.

MONSTER HUNTER:

The half-elf ringmaster is, in fact, the legendary human monster hunter named Rudolph Van Richten. Van Richten’s tale is a sad one. A scholar and doctor from a land called Darkon, he married his childhood sweetheart, Ingrid and together they had a son, Erasmus. When he was fourteen, Erasmus was stolen away by Vistani and sold to a vampire named Baron Metus to be used as a companion. By the time Van Richten found his son, it was too late: the Baron had already transformed Erasmus into a vampire spawn. Erasmus begged his father to end his suffering, which Van Richten did by pounding a wooden stake through his son’s chest. Baron Metus avenged that death by killing Van Richten’s wife, and Van Richten has lived with the horror of his family’s destruction ever since. After destroying Baron Metus in turn, Van Richten sought revenge against the Vistani and took up a life of hunting evil monsters.

THE WAITING GAME:

Van Richten isn’t a young man anymore. He knows his road is coming to an end, but his work isn’t done. He has come to Barovia to kill Strahd Von Zarovich, the greatest vampire of them all. Van Richten has studied Strahd for years and knows he can’t hope to best the vampire in a straight-up confrontation: he must wait for the right moment to strike. He has good evidence to suggest that Strahd periodically hibernates in his coffin, sometimes for years, when all is quite in the realm. While he bides his time, Van Richten hides in plain sight with the aid of a hat of disguise, his thoughts protected by a ring of mind shielding. He is trying to learn more about the Keepers of the Feather—a society of wereravens that oppose Strahd—while trying not to expose the secret society to their mutual enemy. He thinks the wereravens might prove helpful when the time comes. Van Richten also wants to take out as many of Strahd’s spies as he can, starting with the Vistani.

MAN WITH A PLAN:

Van Richten doesn’t know that his former protégé, a good-aligned Vistani named Ezmerelda d’Avenir, has come to Barovia looking for him. He taught her many of his monster-hunting techniques, but she doesn’t know all of his tricks and disguises. So far, their paths haven’t crossed. In the event that Van Richten becomes aware of Ezmerelda’s presence, he does his utmost to protect her without putting his own plans in jeopardy. If he can manipulate a party of adventurers into keeping an eye on her, he will do so.

VAN RICHTEN WORKS ALONE:

A curse placed on him long ago by a Vistani seer brings doom to those he befriends (see ‘Role Playing Notes’ for details). Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure. Consequently, if he thinks he’s in danger of being unmasked, he retreats to the Tower of Khazan (chapter 11) or some other quiet corner of Strahd’s domain to plan further.

TRAITS:

Ideal. “Evil cannot go unchallenged.”

Bond. “To protect those I love, I must keep them distant and hidden from my enemies.”

Flaw. “I am cursed. Thus, I will never have peace.”

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

A CURSED MAN:

Van Richten suffers a curse bestowed on him by a Vistani:

Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws.

Its effect on him can best be summarized with this statement: "Van Richten Dies Last." This curse is both a boon and a bane to him. The curse is a large part of why he has lived so long--how he has accumulated so much experience and expertise. He is cursed to always see his friends and allies die--which means he has to live long enough to see it happen.

For a long time, he was unaware of the exact nature of the curse on him, but he is apparently aware of it now.

• Van Richten feels guilty. For decades he fought alongside others with monsters, completely unaware that he was a doombringer among them. Now that he knows, he is burdened by all the deaths he feels that his presence caused.

• Van Richten isolates himself. He doesn't let people get close to him for fear that his curse will take them out.

• If Van Richten is traveling with the party, he has excellent odds of surviving--if someone is going to die in the party, it'll be someone other than him.

• Van Richten's curse should have a tangible impact if he’s traveling with the party: he is a doombringer of the highest order. His mere presence among the party should invite tragedy and disaster.

The Tragedy of Ezmerelda and Van Richten. In the backstory that created Ezmerelda d’Avenir (Appendix D: Monsters and NPCs pages 230-231), there's a tragedy in there: Van Richten's curse could have been lifted years ago.

By Ravenloft Lore, the strongest of curses laid down by a Vistani can only be lifted by the Vistani who placed it, or a blood relative of that Vistani. Van Richten's curse was a Death Curse laid on him by Ezmerelda's mother. Only Ezmerelda has the ability to revoke the curse. But here's the problem...
Ezmerelda is Vistani...by nature; they are secretive about their abilities. Beyond that, Van Richten doesn't trust Vistani and likely commanded Ezmerelda to not use her Vistani abilities in his presence. As a result, Van Richten doesn't know how Vistani curses work--he doesn't know that they can be revoked by a blood relative of the one who laid it. He's a Cleric, he has undoubtedly tried remove curse on himself and it failed. As far as he knows, the curse is permanent.
Van Richten is also secretive and, as mentioned, doesn't trust the Vistani. He kept Ezmerelda at arm's length as best he could both because he couldn't trust her, but also to try to protect her from the curse...and even if he was aware of the curse when they traveled together, he never told her about it.

If either one of them had been less secretive, more open, his curse would have been revoked a long time ago.

If the players want to help Van Richten break the curse, here's the backstory:

The story of Ezmerelda and Van Richten's history was written in the Van Richten's Journal (Appendix F: Handouts pages 254-255). It involves him destroying Ezmerelda's caravan while she was very, very young. She survived the undead assault and later got picked up by another caravan of Vistani (it was actually the Zarovan tribe--Madam Eva's caravan). She originally wanted revenge on Van Richten, but time with Eva (and the presence of the most powerful Vistani of them all) showed her the tragedy of what had happened from an outside perspective. Ezmerelda realized that the whole thing was a horrible tragedy and wrongs had been committed on both sides. She, thus, set out to try to find Van Richten and try to make things right...though Eva never told her about the curse her mother had laid on Van Richten.

Van Richten and Ezmerelda must travel to the place the curse was first laid...a small clearing in the forests of Barovia where the ruins of Ezmerelda's caravan still lie. Both must verbally acknowledge the wrong that had been done and verbally forgive one another for it...then the remains of Ezmerelda's caravan must be burned.

THE DISGUISE:

Van Richten got the idea for “Rictavio” from his exposure to Ezmerelda and her occasional methods for blending in when going somewhere that didn't like Vistani. In short: "Sometimes the best disguise is being the most obvious thing in the room." As mentioned above, Ezmerelda has never encountered the Rictavio disguise and Van Richten isn't familiar with any of the disguises Ezmerelda is currently using.

It is a rather perfect disguise. Van Richten is known as a grim and serious individual, a dour old man who roves the world slaying monsters. “Rictavio” is a flamboyant fop who tells ludicrous stories, commits crimes against music, and is constantly trying to recruit people to his Circus of Wonders. He should be portrayed as extremely over the top and completely harmless. It should be very jarring to your players if he drops the act and reveals who he truly is.
Furthermore, Rictavio knows that even if someone suspects he's hiding something, they are extremely unlikely to guess the truth. If a player rolls well on Insight against him and figures out he's full of crap, that only tells them that he's lying about something...not what he is lying about. And his response is to just carry on and ignore accusations. Sure, the PCs may figure out that he's full of it (his stories are obvious fabrications) but he just carries right along, sticking to his guns even though the players know it’s a load of BS.

The players should have a hard time to get a serious read on Rictavio's personality. He strikes them as so straight forward--a carnie who is spinning tall tales for amusement. So they shouldn’t suspect that he's any more than what he appears to be.

A HARD MAN TO PIN DOWN:

Van Richten is a man with a plan for killing Strahd Von Zarovich, and it's a plan that plays well to his aged capabilities: "wait til Strahd takes a long nap, then stake him in his sleep." Of anyone in the valley, Van Richten knows how deadly Strahd is. He has fought elder vampires before and Strahd is the greatest of them all. He may very well believe that trying to fight him head on is pure folly, but he’s the one most capable of doing so.

It's important to note: Most of the "Destined Allies" the party can draw from Madame Eva’s Tarokka card reading have notes about how the PCs can get that individual to join them. Van Richten has no such notes. Instead, it says this...

Van Richten works alone. [...] Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure.

Van Richten is aware of Madame Eva but (unlike many others in the valley) he won't immediately cave to her prophecies, drop everything he has been working on, and throw his lot in with the PCs. Here are a few important things to keep in mind if the party is trying to recruit him...

• Van Richten is quite certain that if he drops his disguise, Strahd will find him and set out to kill him. (This is one of Strahd's Primary Goals as listed in Chapter 1)

• Van Richten's disguise is magically augmented. As long as the party can't get his hat off, they cannot prove that he’s not a carnie ringmaster

• Van Richten's disguise is only useful against Strahd as long as no one knows who he really is. The ring of mind shielding only works on him...it doesn't work on the PCs. He knows that if anyone else finds out, Strahd can charm them, read their mind or otherwise extract that information from them.

• Van Richten is fully aware of his curse. He will avoid physically joining up with the party for fear that he will get them all killed.

• Van Richten does not talk about his curse. He knows well the bravery of adventurers and that telling them about his curse tends to result in responses like "Oh, you don't need to worry about us, we're strong!" followed shortly by ":dying noises:." Rebuffing their advances without mentioning the curse is much more effective at getting them to stay away from him so his curse doesn't kill them.

• Even if Van Richten consents to offer them aid, it should be indirect as much as possible. He has his plan, he's set in his ways, and he’s not going to go gallivanting off with a bunch of young adventurers. And, he should stay in character as much as possible...blowing his cover will only bring Strahd down on him AND the PCs.

Ideally, even if the party can convince him to help...his help should primarily take the form of a surprisingly knowledgeable carnival ringmaster who is "certainly not going to go out and fight monsters with you. I'm a ringmaster, not an adventurer!"

He may lend the party his carnival wagon to travel around in (once he finds somewhere else to stash his saber-toothed tiger that has been trained to hunt Vistani, or he may lend them the tiger), give them helpful advice--possibly using ravens to stay in touch over long-distance if the PCs make friends with the Keepers of the Feather, and provide the sort of support that a Carnie could offer. But, it should take rather extreme circumstances for him to actually be honest with the PCs...and they may have to do something about his curse before he'll actually travel with them.

GETTING HIM TO JOIN UP:

Van Richten wants to stay under cover...so how does the party get him to change his mind?

Easy: Ruin his plan.

If Van Richten's cover is blown, his plan is a wash. The whole plan depends on his identity staying a secret until Strahd goes into hibernation. If Strahd identifies Van Richten before then, he will try to kill him and Van Richten is pretty sure he can't take Strahd in a straight-up fight. Thus...if Van Richten’s cover is blown, he is stuck with two bad choices: Either he tries to keep going it alone, possibly getting killed by Strahd, and fails his “final mission,” or he accepts the risk to the PCs and joins them to try to take Strahd down directly. A few example ways to blow his cover...

• Knock his hat off. A hat of disguise only works as long as it stays on your head, so if something happens that knocks his hat off; “Rictavio” is replaced by Van Richten.

• Let the Tyger Tyger event happen (chapter 5). When Rictavio flees to the Tower of Khazan, he's inside an antimagic field and cannot disguise himself.

• Even if Van Richten is distorting his voice, if the PCs have already befriended Ezmerelda, she may still recognize it...even if what she recognizes is the cadence his voice adopts when he's explaining something.

ABILITY LOADOUT:

Van Richten is a Cleric...and his listed prepared spells speaks more of a support caster than a monster hunter who has gone solo. But, because he's a Cleric, he can swap out his prepared spells at will to any other spells on the Cleric list. Here are a few notes on spells for him to use...

• Dawn creates sunlight. If he can lock a vampire down within the area of effect, they will be dust in short order.

• Dispel Evil and Good breaks a vampire's charm. However...things can't really leave Barovia, so the dismissal part of that spell won't be terribly effective here.

• Geas is useful when he needs to find something. For example, capture a werewolf then place a geas on it to lead them to the den.

• Lesser and Greater Restoration are enormously useful, as is remove curse.

• Guiding Bolt is a great weapon against Vampires. Shuts down their regeneration, and gives the next attack advantage.

• Hallow: If Van Richten can get his hands on the material components for this, he can create holy ground to help protect the PCs. Create a bubble of hallowed ground around the antimagic field that covers the Tower of Khazan....talk about a fortress. Sure, you'll have a bubble of non-hallowed ground where the antimagic field zone is...but the territory around the tower itself will be holy ground.

• Given his skill at predicting his foes...dropping sanctuary on a creature they are about to attack can completely trash their attempts.

• Spirit Guardians is another spell that is just....awesome.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Appearances==
===[[Campaign Setting]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[Ravenloft: Realm of Terror]]
**[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting (Box)]]

===[[Modules]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[The Nightmare Lands (Boxed Set)]] (referenced only)
**[[Chilling Tales]]
**[[Dungeon Magazine #55]]: [[The Sea Wolf]]
**[[Bleak House: The Death of Rudolph Van Richten]]
*[[5th Edition]]
**[[Curse of Strahd]]
**[[Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft]]

===[[Novels]], stories===

*[[Tales of Ravenloft]]: [[The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]
*[[Dragon magazine #416 (Online)]]: [[Strahd and Van Richten]]

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (NPC)

2022-01-29T23:48:11Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* Appearances */

[[File:Original VR.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
[[File:Rudolph van richten.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten and [[Strahd]] by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
{{canon}}
'''Dr. Rudolph Van Richten''' is the greatest monster hunter that has ever lived and the most well-known hero of the Lands of the Mists.

==History==
He was born in [[Rivalis]] in [[Darkon]] in [[671 BC]]. He took [[medicine]] at the [[University of Il Aluk]], completing his four or five year program of study in [[693 BC]]. This humble man was spurred into a life of monster hunting when his son [[Erasmus van Richten]] was kidnapped by the [[Radanavich clan]] and sold to [[Baron Metus]]. Metus turned Erasmus into a [[vampire groom]] and Van Richten was forced to slay his son. In revenge, Metus killed Rudolph's wife, [[Ingrid van Richten]]. Van Richten eventually slew Metus, and then, with the help of [[Azalin]], the entire [[Radanavich tribe]].

Until his disappearance in [[750 BC]], he resided in [[Mordentshire]], where he ran an [[Van Richten's Herbalist Shop|herbalist shop]], as well as wrote several of his famous [[Van Richten's Guides]], and mentored [[The Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]], who regarded him as an uncle and took up his work.

==In [[Curse of Strahd]]==
Dr. van Richten makes a notable appearance in the [[5th Edition]] [[module]], [[Curse of Strahd]], though not in his [[famous]] persona as the monster hunter and [[writer]] of the [[Van Richten's Guides]] he is notable for in previous Ravenloft products. Instead, he adopts the guise of [[Rictavio]], a traveling [[half-elf]] [[bard]], [[storyteller]], and [[ringmaster]] gathering stories and watching out for talent. In reality he is gathering formation and waiting for an optimal time to strike at [[Strahd]], preferably when the vampire lord is in [[hibernation]]. Unlike other versions of van Richten, the Curse of Strahd van Richten is a [[loner]] because he knows the full extent of his [[curse]].<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> For more details, see [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Curse of Strahd)]]

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Appearances==
===[[Campaign Setting]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[Ravenloft: Realm of Terror]]
**[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting (Box)]]

===[[Modules]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[The Nightmare Lands (Boxed Set)]] (referenced only)
**[[Chilling Tales]]
**[[Dungeon Magazine #55]]: [[The Sea Wolf]]
**[[Bleak House: The Death of Rudolph Van Richten]]
**[[Dragon magazine #416 (Online)]]: [[Strahd and Van Richten]]

===[[Novels]]===

*[[Tales of Ravenloft]]: [[The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]

==Authored:==
* ''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Demons]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Witches (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Witches]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]''

Credited for marketing purposes with:
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Mists (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Mists]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]]''

==[[Associate of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]==

==Chronology==

[[671 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten born<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, son of Otto and Mrs. Van Richten
 
{{Spec|[[678 BC]] - Rudolph’s sister [[Maria Van Richten]] born.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 18 "Speculation based on BH. We only know that she is younger than Rudolph."</ref>
 

[[679 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten sent to boarding school in [[Nartok]]. A childhood friend is [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]].<ref name="VRMHCII p.25-26">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 25-26</ref>

[[680 BC]] - [[Casimir (of Richten Haus)|Casimir]] (not to be confused with [[Casimir Lukas|Harkon Lukas’ son]]) starts working at Richten Haus as the gate keeper.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 6">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 6</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[683 BC]] - The servants of [[Richten Haus]] are all killed while the family is away one day. (summer)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.18: "Speculation based on [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] pg. 15, 24: I’m going on the hunch that VR grows younger until he reaches the age he was at when this event occurred"</ref>
 

[[685 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten meets [[Robert Tatenna]], a fellow student at boarding school. (fall)<ref name="CT p.14">[[Chilling Tales]] p.14</ref>

[[688 BC]] - The [[The Crimson Death Epidemic | Crimson Death]] spreads across Darkon (winter); it claims Van Richten’s great aunt Helga, despite his efforts; Rudolph is even more driven into his medical studies.<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[689 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten attends the [[University of Il Aluk]]. While there, he meets a fellow student, [[Dr. Harmon Ruscheider]]. (fall)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]] pg. 15"</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[691 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten marries his childhood sweetheart, [[Ingrid van Richten|Ingrid]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "[[Realm of Terror]]; [[VRGtV]]: Give VR a good respectable year between their marriage and birth of Erasmus in 692"</ref>
 

[[692 BC]] - Rudolph and Ingrid Van Richten's son [[Erasmus van Richten|Erasmus]] is born.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]] p. 4; [[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 8, "fourteen summers" before [[706 BC]]</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[693 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten finishes his studies; opens his practice back home in [[Rivalis]].}},<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VR’s age, RoT; VRGtV; and ToDm pg. 86, which indicates it takes 4-5 years to get a medical education at the University of Il Aluk"</ref> 
 
{{Spec|693 BC - Dr. Van Richten travels to [[Lamordia]], hears of the [[Loud Man of Lamordia]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VRGtG pg. 9: “When I was young.”</ref> 

[[696 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Antonin Madren]] and becomes his mentor.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 21: "VRGttC pg. 6: Van Richten takes Madren on as a medical student, which implies Van Richten has time to offer such an education (which lasts up to 8 years), i.e., while he was still a simple doctor (693-706)."</ref>

[[706 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten suffers the wrath of the [[Radanavich clan]]; the Vistani steal his son Erasmus; they sell Erasmus to [[Baron Metus]]<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, a vampire from [[Richemulot]]; with the help of an amused [[Azalin]], Van Richten wipes out all but one member of the Radanavich caravan<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]</ref>; [[Madame Radanavich]] [[curse | curses]] Van Richten<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, although he doesn’t realize it until the end of his career.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

[[706 BC]] Van Richten puts his Erasmus, now a vampire, out of his misery, but in spite [[Baron Metus]] tears [[Ingrid van Richten]] to pieces; Dr. Van Richten destroys Baron Metus, starting his career of hunting evil. Unable to live with the memories in [[Richten Haus]], Van Richten moves to [[Corvia]].<ref name="VRA p. 5">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 5</ref>

[[707 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten researches vampires, and meets [[Aimon Davidovitch]], a fellow scholar of the arcane.<ref> from [[JWM Timeline]] p.22: "[[VRGtF]] pg. 4: VR knew him for “some 30-odd years”]</ref>

[[710 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten encounters his first werebeast near [[Varithne]], a small village in northern [[Darkon]]. Dr. Van Richten starts hunting werebeasts as well<ref name="VRMHC p. 109-110">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 109-110</ref>

[[711 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Gedlan Ironheart]], a fearless [[dwarven]] [[innkeeper]] in [[Corvia]]. Gedlan becomes a frequent hunting companion.<ref name="Bleah House p. 11">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p.11</ref>

[[712 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets the mage [[Shauten]]; they bond when they are attacked by one of Azalin's patrols. Shauten opens Van Richten's eyes to the existence of the [[Lich]].<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref>

[[713 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten is visited by the dying Dr. Ruscheider, who tells Rudolph all he can about several months spent as a lich's captive; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting liches.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p.111-112</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[714 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten receives a visit from his childhood friend, [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]], who is now a ghostly slave to Azalin; Dr. Van Richten learns the terrible truth about [[Azalin Rex]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on [[VRGtG]] pg. 22, [[VRMHCII]] pg. 24</ref>
 

{{Spec|714 BC - Dr. Van Richten moves to [[Mordentshire]], sensing it is politically unsafe for him to remain in [[Darkon]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on VRGttL pg. 22</ref>
 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[716 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 3 n1">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade after her death, but [[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[718 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and [[Shauten]] battle a creature they believe to be a priestly [[lich]]; it is actually Van Richten's first [[ancient dead]]}}.<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] "Speculation based on VRGAD pg. 5: “Some years ago,” and other markers. It happened after VR started hunting liches, but before he started hunting ghosts. (The latter conclusion taken from numerous references to Claudia in this Guide"</ref>
 
[[724 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten battles the [[Bog Monster of Hroth]], and meets [[Jameld of Hroth|Jameld]]. This is also Van Richten's first visit to both [[Kartakass]] and [[Sithicus]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p.153</ref> 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[726 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decade n1">[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades after her death but[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade</ref> 

{{Spec|726 BC - Dr. Van Richten visits [[Sanguinia]] with [[George Weathermay]] and [[Arametrius]]; they meet [[Claudia DeShanes]]; Claudia becomes Rudolph’s assistant, and it seems he had certain unspoken feelings for her.}}<ref>Speculation from JWM Timeline p.28: "Since Arametrius is probably [[Athasian]], Van Richten may have recently visited [[Kalidnay]] and encountered [[Ahmose Tanit]]. [VRGtG pg. 73. This is the earliest possible date for this event (due to George’s inclusion, and we know from this source and BH that VR starts hunting ghosts one year after this event. That leaves only 9 years between VR starting to hunt and writing his Guide on the subject. I chose to go with this date to keep as wide a margin of opportunity as possible.]"</ref>
 

[[727 BC]] - [[Merilee Markuza]], the Child [[Vampire]], kills Claudia. Van Richten pursues the creature relentlessly, but loses her in [[Lamordia]].<ref name="Darklords p. 63">[[Darklords]] p. 63</ref>

727 BC - While hunting the Child Vampire, Van Richten witnesses the [[Thundering Carriage]]; Van Richten decides he must put an end to these ghostly horrors, too.<ref name="Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts p. 6">[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 6</ref>

[[728 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten defeats the [[Phantom Army]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 91</ref>

[[729 BC]] - The fiend [[Elsepeth]] enters Ravenloft via [[transposition]] in a small village outside [[Stangengrad]], near the [[Grashen Falls]] (sept)<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.28: "[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] pg. 14: the diary is dated “twelve years ago.”</ref>

[[730 BC]] - {{Spec|[[Gedlan Ironheart]] killed while battling evil spirits.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: "VRGtG pg. 23: Gedlan is referred to as “Geddar” in this book. The date is an estimate based on the 727-736 available time span."</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] leaves [[Borca]], having lurked there for years.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] p. 66</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] writes to Van Richten about the death of Madren’s sister.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[734 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] shows up on Van Richten's doorstep, and gives the good doctor his notes; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting the [[Created]].}}<ref>JWM Timeline p. 30: "VRGttC pg. 6: Estimate. “Years” after Madren wrote about his sister’s death"</ref> 

[[735 BC] - Dr. Van Richten is forced to kill his old friend [[Shauten]] in self-defense, when Shauten tries to sacrifice Rudolph in a bid for [[lichdom]]<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref><ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>. {{Spec|This "near-miss" may have inspired Van Richten to start recording his collected knowledge for heroes to come.}}<ref>JWM Timeline: "Speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6"</ref>

735 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''.<ref name="RLCS p.18">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.18</ref><ref name="RLPHB p.20">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.20</ref>

[[736 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''.

[[737 BC]] - The [[Vistana]] [[Cyrilla]]'s niece [[Vassa]] is [[kidnapped]] near [[Corvia]].<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 20: The golem appeared “the following year” after Vaasa’s soul is taken."</ref>

737 BC - [[Vassa]] returns as a [[clay golem]]; Cyrilla writes to Dr. Van Richten.<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 19 "just last year"</ref>

737 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''.

[[738 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''.

[[738 BC]] [[Emil Bollenbach]] engineers the [[kidnapping]] of Dr. Rudolph van Richten to the end of seizing his [[brain]] for [[transplantation]] into a super-golem. fortunately, several of Van Richten's friends intercede to thwart Dr. Bollenbach.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 33: "[[Children of the Night: The Created]] pg. 50; CT pg. 32 places this adventure 8 years after Emil’s disappearance (i.e., 746), but the dating used in CotN:C fits VR’s chronology better.</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] goes to [[Nartok]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 67-68">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.67-68</ref>

[[739 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and the adventuring band known as [[the Hand (Adventurer Band)|the Hand]] hunt and destroy [[the Gibbering Golem]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 265-276">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.265-276</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]] publishes ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''. This act earns him considerable ire from [[Agatha Clairmont]], whom sees it as an instruction manual to building [[dread golem]]s just much as it is hunting them.<ref name="Van Richten's Arsenal p. 149">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p. 149</ref>

[[740 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]'' (early spring).

740 BC - Dr. Van Richten inherits the [[library (Aimon Davidovitch)]] of [[Aimon Davidovitch]]. Dr. Van Richten starts studying tomes. (Sept)<ref>JWM Timeline p. 35 "Extrapolated from VRGtF pg. 4"</ref>

[[741 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]], [[Davvyd]], [[Samuel]] and [[Dr. Ottelie Farringer]] battle the fiend [[Drigor]]. Only Dr. van Richten survives. (Feb.)<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 79-85">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p. 79-85</ref>

741 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]]''.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Book)]] p.4</ref>

741 BC - [[Van Richten]] stumbles into the clutches of [[the nameless Amnizu]] and [[the nameless Barbazu]] infesting [[Chateaufaux]]. He is captured. However, he manages to join with some [[adventurer]]s to route the [[devil]]s from the town.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.72-73; Note that the encounter with these [[fiend]]s doesn't appear in the original uncompiled Van Richten's Guide to Fiends. Therefore, the encounter with the [[Fiends of Chateaufaux]] took place after took place after the first VRGtF was published.</ref><ref>[[Gazetteer III]] p.30-31, "just over 15 years ago"</ref>

741 BC<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> - Dr. Van Richten is [[depressed]]; he consults with the [[diviner]], [[Inarin Alster]]; Rudolph realizes he had been laboring under a [[curse]] all these years; Dr. Van Richten spends a year with [[Arturi Radanavich]] studying the Vistani.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]] p.5-7; 87-89</ref>

[[742 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten writes his ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]'' and retires.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> (Oct.)

[[750 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten dies in [[Richten Haus|Bleak House]] in the fight against [[Madame Radanavich]]<ref>[[Domains of Dread]] p. 17, as told in [[Bleak House]], particularly [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 58-63</ref> Meanwhile, all that is known to most, including the [[Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]] is that he [[disappeared]].<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

{{ref}}

[[category:Character]] [[category:NPC]]
[[category:2nd Edition Character]]
[[category:3rd Edition Character]]
[[category:4th Edition Character]]
[[category:5th Edition Character]]
[[category:Abused]]
[[category:Betrayed]]
[[Category:Cursed]]
[[category:Cursed by the Vistani]]
[[Category:Darkonian]]
[[Category:Demonologist]]
[[category:Energy Drained]]
[[Category:Filicide]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Rivalis]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Nartok]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Forest of Shadows]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Darkon]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordentshire]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordent]]
[[Category:Former Patients of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Dominia]]
[[Category:Former Medical Student]]
[[Category:Former Student of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[category:Gaslighted]]
[[category:Giogoto]]
[[Category:Ghost]]
[[Category:Graduate of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Graduate]]
[[Category:Herbalist]]
[[Category:Human]]
[[category:healer]]
[[category:Hero]]
[[Category:Hunter Of Monsters]]
[[Category:Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[category:Intellectual]]
[[Category:Kidnapped]]
[[category:Killer]]
[[category:Lorist]]
[[Category:Male]]
[[category:Mass Murderer]]
[[category:Medical Doctor]]
[[category:Medical Professional]]
[[category:Mentor]]
[[category:Murderer]]
[[Category:Necrologist]]
[[category:Old]]
[[Category:Planar Mechanic]]
[[category:Polymath]]
[[category:Posthumous Character]]
[[category:Potential Darklord]]
[[Category:Proprietor]]
[[category:Professional Killer]]
[[category:Punished]]
[[category:Ravenloft Lorist]]
[[Category:Ravenloft Loremaster]]
[[category:Redeemed]]
[[category:Reformed]]
[[category:Repentant]]
[[category:Researcher]]
[[category:Retired]]
[[Category:Rogue]]
[[category:Sage]]
[[category:Seduced]]
[[Category:Stasis]]
[[category:Tempted]]
[[category:Transgressed]]
[[category:Transgressor]]
[[Category:Van Richten Family]]
[[category:Victim of Medical Malpractice]]
[[Category:Victim of the van Richten Curse]]
[[category:Victimized]]
[[Category:Widowed]]
[[Category:writer]]
[[category:Births in 671 BC]]
[[category:Deaths in 750 BC]]
<references/>

==Data from the Ravenloft Catalogue==



{|
|-valign="top"
|[[Image:rldb_npc.jpg]]
|[[Image:rldb_primary.gif]]
|
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' 
''[[Bleak House]]''
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_art.gif]]
|
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - p4 
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - cover, p4 
''[[Bleak House:Homecoming]]'' - p4,p16 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - p7,8 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p92 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - p114 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 5,11 
''[[The Created]]'' - p13 
''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]'' - p5
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_stats.gif]]
|
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - pp4-5 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p91 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 3
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_desc.gif]]
|
''[[Ravenloft Third Edition]]'' - pp14,17-18,27,176 
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - throughout 
''[[Bleak House]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to The Created]]'' - throughout 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]'' - throughout 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - pp91-93 
''[[Tales of Ravenloft: The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]'' - pp1-17 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - pp 2-3 
''[[Heroes of Light]]'' - p64 
''[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]]'' - pp1-4, pp9-13, pp304-310
|-valign="top"
|}

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (NPC)

2022-01-29T23:47:40Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* Appearances */

[[File:Original VR.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
[[File:Rudolph van richten.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten and [[Strahd]] by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
{{canon}}
'''Dr. Rudolph Van Richten''' is the greatest monster hunter that has ever lived and the most well-known hero of the Lands of the Mists.

==History==
He was born in [[Rivalis]] in [[Darkon]] in [[671 BC]]. He took [[medicine]] at the [[University of Il Aluk]], completing his four or five year program of study in [[693 BC]]. This humble man was spurred into a life of monster hunting when his son [[Erasmus van Richten]] was kidnapped by the [[Radanavich clan]] and sold to [[Baron Metus]]. Metus turned Erasmus into a [[vampire groom]] and Van Richten was forced to slay his son. In revenge, Metus killed Rudolph's wife, [[Ingrid van Richten]]. Van Richten eventually slew Metus, and then, with the help of [[Azalin]], the entire [[Radanavich tribe]].

Until his disappearance in [[750 BC]], he resided in [[Mordentshire]], where he ran an [[Van Richten's Herbalist Shop|herbalist shop]], as well as wrote several of his famous [[Van Richten's Guides]], and mentored [[The Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]], who regarded him as an uncle and took up his work.

==In [[Curse of Strahd]]==
Dr. van Richten makes a notable appearance in the [[5th Edition]] [[module]], [[Curse of Strahd]], though not in his [[famous]] persona as the monster hunter and [[writer]] of the [[Van Richten's Guides]] he is notable for in previous Ravenloft products. Instead, he adopts the guise of [[Rictavio]], a traveling [[half-elf]] [[bard]], [[storyteller]], and [[ringmaster]] gathering stories and watching out for talent. In reality he is gathering formation and waiting for an optimal time to strike at [[Strahd]], preferably when the vampire lord is in [[hibernation]]. Unlike other versions of van Richten, the Curse of Strahd van Richten is a [[loner]] because he knows the full extent of his [[curse]].<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> For more details, see [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Curse of Strahd)]]

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Appearances==
===[[Campaign Setting]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[Ravenloft: Realm of Terror]]
**[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting (Box)]]

===[[Modules]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[The Nightmare Lands (Boxed Set)]] (referenced only)
**[[Chilling Tales]]
**[[Dungeon Magazine #55]]: [[The Sea Wolf]]
**[[Bleak House: The Death of Rudolph Van Richten]]
**[[Dragon magazine #416 (online)]]: [[Strahd and Van Richten]]

===[[Novels]]===

*[[Tales of Ravenloft]]: [[The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]

==Authored:==
* ''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Demons]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Witches (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Witches]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]''

Credited for marketing purposes with:
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Mists (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Mists]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]]''

==[[Associate of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]==

==Chronology==

[[671 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten born<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, son of Otto and Mrs. Van Richten
 
{{Spec|[[678 BC]] - Rudolph’s sister [[Maria Van Richten]] born.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 18 "Speculation based on BH. We only know that she is younger than Rudolph."</ref>
 

[[679 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten sent to boarding school in [[Nartok]]. A childhood friend is [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]].<ref name="VRMHCII p.25-26">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 25-26</ref>

[[680 BC]] - [[Casimir (of Richten Haus)|Casimir]] (not to be confused with [[Casimir Lukas|Harkon Lukas’ son]]) starts working at Richten Haus as the gate keeper.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 6">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 6</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[683 BC]] - The servants of [[Richten Haus]] are all killed while the family is away one day. (summer)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.18: "Speculation based on [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] pg. 15, 24: I’m going on the hunch that VR grows younger until he reaches the age he was at when this event occurred"</ref>
 

[[685 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten meets [[Robert Tatenna]], a fellow student at boarding school. (fall)<ref name="CT p.14">[[Chilling Tales]] p.14</ref>

[[688 BC]] - The [[The Crimson Death Epidemic | Crimson Death]] spreads across Darkon (winter); it claims Van Richten’s great aunt Helga, despite his efforts; Rudolph is even more driven into his medical studies.<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[689 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten attends the [[University of Il Aluk]]. While there, he meets a fellow student, [[Dr. Harmon Ruscheider]]. (fall)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]] pg. 15"</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[691 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten marries his childhood sweetheart, [[Ingrid van Richten|Ingrid]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "[[Realm of Terror]]; [[VRGtV]]: Give VR a good respectable year between their marriage and birth of Erasmus in 692"</ref>
 

[[692 BC]] - Rudolph and Ingrid Van Richten's son [[Erasmus van Richten|Erasmus]] is born.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]] p. 4; [[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 8, "fourteen summers" before [[706 BC]]</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[693 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten finishes his studies; opens his practice back home in [[Rivalis]].}},<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VR’s age, RoT; VRGtV; and ToDm pg. 86, which indicates it takes 4-5 years to get a medical education at the University of Il Aluk"</ref> 
 
{{Spec|693 BC - Dr. Van Richten travels to [[Lamordia]], hears of the [[Loud Man of Lamordia]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VRGtG pg. 9: “When I was young.”</ref> 

[[696 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Antonin Madren]] and becomes his mentor.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 21: "VRGttC pg. 6: Van Richten takes Madren on as a medical student, which implies Van Richten has time to offer such an education (which lasts up to 8 years), i.e., while he was still a simple doctor (693-706)."</ref>

[[706 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten suffers the wrath of the [[Radanavich clan]]; the Vistani steal his son Erasmus; they sell Erasmus to [[Baron Metus]]<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, a vampire from [[Richemulot]]; with the help of an amused [[Azalin]], Van Richten wipes out all but one member of the Radanavich caravan<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]</ref>; [[Madame Radanavich]] [[curse | curses]] Van Richten<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, although he doesn’t realize it until the end of his career.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

[[706 BC]] Van Richten puts his Erasmus, now a vampire, out of his misery, but in spite [[Baron Metus]] tears [[Ingrid van Richten]] to pieces; Dr. Van Richten destroys Baron Metus, starting his career of hunting evil. Unable to live with the memories in [[Richten Haus]], Van Richten moves to [[Corvia]].<ref name="VRA p. 5">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 5</ref>

[[707 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten researches vampires, and meets [[Aimon Davidovitch]], a fellow scholar of the arcane.<ref> from [[JWM Timeline]] p.22: "[[VRGtF]] pg. 4: VR knew him for “some 30-odd years”]</ref>

[[710 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten encounters his first werebeast near [[Varithne]], a small village in northern [[Darkon]]. Dr. Van Richten starts hunting werebeasts as well<ref name="VRMHC p. 109-110">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 109-110</ref>

[[711 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Gedlan Ironheart]], a fearless [[dwarven]] [[innkeeper]] in [[Corvia]]. Gedlan becomes a frequent hunting companion.<ref name="Bleah House p. 11">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p.11</ref>

[[712 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets the mage [[Shauten]]; they bond when they are attacked by one of Azalin's patrols. Shauten opens Van Richten's eyes to the existence of the [[Lich]].<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref>

[[713 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten is visited by the dying Dr. Ruscheider, who tells Rudolph all he can about several months spent as a lich's captive; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting liches.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p.111-112</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[714 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten receives a visit from his childhood friend, [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]], who is now a ghostly slave to Azalin; Dr. Van Richten learns the terrible truth about [[Azalin Rex]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on [[VRGtG]] pg. 22, [[VRMHCII]] pg. 24</ref>
 

{{Spec|714 BC - Dr. Van Richten moves to [[Mordentshire]], sensing it is politically unsafe for him to remain in [[Darkon]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on VRGttL pg. 22</ref>
 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[716 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 3 n1">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade after her death, but [[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[718 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and [[Shauten]] battle a creature they believe to be a priestly [[lich]]; it is actually Van Richten's first [[ancient dead]]}}.<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] "Speculation based on VRGAD pg. 5: “Some years ago,” and other markers. It happened after VR started hunting liches, but before he started hunting ghosts. (The latter conclusion taken from numerous references to Claudia in this Guide"</ref>
 
[[724 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten battles the [[Bog Monster of Hroth]], and meets [[Jameld of Hroth|Jameld]]. This is also Van Richten's first visit to both [[Kartakass]] and [[Sithicus]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p.153</ref> 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[726 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decade n1">[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades after her death but[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade</ref> 

{{Spec|726 BC - Dr. Van Richten visits [[Sanguinia]] with [[George Weathermay]] and [[Arametrius]]; they meet [[Claudia DeShanes]]; Claudia becomes Rudolph’s assistant, and it seems he had certain unspoken feelings for her.}}<ref>Speculation from JWM Timeline p.28: "Since Arametrius is probably [[Athasian]], Van Richten may have recently visited [[Kalidnay]] and encountered [[Ahmose Tanit]]. [VRGtG pg. 73. This is the earliest possible date for this event (due to George’s inclusion, and we know from this source and BH that VR starts hunting ghosts one year after this event. That leaves only 9 years between VR starting to hunt and writing his Guide on the subject. I chose to go with this date to keep as wide a margin of opportunity as possible.]"</ref>
 

[[727 BC]] - [[Merilee Markuza]], the Child [[Vampire]], kills Claudia. Van Richten pursues the creature relentlessly, but loses her in [[Lamordia]].<ref name="Darklords p. 63">[[Darklords]] p. 63</ref>

727 BC - While hunting the Child Vampire, Van Richten witnesses the [[Thundering Carriage]]; Van Richten decides he must put an end to these ghostly horrors, too.<ref name="Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts p. 6">[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 6</ref>

[[728 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten defeats the [[Phantom Army]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 91</ref>

[[729 BC]] - The fiend [[Elsepeth]] enters Ravenloft via [[transposition]] in a small village outside [[Stangengrad]], near the [[Grashen Falls]] (sept)<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.28: "[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] pg. 14: the diary is dated “twelve years ago.”</ref>

[[730 BC]] - {{Spec|[[Gedlan Ironheart]] killed while battling evil spirits.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: "VRGtG pg. 23: Gedlan is referred to as “Geddar” in this book. The date is an estimate based on the 727-736 available time span."</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] leaves [[Borca]], having lurked there for years.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] p. 66</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] writes to Van Richten about the death of Madren’s sister.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[734 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] shows up on Van Richten's doorstep, and gives the good doctor his notes; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting the [[Created]].}}<ref>JWM Timeline p. 30: "VRGttC pg. 6: Estimate. “Years” after Madren wrote about his sister’s death"</ref> 

[[735 BC] - Dr. Van Richten is forced to kill his old friend [[Shauten]] in self-defense, when Shauten tries to sacrifice Rudolph in a bid for [[lichdom]]<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref><ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>. {{Spec|This "near-miss" may have inspired Van Richten to start recording his collected knowledge for heroes to come.}}<ref>JWM Timeline: "Speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6"</ref>

735 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''.<ref name="RLCS p.18">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.18</ref><ref name="RLPHB p.20">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.20</ref>

[[736 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''.

[[737 BC]] - The [[Vistana]] [[Cyrilla]]'s niece [[Vassa]] is [[kidnapped]] near [[Corvia]].<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 20: The golem appeared “the following year” after Vaasa’s soul is taken."</ref>

737 BC - [[Vassa]] returns as a [[clay golem]]; Cyrilla writes to Dr. Van Richten.<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 19 "just last year"</ref>

737 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''.

[[738 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''.

[[738 BC]] [[Emil Bollenbach]] engineers the [[kidnapping]] of Dr. Rudolph van Richten to the end of seizing his [[brain]] for [[transplantation]] into a super-golem. fortunately, several of Van Richten's friends intercede to thwart Dr. Bollenbach.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 33: "[[Children of the Night: The Created]] pg. 50; CT pg. 32 places this adventure 8 years after Emil’s disappearance (i.e., 746), but the dating used in CotN:C fits VR’s chronology better.</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] goes to [[Nartok]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 67-68">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.67-68</ref>

[[739 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and the adventuring band known as [[the Hand (Adventurer Band)|the Hand]] hunt and destroy [[the Gibbering Golem]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 265-276">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.265-276</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]] publishes ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''. This act earns him considerable ire from [[Agatha Clairmont]], whom sees it as an instruction manual to building [[dread golem]]s just much as it is hunting them.<ref name="Van Richten's Arsenal p. 149">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p. 149</ref>

[[740 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]'' (early spring).

740 BC - Dr. Van Richten inherits the [[library (Aimon Davidovitch)]] of [[Aimon Davidovitch]]. Dr. Van Richten starts studying tomes. (Sept)<ref>JWM Timeline p. 35 "Extrapolated from VRGtF pg. 4"</ref>

[[741 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]], [[Davvyd]], [[Samuel]] and [[Dr. Ottelie Farringer]] battle the fiend [[Drigor]]. Only Dr. van Richten survives. (Feb.)<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 79-85">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p. 79-85</ref>

741 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]]''.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Book)]] p.4</ref>

741 BC - [[Van Richten]] stumbles into the clutches of [[the nameless Amnizu]] and [[the nameless Barbazu]] infesting [[Chateaufaux]]. He is captured. However, he manages to join with some [[adventurer]]s to route the [[devil]]s from the town.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.72-73; Note that the encounter with these [[fiend]]s doesn't appear in the original uncompiled Van Richten's Guide to Fiends. Therefore, the encounter with the [[Fiends of Chateaufaux]] took place after took place after the first VRGtF was published.</ref><ref>[[Gazetteer III]] p.30-31, "just over 15 years ago"</ref>

741 BC<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> - Dr. Van Richten is [[depressed]]; he consults with the [[diviner]], [[Inarin Alster]]; Rudolph realizes he had been laboring under a [[curse]] all these years; Dr. Van Richten spends a year with [[Arturi Radanavich]] studying the Vistani.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]] p.5-7; 87-89</ref>

[[742 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten writes his ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]'' and retires.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> (Oct.)

[[750 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten dies in [[Richten Haus|Bleak House]] in the fight against [[Madame Radanavich]]<ref>[[Domains of Dread]] p. 17, as told in [[Bleak House]], particularly [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 58-63</ref> Meanwhile, all that is known to most, including the [[Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]] is that he [[disappeared]].<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

{{ref}}

[[category:Character]] [[category:NPC]]
[[category:2nd Edition Character]]
[[category:3rd Edition Character]]
[[category:4th Edition Character]]
[[category:5th Edition Character]]
[[category:Abused]]
[[category:Betrayed]]
[[Category:Cursed]]
[[category:Cursed by the Vistani]]
[[Category:Darkonian]]
[[Category:Demonologist]]
[[category:Energy Drained]]
[[Category:Filicide]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Rivalis]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Nartok]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Forest of Shadows]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Darkon]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordentshire]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordent]]
[[Category:Former Patients of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Dominia]]
[[Category:Former Medical Student]]
[[Category:Former Student of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[category:Gaslighted]]
[[category:Giogoto]]
[[Category:Ghost]]
[[Category:Graduate of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Graduate]]
[[Category:Herbalist]]
[[Category:Human]]
[[category:healer]]
[[category:Hero]]
[[Category:Hunter Of Monsters]]
[[Category:Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[category:Intellectual]]
[[Category:Kidnapped]]
[[category:Killer]]
[[category:Lorist]]
[[Category:Male]]
[[category:Mass Murderer]]
[[category:Medical Doctor]]
[[category:Medical Professional]]
[[category:Mentor]]
[[category:Murderer]]
[[Category:Necrologist]]
[[category:Old]]
[[Category:Planar Mechanic]]
[[category:Polymath]]
[[category:Posthumous Character]]
[[category:Potential Darklord]]
[[Category:Proprietor]]
[[category:Professional Killer]]
[[category:Punished]]
[[category:Ravenloft Lorist]]
[[Category:Ravenloft Loremaster]]
[[category:Redeemed]]
[[category:Reformed]]
[[category:Repentant]]
[[category:Researcher]]
[[category:Retired]]
[[Category:Rogue]]
[[category:Sage]]
[[category:Seduced]]
[[Category:Stasis]]
[[category:Tempted]]
[[category:Transgressed]]
[[category:Transgressor]]
[[Category:Van Richten Family]]
[[category:Victim of Medical Malpractice]]
[[Category:Victim of the van Richten Curse]]
[[category:Victimized]]
[[Category:Widowed]]
[[Category:writer]]
[[category:Births in 671 BC]]
[[category:Deaths in 750 BC]]
<references/>

==Data from the Ravenloft Catalogue==



{|
|-valign="top"
|[[Image:rldb_npc.jpg]]
|[[Image:rldb_primary.gif]]
|
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' 
''[[Bleak House]]''
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_art.gif]]
|
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - p4 
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - cover, p4 
''[[Bleak House:Homecoming]]'' - p4,p16 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - p7,8 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p92 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - p114 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 5,11 
''[[The Created]]'' - p13 
''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]'' - p5
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_stats.gif]]
|
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - pp4-5 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p91 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 3
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_desc.gif]]
|
''[[Ravenloft Third Edition]]'' - pp14,17-18,27,176 
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - throughout 
''[[Bleak House]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to The Created]]'' - throughout 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]'' - throughout 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - pp91-93 
''[[Tales of Ravenloft: The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]'' - pp1-17 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - pp 2-3 
''[[Heroes of Light]]'' - p64 
''[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]]'' - pp1-4, pp9-13, pp304-310
|-valign="top"
|}

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (5th Edition)

2022-01-29T21:26:31Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* Appearances */

{{canon}}

NOTE: This entry is for the [[5th Edition]] version of Dr. Rudolph van Richten presented in [[Curse of Strahd]]. For the older edition character, see [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten (NPC)]].

Dr. van Richten makes a notable appearance in the [[5th Edition]] [[module]], [[Curse of Strahd]], though not in his [[famous]] persona as the monster hunter and [[writer]] of the [[Van Richten's Guide]]s he is notable for in previous Ravenloft products. Instead, he adopts the guise of [[Rictavio]], a traveling [[half-elf]] [[bard]], [[storyteller]], and [[ringmaster]] gathering stories and watching out for talent. In reality he is gathering formation and waiting for an optimal time to strike at [[Strahd]], preferably when the vampire lord is in [[hibernation]]. Unlike other versions of van Richten, the Curse of Strahd van Richten is a [[loner]] because he knows the full extent of his [[curse]].<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref>

==History==
Much of Dr. van Richten's early history before he came a monster hunter remains the same. One key difference is that he did not wholesale murder the [[Vistani]] that [[kidnapped]] his son [[Erasmus van Richten]]. In fact, one of them, [[Ezmerelda d'Avenir]] appeared to him one day and expressed her remorse, eventually becoming van Richten's student in monster hunting. However, their relationship frayed after a couple of years, and at, Ezmerelda's suggestion, they left each other's company amicably.<ref name="CoS p. 230-231">CoS p. 230-231</ref>

At some point in his adventuring career, a [[Vistani]] [[seer]] [[cursed]] van Richten, dooming his friends to die. ''Curse of Strahd'' is not specific to when in his adventuring career or why van Richten's curse was put upon him, though he is aware of it.<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> In contrast, in the traditional van Richten story, van Richten is [[cursed]] by [[Madame Radanavich]] early on in his career but does not realize how it has effected him until [[741 BC]] (the year before he retires). He thus operates as a [[loner]], to not cause the death of any friends or allies he would work with.<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref>

Eventually, Dr. van Richten set his sights upon the destruction of Strahd. By now having adopted the identity of Rictavio, van Richten eventually encountered [[Yan]], an [[exile]]d [[Vistani]]. Once Yan discovered van Richten's intentions to go to [[Barovia]] and seek out the Vistani there, Yan tried to make off with [[Rictavio's Wagon]] along with [[Piccolo]]. Van Richten caught him and [[killed]] the [[thief]], removed his head, and preserved it with special magic oils to be used with [[speak with dead]] later on.<ref>CoS p. 171</ref>

Rictavio came to [[Barovia]] in the guise of [[Rictavio]]<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> and set up shop at a then [[abandoned]] tower formerly belonging to the [[wizard]] [[Khazan]]. Dr. van Richten made [[Van Richten's Tower|Khazan's old tower]] his own for a time, before moving on to [[Vallaki]] and setting up shop there.<ref name="CoS p. 167">CoS p. 167</ref> In the meantime, Ezmerelda heard [[rumor]]s about her former mentor's travel to [[Barovia]] to take out Strahd, and she traveled to Barovia to find van Richten, eventually setting up shop in his old tower.<ref>CoS p. 231</ref>

About a month prior to the current point in the timeline of the module, "Rictavio" came to Vallaki. There he met and purchased a [[doll]] of a [[Vistani]] from [[Gadof Blinsky]]. Noting the toymaker's loneliness and despair, van Richten left his [[pet]] [[monkey]], [[Piccolo]] with Blinsky for company.<ref name="Curse of Strahd p. 118">CoS p. 118</ref> Dr. van Richten has stayed at the [[Blue Water Inn]] and received generous treatment from the charitable [[Urwin Martikov]].<ref>CoS p. 100</ref>. Dr. van Richten keeps his wagon (and [[Rictavio's saber-toothed tiger|his sabre-toothed tiger]]) inside the [[Arasek Stockyards]], bribing off its owners to prevent any details from leaking out.<ref name="CoS p. 115-116">CoS p. 115-116</ref>

==Modus Operandi==
As previously mentioned, Dr. van Richten is a [[loner]], posing in his [[Rictavio]] guise to gather information until the time is right to strike against Strahd. Van Richten drives [[Rictavio's Carnival wagon|a carnival wagon]]<ref>CoS p. 115-116</ref> pulled by a [[horse]]] named [[Drusilla (Horse)|Drusilla]].<ref>CoS p. 101-102</ref> Dr. van Richten uses [[Rictavio's saber-toothed tiger|his sabre-toothed tiger]] to hunt [[evil]] [[Vistani]], for which it is especially trained to do.<ref name="CoS p. 115-116">CoS p. 115-116</ref> Currently, van Richten is gathering information on both a)the [[Keepers of the Feather]] to learn their allegiances/membership and b)the [[evil]] [[Vistani]] of [[Arrigal's Clan]] at the [[Vistani camp near Vallaki]]. Van Richten plans on sending the tiger after the evil Vistani in the camp.

==Art==
p. 238

==Game Statistics==
Van Richten has his own [[NPC]] game statistics block.

DR. RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN

Medium humanoid (human), Lawful Good

Armor Class: 17 (half plate of flowing sanctity)

Hit Points: 77 (14d8 +14)

Speed: 30 ft.

Strength: 9 (-1)

Dexterity: 13 (+1)

Constitution: 13 (+1)

Intelligence: 17 (+3)

Wisdom: 18 (+4)

Charisma: 16 (+3)

Saving Throws: Con +5, Wis +8, Cha +7

Skills: Arcana +7, Deception +7, Insight +12,
Investigation +7, Medicine +8, Perception +12,
Religion +6, Sleight of Hand +4

Condition Immunities: charmed

Senses: darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 22

Languages: Abyssal, Celestial, Common, Draconic, Dwarvish, Elvish, Gundarak, Infernal, Sylvan

Challenge: 9 (5,000 XP)

SPECIAL EQUIPMENT:

In addition to his +1 sword cane and light crossbow, Van Richten wears a hat of disguise, goggles of night, and a ring of mind shielding, and he carries a spell scroll of raise dead.

Half Plate of Flowing Sanctity +1 mithril half plate. Once a day, a flask of water placed in the belt of armor becomes holy water.

ACTIONS:

Spellcasting: Van Richter is a 9th level Cleric of Helm, 1st level Wizard. His spellcasting ability is Wisdom (save DC 15, +7 to hit with spell attacks). Van Richten has the following Cleric and Wizard spells prepared:

Cantrips (at will): light, mage hand, mending, minor illusion, prestidigitation, sacred flame, thaumaturgy, toll the dead

1st level (4 slots): alarm, bless, cure wounds, detect evil and good, feather fall, find familiar, healing word, identify, protection from evil and good, shield, sleep

2nd level (3 slots): augury, beacon of hope, lesser restoration, protection from poison, silence, spiritual weapon warding bond, zone of truth

3rd level (3 slots): glyph of warding, magic circle, mass healing word, revivify, speak with dead, spirit guardians

4th level (3 slots): death ward, freedom of movement

5th level (3 slots): dawn, greater restoration, mass cure wounds, raise dead

Skulker: Van Richten can hide when he is lightly obscured from the creature from which he is hiding. When he’s hidden from a creature and misses it with a ranged weapon attack, making the attack doesn’t reveal his position. Dim light doesn’t impose disadvantage on his Wisdom (Perception) checks relying on sight.

Undead Slayer: When Van Richten hits an undead with a weapon attack, the undead takes an extra 10 (3d6) damage of weapon’s type.

Cunning Action: Van Richten can use a bonus action to take the Dash, Disengage or Hide action.

Sneak Attack: When Van Richten surprises a target, has advantage on an attack roll, or an enemy is within 5 ft. of the target, Van Richten deals and extra 7 damage.

Assassin Proficiencies: Van Richten is proficient with Disguise and Poisoner’s Kits.

Assassinate: When Van Richten hits a surprised enemy, it’s automatically a critical hit. When he attacks an enemy that hasn’t yet had a turn, he gains advantage on the attack.

Channel Divinity: Turn Undead: Undead within 30 ft. of Van Richten must make a Wisdom saving throw. If the creature fails its saving throw, they are turned for 1 minute or until they take damage. A turned creature must spend its turns trying to move as far away from him as it can, and it can’t willingly move to a space within 30 ft. of him. It also can’t take reactions. For its action, it can use only the Dash action or try to escape from an effect that prevents it from moving. If there’s nowhere to move, the creature can use the Dodge action. Undead with CR 1 or less are automatically destroyed on a failed save.

Preserve Life: As an action, Van Richten can distribute 45 hit points. This feature can restore a creature to no more than half of its hit point maximum and has no effect on an undead or construct.

Multiattack: Van Richten makes two attacks with his sword cane or light crossbow.

Sword Cane: Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 6 (1d6 +2) bludgeon damage (wooden cane) or piercing damage (silvered sword).

Light Crossbow: Ranged Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, range 80/320 ft., one target. Hit: 7 (1d8 +2) piercing damage.

Healer: As an action, Van Richten can spend one use of a Healer’s Kit to tend to a creature and restore 1d6 +4 hit points to it, plus additional hit points equal to the creature’s maximum number of Hit Dice. The creature can’t regain hit points from this feat again until it finishes a short or long rest.

REACTIONS:

Final Ward: Van Richten has a permanent glyph of warding tattooed on his neck that activates when he’s bitten there and chooses to say “Erasmus, I’m coming home” in Celestial. All targets in a 20 ft. radius must make a Dexterity saving throw or take 5d8 +5 radiant damage on a failed save or half as much (rounded up) on a successful one. Van Richten automatically fails the save and is disintegrated along with all of the items on his person.

RICTAVIO:

Several months ago a colorfully dressed half-elf bard came to Barovia in a carnival wagon, with a pet monkey on his shoulder. He took over an abandoned tower on Lake Baratok before rolling into town of Vallaki several months later. Claiming to be a carnival ringmaster in search of new actors, he began regaling locals with tales of distant lands.

MONSTER HUNTER:

The half-elf ringmaster is, in fact, the legendary human monster hunter named Rudolph Van Richten. Van Richten’s tale is a sad one. A scholar and doctor from a land called Darkon, he married his childhood sweetheart, Ingrid and together they had a son, Erasmus. When he was fourteen, Erasmus was stolen away by Vistani and sold to a vampire named Baron Metus to be used as a companion. By the time Van Richten found his son, it was too late: the Baron had already transformed Erasmus into a vampire spawn. Erasmus begged his father to end his suffering, which Van Richten did by pounding a wooden stake through his son’s chest. Baron Metus avenged that death by killing Van Richten’s wife, and Van Richten has lived with the horror of his family’s destruction ever since. After destroying Baron Metus in turn, Van Richten sought revenge against the Vistani and took up a life of hunting evil monsters.

THE WAITING GAME:

Van Richten isn’t a young man anymore. He knows his road is coming to an end, but his work isn’t done. He has come to Barovia to kill Strahd Von Zarovich, the greatest vampire of them all. Van Richten has studied Strahd for years and knows he can’t hope to best the vampire in a straight-up confrontation: he must wait for the right moment to strike. He has good evidence to suggest that Strahd periodically hibernates in his coffin, sometimes for years, when all is quite in the realm. While he bides his time, Van Richten hides in plain sight with the aid of a hat of disguise, his thoughts protected by a ring of mind shielding. He is trying to learn more about the Keepers of the Feather—a society of wereravens that oppose Strahd—while trying not to expose the secret society to their mutual enemy. He thinks the wereravens might prove helpful when the time comes. Van Richten also wants to take out as many of Strahd’s spies as he can, starting with the Vistani.

MAN WITH A PLAN:

Van Richten doesn’t know that his former protégé, a good-aligned Vistani named Ezmerelda d’Avenir, has come to Barovia looking for him. He taught her many of his monster-hunting techniques, but she doesn’t know all of his tricks and disguises. So far, their paths haven’t crossed. In the event that Van Richten becomes aware of Ezmerelda’s presence, he does his utmost to protect her without putting his own plans in jeopardy. If he can manipulate a party of adventurers into keeping an eye on her, he will do so.

VAN RICHTEN WORKS ALONE:

A curse placed on him long ago by a Vistani seer brings doom to those he befriends (see ‘Role Playing Notes’ for details). Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure. Consequently, if he thinks he’s in danger of being unmasked, he retreats to the Tower of Khazan (chapter 11) or some other quiet corner of Strahd’s domain to plan further.

TRAITS:

Ideal. “Evil cannot go unchallenged.”

Bond. “To protect those I love, I must keep them distant and hidden from my enemies.”

Flaw. “I am cursed. Thus, I will never have peace.”

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

A CURSED MAN:

Van Richten suffers a curse bestowed on him by a Vistani:

Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws.

Its effect on him can best be summarized with this statement: "Van Richten Dies Last." This curse is both a boon and a bane to him. The curse is a large part of why he has lived so long--how he has accumulated so much experience and expertise. He is cursed to always see his friends and allies die--which means he has to live long enough to see it happen.

For a long time, he was unaware of the exact nature of the curse on him, but he is apparently aware of it now.

• Van Richten feels guilty. For decades he fought alongside others with monsters, completely unaware that he was a doombringer among them. Now that he knows, he is burdened by all the deaths he feels that his presence caused.

• Van Richten isolates himself. He doesn't let people get close to him for fear that his curse will take them out.

• If Van Richten is traveling with the party, he has excellent odds of surviving--if someone is going to die in the party, it'll be someone other than him.

• Van Richten's curse should have a tangible impact if he’s traveling with the party: he is a doombringer of the highest order. His mere presence among the party should invite tragedy and disaster.

The Tragedy of Ezmerelda and Van Richten. In the backstory that created Ezmerelda d’Avenir (Appendix D: Monsters and NPCs pages 230-231), there's a tragedy in there: Van Richten's curse could have been lifted years ago.

By Ravenloft Lore, the strongest of curses laid down by a Vistani can only be lifted by the Vistani who placed it, or a blood relative of that Vistani. Van Richten's curse was a Death Curse laid on him by Ezmerelda's mother. Only Ezmerelda has the ability to revoke the curse. But here's the problem...
Ezmerelda is Vistani...by nature; they are secretive about their abilities. Beyond that, Van Richten doesn't trust Vistani and likely commanded Ezmerelda to not use her Vistani abilities in his presence. As a result, Van Richten doesn't know how Vistani curses work--he doesn't know that they can be revoked by a blood relative of the one who laid it. He's a Cleric, he has undoubtedly tried remove curse on himself and it failed. As far as he knows, the curse is permanent.
Van Richten is also secretive and, as mentioned, doesn't trust the Vistani. He kept Ezmerelda at arm's length as best he could both because he couldn't trust her, but also to try to protect her from the curse...and even if he was aware of the curse when they traveled together, he never told her about it.

If either one of them had been less secretive, more open, his curse would have been revoked a long time ago.

If the players want to help Van Richten break the curse, here's the backstory:

The story of Ezmerelda and Van Richten's history was written in the Van Richten's Journal (Appendix F: Handouts pages 254-255). It involves him destroying Ezmerelda's caravan while she was very, very young. She survived the undead assault and later got picked up by another caravan of Vistani (it was actually the Zarovan tribe--Madam Eva's caravan). She originally wanted revenge on Van Richten, but time with Eva (and the presence of the most powerful Vistani of them all) showed her the tragedy of what had happened from an outside perspective. Ezmerelda realized that the whole thing was a horrible tragedy and wrongs had been committed on both sides. She, thus, set out to try to find Van Richten and try to make things right...though Eva never told her about the curse her mother had laid on Van Richten.

Van Richten and Ezmerelda must travel to the place the curse was first laid...a small clearing in the forests of Barovia where the ruins of Ezmerelda's caravan still lie. Both must verbally acknowledge the wrong that had been done and verbally forgive one another for it...then the remains of Ezmerelda's caravan must be burned.

THE DISGUISE:

Van Richten got the idea for “Rictavio” from his exposure to Ezmerelda and her occasional methods for blending in when going somewhere that didn't like Vistani. In short: "Sometimes the best disguise is being the most obvious thing in the room." As mentioned above, Ezmerelda has never encountered the Rictavio disguise and Van Richten isn't familiar with any of the disguises Ezmerelda is currently using.

It is a rather perfect disguise. Van Richten is known as a grim and serious individual, a dour old man who roves the world slaying monsters. “Rictavio” is a flamboyant fop who tells ludicrous stories, commits crimes against music, and is constantly trying to recruit people to his Circus of Wonders. He should be portrayed as extremely over the top and completely harmless. It should be very jarring to your players if he drops the act and reveals who he truly is.
Furthermore, Rictavio knows that even if someone suspects he's hiding something, they are extremely unlikely to guess the truth. If a player rolls well on Insight against him and figures out he's full of crap, that only tells them that he's lying about something...not what he is lying about. And his response is to just carry on and ignore accusations. Sure, the PCs may figure out that he's full of it (his stories are obvious fabrications) but he just carries right along, sticking to his guns even though the players know it’s a load of BS.

The players should have a hard time to get a serious read on Rictavio's personality. He strikes them as so straight forward--a carnie who is spinning tall tales for amusement. So they shouldn’t suspect that he's any more than what he appears to be.

A HARD MAN TO PIN DOWN:

Van Richten is a man with a plan for killing Strahd Von Zarovich, and it's a plan that plays well to his aged capabilities: "wait til Strahd takes a long nap, then stake him in his sleep." Of anyone in the valley, Van Richten knows how deadly Strahd is. He has fought elder vampires before and Strahd is the greatest of them all. He may very well believe that trying to fight him head on is pure folly, but he’s the one most capable of doing so.

It's important to note: Most of the "Destined Allies" the party can draw from Madame Eva’s Tarokka card reading have notes about how the PCs can get that individual to join them. Van Richten has no such notes. Instead, it says this...

Van Richten works alone. [...] Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure.

Van Richten is aware of Madame Eva but (unlike many others in the valley) he won't immediately cave to her prophecies, drop everything he has been working on, and throw his lot in with the PCs. Here are a few important things to keep in mind if the party is trying to recruit him...

• Van Richten is quite certain that if he drops his disguise, Strahd will find him and set out to kill him. (This is one of Strahd's Primary Goals as listed in Chapter 1)

• Van Richten's disguise is magically augmented. As long as the party can't get his hat off, they cannot prove that he’s not a carnie ringmaster

• Van Richten's disguise is only useful against Strahd as long as no one knows who he really is. The ring of mind shielding only works on him...it doesn't work on the PCs. He knows that if anyone else finds out, Strahd can charm them, read their mind or otherwise extract that information from them.

• Van Richten is fully aware of his curse. He will avoid physically joining up with the party for fear that he will get them all killed.

• Van Richten does not talk about his curse. He knows well the bravery of adventurers and that telling them about his curse tends to result in responses like "Oh, you don't need to worry about us, we're strong!" followed shortly by ":dying noises:." Rebuffing their advances without mentioning the curse is much more effective at getting them to stay away from him so his curse doesn't kill them.

• Even if Van Richten consents to offer them aid, it should be indirect as much as possible. He has his plan, he's set in his ways, and he’s not going to go gallivanting off with a bunch of young adventurers. And, he should stay in character as much as possible...blowing his cover will only bring Strahd down on him AND the PCs.

Ideally, even if the party can convince him to help...his help should primarily take the form of a surprisingly knowledgeable carnival ringmaster who is "certainly not going to go out and fight monsters with you. I'm a ringmaster, not an adventurer!"

He may lend the party his carnival wagon to travel around in (once he finds somewhere else to stash his saber-toothed tiger that has been trained to hunt Vistani, or he may lend them the tiger), give them helpful advice--possibly using ravens to stay in touch over long-distance if the PCs make friends with the Keepers of the Feather, and provide the sort of support that a Carnie could offer. But, it should take rather extreme circumstances for him to actually be honest with the PCs...and they may have to do something about his curse before he'll actually travel with them.

GETTING HIM TO JOIN UP:

Van Richten wants to stay under cover...so how does the party get him to change his mind?

Easy: Ruin his plan.

If Van Richten's cover is blown, his plan is a wash. The whole plan depends on his identity staying a secret until Strahd goes into hibernation. If Strahd identifies Van Richten before then, he will try to kill him and Van Richten is pretty sure he can't take Strahd in a straight-up fight. Thus...if Van Richten’s cover is blown, he is stuck with two bad choices: Either he tries to keep going it alone, possibly getting killed by Strahd, and fails his “final mission,” or he accepts the risk to the PCs and joins them to try to take Strahd down directly. A few example ways to blow his cover...

• Knock his hat off. A hat of disguise only works as long as it stays on your head, so if something happens that knocks his hat off; “Rictavio” is replaced by Van Richten.

• Let the Tyger Tyger event happen (chapter 5). When Rictavio flees to the Tower of Khazan, he's inside an antimagic field and cannot disguise himself.

• Even if Van Richten is distorting his voice, if the PCs have already befriended Ezmerelda, she may still recognize it...even if what she recognizes is the cadence his voice adopts when he's explaining something.

ABILITY LOADOUT:

Van Richten is a Cleric...and his listed prepared spells speaks more of a support caster than a monster hunter who has gone solo. But, because he's a Cleric, he can swap out his prepared spells at will to any other spells on the Cleric list. Here are a few notes on spells for him to use...

• Dawn creates sunlight. If he can lock a vampire down within the area of effect, they will be dust in short order.

• Dispel Evil and Good breaks a vampire's charm. However...things can't really leave Barovia, so the dismissal part of that spell won't be terribly effective here.

• Geas is useful when he needs to find something. For example, capture a werewolf then place a geas on it to lead them to the den.

• Lesser and Greater Restoration are enormously useful, as is remove curse.

• Guiding Bolt is a great weapon against Vampires. Shuts down their regeneration, and gives the next attack advantage.

• Hallow: If Van Richten can get his hands on the material components for this, he can create holy ground to help protect the PCs. Create a bubble of hallowed ground around the antimagic field that covers the Tower of Khazan....talk about a fortress. Sure, you'll have a bubble of non-hallowed ground where the antimagic field zone is...but the territory around the tower itself will be holy ground.

• Given his skill at predicting his foes...dropping sanctuary on a creature they are about to attack can completely trash their attempts.

• Spirit Guardians is another spell that is just....awesome.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Appearances==

*[[5th Edition]]
**[[Curse of Strahd]]
**[[Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft]]

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (5th Edition)

2022-01-29T21:25:59Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* Game Statistics */

{{canon}}

NOTE: This entry is for the [[5th Edition]] version of Dr. Rudolph van Richten presented in [[Curse of Strahd]]. For the older edition character, see [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten (NPC)]].

Dr. van Richten makes a notable appearance in the [[5th Edition]] [[module]], [[Curse of Strahd]], though not in his [[famous]] persona as the monster hunter and [[writer]] of the [[Van Richten's Guide]]s he is notable for in previous Ravenloft products. Instead, he adopts the guise of [[Rictavio]], a traveling [[half-elf]] [[bard]], [[storyteller]], and [[ringmaster]] gathering stories and watching out for talent. In reality he is gathering formation and waiting for an optimal time to strike at [[Strahd]], preferably when the vampire lord is in [[hibernation]]. Unlike other versions of van Richten, the Curse of Strahd van Richten is a [[loner]] because he knows the full extent of his [[curse]].<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref>

==History==
Much of Dr. van Richten's early history before he came a monster hunter remains the same. One key difference is that he did not wholesale murder the [[Vistani]] that [[kidnapped]] his son [[Erasmus van Richten]]. In fact, one of them, [[Ezmerelda d'Avenir]] appeared to him one day and expressed her remorse, eventually becoming van Richten's student in monster hunting. However, their relationship frayed after a couple of years, and at, Ezmerelda's suggestion, they left each other's company amicably.<ref name="CoS p. 230-231">CoS p. 230-231</ref>

At some point in his adventuring career, a [[Vistani]] [[seer]] [[cursed]] van Richten, dooming his friends to die. ''Curse of Strahd'' is not specific to when in his adventuring career or why van Richten's curse was put upon him, though he is aware of it.<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> In contrast, in the traditional van Richten story, van Richten is [[cursed]] by [[Madame Radanavich]] early on in his career but does not realize how it has effected him until [[741 BC]] (the year before he retires). He thus operates as a [[loner]], to not cause the death of any friends or allies he would work with.<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref>

Eventually, Dr. van Richten set his sights upon the destruction of Strahd. By now having adopted the identity of Rictavio, van Richten eventually encountered [[Yan]], an [[exile]]d [[Vistani]]. Once Yan discovered van Richten's intentions to go to [[Barovia]] and seek out the Vistani there, Yan tried to make off with [[Rictavio's Wagon]] along with [[Piccolo]]. Van Richten caught him and [[killed]] the [[thief]], removed his head, and preserved it with special magic oils to be used with [[speak with dead]] later on.<ref>CoS p. 171</ref>

Rictavio came to [[Barovia]] in the guise of [[Rictavio]]<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> and set up shop at a then [[abandoned]] tower formerly belonging to the [[wizard]] [[Khazan]]. Dr. van Richten made [[Van Richten's Tower|Khazan's old tower]] his own for a time, before moving on to [[Vallaki]] and setting up shop there.<ref name="CoS p. 167">CoS p. 167</ref> In the meantime, Ezmerelda heard [[rumor]]s about her former mentor's travel to [[Barovia]] to take out Strahd, and she traveled to Barovia to find van Richten, eventually setting up shop in his old tower.<ref>CoS p. 231</ref>

About a month prior to the current point in the timeline of the module, "Rictavio" came to Vallaki. There he met and purchased a [[doll]] of a [[Vistani]] from [[Gadof Blinsky]]. Noting the toymaker's loneliness and despair, van Richten left his [[pet]] [[monkey]], [[Piccolo]] with Blinsky for company.<ref name="Curse of Strahd p. 118">CoS p. 118</ref> Dr. van Richten has stayed at the [[Blue Water Inn]] and received generous treatment from the charitable [[Urwin Martikov]].<ref>CoS p. 100</ref>. Dr. van Richten keeps his wagon (and [[Rictavio's saber-toothed tiger|his sabre-toothed tiger]]) inside the [[Arasek Stockyards]], bribing off its owners to prevent any details from leaking out.<ref name="CoS p. 115-116">CoS p. 115-116</ref>

==Modus Operandi==
As previously mentioned, Dr. van Richten is a [[loner]], posing in his [[Rictavio]] guise to gather information until the time is right to strike against Strahd. Van Richten drives [[Rictavio's Carnival wagon|a carnival wagon]]<ref>CoS p. 115-116</ref> pulled by a [[horse]]] named [[Drusilla (Horse)|Drusilla]].<ref>CoS p. 101-102</ref> Dr. van Richten uses [[Rictavio's saber-toothed tiger|his sabre-toothed tiger]] to hunt [[evil]] [[Vistani]], for which it is especially trained to do.<ref name="CoS p. 115-116">CoS p. 115-116</ref> Currently, van Richten is gathering information on both a)the [[Keepers of the Feather]] to learn their allegiances/membership and b)the [[evil]] [[Vistani]] of [[Arrigal's Clan]] at the [[Vistani camp near Vallaki]]. Van Richten plans on sending the tiger after the evil Vistani in the camp.

==Art==
p. 238

==Game Statistics==
Van Richten has his own [[NPC]] game statistics block.

DR. RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN

Medium humanoid (human), Lawful Good

Armor Class: 17 (half plate of flowing sanctity)

Hit Points: 77 (14d8 +14)

Speed: 30 ft.

Strength: 9 (-1)

Dexterity: 13 (+1)

Constitution: 13 (+1)

Intelligence: 17 (+3)

Wisdom: 18 (+4)

Charisma: 16 (+3)

Saving Throws: Con +5, Wis +8, Cha +7

Skills: Arcana +7, Deception +7, Insight +12,
Investigation +7, Medicine +8, Perception +12,
Religion +6, Sleight of Hand +4

Condition Immunities: charmed

Senses: darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 22

Languages: Abyssal, Celestial, Common, Draconic, Dwarvish, Elvish, Gundarak, Infernal, Sylvan

Challenge: 9 (5,000 XP)

SPECIAL EQUIPMENT:

In addition to his +1 sword cane and light crossbow, Van Richten wears a hat of disguise, goggles of night, and a ring of mind shielding, and he carries a spell scroll of raise dead.

Half Plate of Flowing Sanctity +1 mithril half plate. Once a day, a flask of water placed in the belt of armor becomes holy water.

ACTIONS:

Spellcasting: Van Richter is a 9th level Cleric of Helm, 1st level Wizard. His spellcasting ability is Wisdom (save DC 15, +7 to hit with spell attacks). Van Richten has the following Cleric and Wizard spells prepared:

Cantrips (at will): light, mage hand, mending, minor illusion, prestidigitation, sacred flame, thaumaturgy, toll the dead

1st level (4 slots): alarm, bless, cure wounds, detect evil and good, feather fall, find familiar, healing word, identify, protection from evil and good, shield, sleep

2nd level (3 slots): augury, beacon of hope, lesser restoration, protection from poison, silence, spiritual weapon warding bond, zone of truth

3rd level (3 slots): glyph of warding, magic circle, mass healing word, revivify, speak with dead, spirit guardians

4th level (3 slots): death ward, freedom of movement

5th level (3 slots): dawn, greater restoration, mass cure wounds, raise dead

Skulker: Van Richten can hide when he is lightly obscured from the creature from which he is hiding. When he’s hidden from a creature and misses it with a ranged weapon attack, making the attack doesn’t reveal his position. Dim light doesn’t impose disadvantage on his Wisdom (Perception) checks relying on sight.

Undead Slayer: When Van Richten hits an undead with a weapon attack, the undead takes an extra 10 (3d6) damage of weapon’s type.

Cunning Action: Van Richten can use a bonus action to take the Dash, Disengage or Hide action.

Sneak Attack: When Van Richten surprises a target, has advantage on an attack roll, or an enemy is within 5 ft. of the target, Van Richten deals and extra 7 damage.

Assassin Proficiencies: Van Richten is proficient with Disguise and Poisoner’s Kits.

Assassinate: When Van Richten hits a surprised enemy, it’s automatically a critical hit. When he attacks an enemy that hasn’t yet had a turn, he gains advantage on the attack.

Channel Divinity: Turn Undead: Undead within 30 ft. of Van Richten must make a Wisdom saving throw. If the creature fails its saving throw, they are turned for 1 minute or until they take damage. A turned creature must spend its turns trying to move as far away from him as it can, and it can’t willingly move to a space within 30 ft. of him. It also can’t take reactions. For its action, it can use only the Dash action or try to escape from an effect that prevents it from moving. If there’s nowhere to move, the creature can use the Dodge action. Undead with CR 1 or less are automatically destroyed on a failed save.

Preserve Life: As an action, Van Richten can distribute 45 hit points. This feature can restore a creature to no more than half of its hit point maximum and has no effect on an undead or construct.

Multiattack: Van Richten makes two attacks with his sword cane or light crossbow.

Sword Cane: Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 6 (1d6 +2) bludgeon damage (wooden cane) or piercing damage (silvered sword).

Light Crossbow: Ranged Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, range 80/320 ft., one target. Hit: 7 (1d8 +2) piercing damage.

Healer: As an action, Van Richten can spend one use of a Healer’s Kit to tend to a creature and restore 1d6 +4 hit points to it, plus additional hit points equal to the creature’s maximum number of Hit Dice. The creature can’t regain hit points from this feat again until it finishes a short or long rest.

REACTIONS:

Final Ward: Van Richten has a permanent glyph of warding tattooed on his neck that activates when he’s bitten there and chooses to say “Erasmus, I’m coming home” in Celestial. All targets in a 20 ft. radius must make a Dexterity saving throw or take 5d8 +5 radiant damage on a failed save or half as much (rounded up) on a successful one. Van Richten automatically fails the save and is disintegrated along with all of the items on his person.

RICTAVIO:

Several months ago a colorfully dressed half-elf bard came to Barovia in a carnival wagon, with a pet monkey on his shoulder. He took over an abandoned tower on Lake Baratok before rolling into town of Vallaki several months later. Claiming to be a carnival ringmaster in search of new actors, he began regaling locals with tales of distant lands.

MONSTER HUNTER:

The half-elf ringmaster is, in fact, the legendary human monster hunter named Rudolph Van Richten. Van Richten’s tale is a sad one. A scholar and doctor from a land called Darkon, he married his childhood sweetheart, Ingrid and together they had a son, Erasmus. When he was fourteen, Erasmus was stolen away by Vistani and sold to a vampire named Baron Metus to be used as a companion. By the time Van Richten found his son, it was too late: the Baron had already transformed Erasmus into a vampire spawn. Erasmus begged his father to end his suffering, which Van Richten did by pounding a wooden stake through his son’s chest. Baron Metus avenged that death by killing Van Richten’s wife, and Van Richten has lived with the horror of his family’s destruction ever since. After destroying Baron Metus in turn, Van Richten sought revenge against the Vistani and took up a life of hunting evil monsters.

THE WAITING GAME:

Van Richten isn’t a young man anymore. He knows his road is coming to an end, but his work isn’t done. He has come to Barovia to kill Strahd Von Zarovich, the greatest vampire of them all. Van Richten has studied Strahd for years and knows he can’t hope to best the vampire in a straight-up confrontation: he must wait for the right moment to strike. He has good evidence to suggest that Strahd periodically hibernates in his coffin, sometimes for years, when all is quite in the realm. While he bides his time, Van Richten hides in plain sight with the aid of a hat of disguise, his thoughts protected by a ring of mind shielding. He is trying to learn more about the Keepers of the Feather—a society of wereravens that oppose Strahd—while trying not to expose the secret society to their mutual enemy. He thinks the wereravens might prove helpful when the time comes. Van Richten also wants to take out as many of Strahd’s spies as he can, starting with the Vistani.

MAN WITH A PLAN:

Van Richten doesn’t know that his former protégé, a good-aligned Vistani named Ezmerelda d’Avenir, has come to Barovia looking for him. He taught her many of his monster-hunting techniques, but she doesn’t know all of his tricks and disguises. So far, their paths haven’t crossed. In the event that Van Richten becomes aware of Ezmerelda’s presence, he does his utmost to protect her without putting his own plans in jeopardy. If he can manipulate a party of adventurers into keeping an eye on her, he will do so.

VAN RICHTEN WORKS ALONE:

A curse placed on him long ago by a Vistani seer brings doom to those he befriends (see ‘Role Playing Notes’ for details). Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure. Consequently, if he thinks he’s in danger of being unmasked, he retreats to the Tower of Khazan (chapter 11) or some other quiet corner of Strahd’s domain to plan further.

TRAITS:

Ideal. “Evil cannot go unchallenged.”

Bond. “To protect those I love, I must keep them distant and hidden from my enemies.”

Flaw. “I am cursed. Thus, I will never have peace.”

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

A CURSED MAN:

Van Richten suffers a curse bestowed on him by a Vistani:

Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws.

Its effect on him can best be summarized with this statement: "Van Richten Dies Last." This curse is both a boon and a bane to him. The curse is a large part of why he has lived so long--how he has accumulated so much experience and expertise. He is cursed to always see his friends and allies die--which means he has to live long enough to see it happen.

For a long time, he was unaware of the exact nature of the curse on him, but he is apparently aware of it now.

• Van Richten feels guilty. For decades he fought alongside others with monsters, completely unaware that he was a doombringer among them. Now that he knows, he is burdened by all the deaths he feels that his presence caused.

• Van Richten isolates himself. He doesn't let people get close to him for fear that his curse will take them out.

• If Van Richten is traveling with the party, he has excellent odds of surviving--if someone is going to die in the party, it'll be someone other than him.

• Van Richten's curse should have a tangible impact if he’s traveling with the party: he is a doombringer of the highest order. His mere presence among the party should invite tragedy and disaster.

The Tragedy of Ezmerelda and Van Richten. In the backstory that created Ezmerelda d’Avenir (Appendix D: Monsters and NPCs pages 230-231), there's a tragedy in there: Van Richten's curse could have been lifted years ago.

By Ravenloft Lore, the strongest of curses laid down by a Vistani can only be lifted by the Vistani who placed it, or a blood relative of that Vistani. Van Richten's curse was a Death Curse laid on him by Ezmerelda's mother. Only Ezmerelda has the ability to revoke the curse. But here's the problem...
Ezmerelda is Vistani...by nature; they are secretive about their abilities. Beyond that, Van Richten doesn't trust Vistani and likely commanded Ezmerelda to not use her Vistani abilities in his presence. As a result, Van Richten doesn't know how Vistani curses work--he doesn't know that they can be revoked by a blood relative of the one who laid it. He's a Cleric, he has undoubtedly tried remove curse on himself and it failed. As far as he knows, the curse is permanent.
Van Richten is also secretive and, as mentioned, doesn't trust the Vistani. He kept Ezmerelda at arm's length as best he could both because he couldn't trust her, but also to try to protect her from the curse...and even if he was aware of the curse when they traveled together, he never told her about it.

If either one of them had been less secretive, more open, his curse would have been revoked a long time ago.

If the players want to help Van Richten break the curse, here's the backstory:

The story of Ezmerelda and Van Richten's history was written in the Van Richten's Journal (Appendix F: Handouts pages 254-255). It involves him destroying Ezmerelda's caravan while she was very, very young. She survived the undead assault and later got picked up by another caravan of Vistani (it was actually the Zarovan tribe--Madam Eva's caravan). She originally wanted revenge on Van Richten, but time with Eva (and the presence of the most powerful Vistani of them all) showed her the tragedy of what had happened from an outside perspective. Ezmerelda realized that the whole thing was a horrible tragedy and wrongs had been committed on both sides. She, thus, set out to try to find Van Richten and try to make things right...though Eva never told her about the curse her mother had laid on Van Richten.

Van Richten and Ezmerelda must travel to the place the curse was first laid...a small clearing in the forests of Barovia where the ruins of Ezmerelda's caravan still lie. Both must verbally acknowledge the wrong that had been done and verbally forgive one another for it...then the remains of Ezmerelda's caravan must be burned.

THE DISGUISE:

Van Richten got the idea for “Rictavio” from his exposure to Ezmerelda and her occasional methods for blending in when going somewhere that didn't like Vistani. In short: "Sometimes the best disguise is being the most obvious thing in the room." As mentioned above, Ezmerelda has never encountered the Rictavio disguise and Van Richten isn't familiar with any of the disguises Ezmerelda is currently using.

It is a rather perfect disguise. Van Richten is known as a grim and serious individual, a dour old man who roves the world slaying monsters. “Rictavio” is a flamboyant fop who tells ludicrous stories, commits crimes against music, and is constantly trying to recruit people to his Circus of Wonders. He should be portrayed as extremely over the top and completely harmless. It should be very jarring to your players if he drops the act and reveals who he truly is.
Furthermore, Rictavio knows that even if someone suspects he's hiding something, they are extremely unlikely to guess the truth. If a player rolls well on Insight against him and figures out he's full of crap, that only tells them that he's lying about something...not what he is lying about. And his response is to just carry on and ignore accusations. Sure, the PCs may figure out that he's full of it (his stories are obvious fabrications) but he just carries right along, sticking to his guns even though the players know it’s a load of BS.

The players should have a hard time to get a serious read on Rictavio's personality. He strikes them as so straight forward--a carnie who is spinning tall tales for amusement. So they shouldn’t suspect that he's any more than what he appears to be.

A HARD MAN TO PIN DOWN:

Van Richten is a man with a plan for killing Strahd Von Zarovich, and it's a plan that plays well to his aged capabilities: "wait til Strahd takes a long nap, then stake him in his sleep." Of anyone in the valley, Van Richten knows how deadly Strahd is. He has fought elder vampires before and Strahd is the greatest of them all. He may very well believe that trying to fight him head on is pure folly, but he’s the one most capable of doing so.

It's important to note: Most of the "Destined Allies" the party can draw from Madame Eva’s Tarokka card reading have notes about how the PCs can get that individual to join them. Van Richten has no such notes. Instead, it says this...

Van Richten works alone. [...] Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure.

Van Richten is aware of Madame Eva but (unlike many others in the valley) he won't immediately cave to her prophecies, drop everything he has been working on, and throw his lot in with the PCs. Here are a few important things to keep in mind if the party is trying to recruit him...

• Van Richten is quite certain that if he drops his disguise, Strahd will find him and set out to kill him. (This is one of Strahd's Primary Goals as listed in Chapter 1)

• Van Richten's disguise is magically augmented. As long as the party can't get his hat off, they cannot prove that he’s not a carnie ringmaster

• Van Richten's disguise is only useful against Strahd as long as no one knows who he really is. The ring of mind shielding only works on him...it doesn't work on the PCs. He knows that if anyone else finds out, Strahd can charm them, read their mind or otherwise extract that information from them.

• Van Richten is fully aware of his curse. He will avoid physically joining up with the party for fear that he will get them all killed.

• Van Richten does not talk about his curse. He knows well the bravery of adventurers and that telling them about his curse tends to result in responses like "Oh, you don't need to worry about us, we're strong!" followed shortly by ":dying noises:." Rebuffing their advances without mentioning the curse is much more effective at getting them to stay away from him so his curse doesn't kill them.

• Even if Van Richten consents to offer them aid, it should be indirect as much as possible. He has his plan, he's set in his ways, and he’s not going to go gallivanting off with a bunch of young adventurers. And, he should stay in character as much as possible...blowing his cover will only bring Strahd down on him AND the PCs.

Ideally, even if the party can convince him to help...his help should primarily take the form of a surprisingly knowledgeable carnival ringmaster who is "certainly not going to go out and fight monsters with you. I'm a ringmaster, not an adventurer!"

He may lend the party his carnival wagon to travel around in (once he finds somewhere else to stash his saber-toothed tiger that has been trained to hunt Vistani, or he may lend them the tiger), give them helpful advice--possibly using ravens to stay in touch over long-distance if the PCs make friends with the Keepers of the Feather, and provide the sort of support that a Carnie could offer. But, it should take rather extreme circumstances for him to actually be honest with the PCs...and they may have to do something about his curse before he'll actually travel with them.

GETTING HIM TO JOIN UP:

Van Richten wants to stay under cover...so how does the party get him to change his mind?

Easy: Ruin his plan.

If Van Richten's cover is blown, his plan is a wash. The whole plan depends on his identity staying a secret until Strahd goes into hibernation. If Strahd identifies Van Richten before then, he will try to kill him and Van Richten is pretty sure he can't take Strahd in a straight-up fight. Thus...if Van Richten’s cover is blown, he is stuck with two bad choices: Either he tries to keep going it alone, possibly getting killed by Strahd, and fails his “final mission,” or he accepts the risk to the PCs and joins them to try to take Strahd down directly. A few example ways to blow his cover...

• Knock his hat off. A hat of disguise only works as long as it stays on your head, so if something happens that knocks his hat off; “Rictavio” is replaced by Van Richten.

• Let the Tyger Tyger event happen (chapter 5). When Rictavio flees to the Tower of Khazan, he's inside an antimagic field and cannot disguise himself.

• Even if Van Richten is distorting his voice, if the PCs have already befriended Ezmerelda, she may still recognize it...even if what she recognizes is the cadence his voice adopts when he's explaining something.

ABILITY LOADOUT:

Van Richten is a Cleric...and his listed prepared spells speaks more of a support caster than a monster hunter who has gone solo. But, because he's a Cleric, he can swap out his prepared spells at will to any other spells on the Cleric list. Here are a few notes on spells for him to use...

• Dawn creates sunlight. If he can lock a vampire down within the area of effect, they will be dust in short order.

• Dispel Evil and Good breaks a vampire's charm. However...things can't really leave Barovia, so the dismissal part of that spell won't be terribly effective here.

• Geas is useful when he needs to find something. For example, capture a werewolf then place a geas on it to lead them to the den.

• Lesser and Greater Restoration are enormously useful, as is remove curse.

• Guiding Bolt is a great weapon against Vampires. Shuts down their regeneration, and gives the next attack advantage.

• Hallow: If Van Richten can get his hands on the material components for this, he can create holy ground to help protect the PCs. Create a bubble of hallowed ground around the antimagic field that covers the Tower of Khazan....talk about a fortress. Sure, you'll have a bubble of non-hallowed ground where the antimagic field zone is...but the territory around the tower itself will be holy ground.

• Given his skill at predicting his foes...dropping sanctuary on a creature they are about to attack can completely trash their attempts.

• Spirit Guardians is another spell that is just....awesome.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Appearances==

*[[5th Edition]]
**[[Curse of Strahd]]
**[[Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft]]

==Appearances==
*[[Curse of Strahd]]
*[[Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft]]

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (NPC)

2022-01-29T21:24:24Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* In Curse of Strahd */

[[File:Original VR.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
[[File:Rudolph van richten.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten and [[Strahd]] by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
{{canon}}
'''Dr. Rudolph Van Richten''' is the greatest monster hunter that has ever lived and the most well-known hero of the Lands of the Mists.

==History==
He was born in [[Rivalis]] in [[Darkon]] in [[671 BC]]. He took [[medicine]] at the [[University of Il Aluk]], completing his four or five year program of study in [[693 BC]]. This humble man was spurred into a life of monster hunting when his son [[Erasmus van Richten]] was kidnapped by the [[Radanavich clan]] and sold to [[Baron Metus]]. Metus turned Erasmus into a [[vampire groom]] and Van Richten was forced to slay his son. In revenge, Metus killed Rudolph's wife, [[Ingrid van Richten]]. Van Richten eventually slew Metus, and then, with the help of [[Azalin]], the entire [[Radanavich tribe]].

Until his disappearance in [[750 BC]], he resided in [[Mordentshire]], where he ran an [[Van Richten's Herbalist Shop|herbalist shop]], as well as wrote several of his famous [[Van Richten's Guides]], and mentored [[The Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]], who regarded him as an uncle and took up his work.

==In [[Curse of Strahd]]==
Dr. van Richten makes a notable appearance in the [[5th Edition]] [[module]], [[Curse of Strahd]], though not in his [[famous]] persona as the monster hunter and [[writer]] of the [[Van Richten's Guides]] he is notable for in previous Ravenloft products. Instead, he adopts the guise of [[Rictavio]], a traveling [[half-elf]] [[bard]], [[storyteller]], and [[ringmaster]] gathering stories and watching out for talent. In reality he is gathering formation and waiting for an optimal time to strike at [[Strahd]], preferably when the vampire lord is in [[hibernation]]. Unlike other versions of van Richten, the Curse of Strahd van Richten is a [[loner]] because he knows the full extent of his [[curse]].<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> For more details, see [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Curse of Strahd)]]

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Appearances==
===[[Campaign Setting]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[Ravenloft: Realm of Terror]]
**[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting (Box)]]

===[[Modules]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[The Nightmare Lands (Boxed Set)]] (referenced only)
**[[Chilling Tales]]
**[[Dungeon Magazine #55]]: [[The Sea Wolf]]
**[[Bleak House: The Death of Rudolph Van Richten]]

===[[Novels]]===

*[[Tales of Ravenloft]]: [[The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]

==Authored:==
* ''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Demons]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Witches (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Witches]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]''

Credited for marketing purposes with:
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Mists (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Mists]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]]''

==[[Associate of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]==

==Chronology==

[[671 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten born<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, son of Otto and Mrs. Van Richten
 
{{Spec|[[678 BC]] - Rudolph’s sister [[Maria Van Richten]] born.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 18 "Speculation based on BH. We only know that she is younger than Rudolph."</ref>
 

[[679 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten sent to boarding school in [[Nartok]]. A childhood friend is [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]].<ref name="VRMHCII p.25-26">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 25-26</ref>

[[680 BC]] - [[Casimir (of Richten Haus)|Casimir]] (not to be confused with [[Casimir Lukas|Harkon Lukas’ son]]) starts working at Richten Haus as the gate keeper.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 6">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 6</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[683 BC]] - The servants of [[Richten Haus]] are all killed while the family is away one day. (summer)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.18: "Speculation based on [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] pg. 15, 24: I’m going on the hunch that VR grows younger until he reaches the age he was at when this event occurred"</ref>
 

[[685 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten meets [[Robert Tatenna]], a fellow student at boarding school. (fall)<ref name="CT p.14">[[Chilling Tales]] p.14</ref>

[[688 BC]] - The [[The Crimson Death Epidemic | Crimson Death]] spreads across Darkon (winter); it claims Van Richten’s great aunt Helga, despite his efforts; Rudolph is even more driven into his medical studies.<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[689 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten attends the [[University of Il Aluk]]. While there, he meets a fellow student, [[Dr. Harmon Ruscheider]]. (fall)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]] pg. 15"</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[691 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten marries his childhood sweetheart, [[Ingrid van Richten|Ingrid]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "[[Realm of Terror]]; [[VRGtV]]: Give VR a good respectable year between their marriage and birth of Erasmus in 692"</ref>
 

[[692 BC]] - Rudolph and Ingrid Van Richten's son [[Erasmus van Richten|Erasmus]] is born.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]] p. 4; [[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 8, "fourteen summers" before [[706 BC]]</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[693 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten finishes his studies; opens his practice back home in [[Rivalis]].}},<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VR’s age, RoT; VRGtV; and ToDm pg. 86, which indicates it takes 4-5 years to get a medical education at the University of Il Aluk"</ref> 
 
{{Spec|693 BC - Dr. Van Richten travels to [[Lamordia]], hears of the [[Loud Man of Lamordia]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VRGtG pg. 9: “When I was young.”</ref> 

[[696 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Antonin Madren]] and becomes his mentor.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 21: "VRGttC pg. 6: Van Richten takes Madren on as a medical student, which implies Van Richten has time to offer such an education (which lasts up to 8 years), i.e., while he was still a simple doctor (693-706)."</ref>

[[706 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten suffers the wrath of the [[Radanavich clan]]; the Vistani steal his son Erasmus; they sell Erasmus to [[Baron Metus]]<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, a vampire from [[Richemulot]]; with the help of an amused [[Azalin]], Van Richten wipes out all but one member of the Radanavich caravan<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]</ref>; [[Madame Radanavich]] [[curse | curses]] Van Richten<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, although he doesn’t realize it until the end of his career.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

[[706 BC]] Van Richten puts his Erasmus, now a vampire, out of his misery, but in spite [[Baron Metus]] tears [[Ingrid van Richten]] to pieces; Dr. Van Richten destroys Baron Metus, starting his career of hunting evil. Unable to live with the memories in [[Richten Haus]], Van Richten moves to [[Corvia]].<ref name="VRA p. 5">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 5</ref>

[[707 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten researches vampires, and meets [[Aimon Davidovitch]], a fellow scholar of the arcane.<ref> from [[JWM Timeline]] p.22: "[[VRGtF]] pg. 4: VR knew him for “some 30-odd years”]</ref>

[[710 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten encounters his first werebeast near [[Varithne]], a small village in northern [[Darkon]]. Dr. Van Richten starts hunting werebeasts as well<ref name="VRMHC p. 109-110">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 109-110</ref>

[[711 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Gedlan Ironheart]], a fearless [[dwarven]] [[innkeeper]] in [[Corvia]]. Gedlan becomes a frequent hunting companion.<ref name="Bleah House p. 11">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p.11</ref>

[[712 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets the mage [[Shauten]]; they bond when they are attacked by one of Azalin's patrols. Shauten opens Van Richten's eyes to the existence of the [[Lich]].<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref>

[[713 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten is visited by the dying Dr. Ruscheider, who tells Rudolph all he can about several months spent as a lich's captive; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting liches.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p.111-112</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[714 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten receives a visit from his childhood friend, [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]], who is now a ghostly slave to Azalin; Dr. Van Richten learns the terrible truth about [[Azalin Rex]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on [[VRGtG]] pg. 22, [[VRMHCII]] pg. 24</ref>
 

{{Spec|714 BC - Dr. Van Richten moves to [[Mordentshire]], sensing it is politically unsafe for him to remain in [[Darkon]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on VRGttL pg. 22</ref>
 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[716 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 3 n1">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade after her death, but [[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[718 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and [[Shauten]] battle a creature they believe to be a priestly [[lich]]; it is actually Van Richten's first [[ancient dead]]}}.<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] "Speculation based on VRGAD pg. 5: “Some years ago,” and other markers. It happened after VR started hunting liches, but before he started hunting ghosts. (The latter conclusion taken from numerous references to Claudia in this Guide"</ref>
 
[[724 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten battles the [[Bog Monster of Hroth]], and meets [[Jameld of Hroth|Jameld]]. This is also Van Richten's first visit to both [[Kartakass]] and [[Sithicus]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p.153</ref> 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[726 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decade n1">[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades after her death but[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade</ref> 

{{Spec|726 BC - Dr. Van Richten visits [[Sanguinia]] with [[George Weathermay]] and [[Arametrius]]; they meet [[Claudia DeShanes]]; Claudia becomes Rudolph’s assistant, and it seems he had certain unspoken feelings for her.}}<ref>Speculation from JWM Timeline p.28: "Since Arametrius is probably [[Athasian]], Van Richten may have recently visited [[Kalidnay]] and encountered [[Ahmose Tanit]]. [VRGtG pg. 73. This is the earliest possible date for this event (due to George’s inclusion, and we know from this source and BH that VR starts hunting ghosts one year after this event. That leaves only 9 years between VR starting to hunt and writing his Guide on the subject. I chose to go with this date to keep as wide a margin of opportunity as possible.]"</ref>
 

[[727 BC]] - [[Merilee Markuza]], the Child [[Vampire]], kills Claudia. Van Richten pursues the creature relentlessly, but loses her in [[Lamordia]].<ref name="Darklords p. 63">[[Darklords]] p. 63</ref>

727 BC - While hunting the Child Vampire, Van Richten witnesses the [[Thundering Carriage]]; Van Richten decides he must put an end to these ghostly horrors, too.<ref name="Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts p. 6">[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 6</ref>

[[728 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten defeats the [[Phantom Army]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 91</ref>

[[729 BC]] - The fiend [[Elsepeth]] enters Ravenloft via [[transposition]] in a small village outside [[Stangengrad]], near the [[Grashen Falls]] (sept)<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.28: "[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] pg. 14: the diary is dated “twelve years ago.”</ref>

[[730 BC]] - {{Spec|[[Gedlan Ironheart]] killed while battling evil spirits.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: "VRGtG pg. 23: Gedlan is referred to as “Geddar” in this book. The date is an estimate based on the 727-736 available time span."</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] leaves [[Borca]], having lurked there for years.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] p. 66</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] writes to Van Richten about the death of Madren’s sister.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[734 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] shows up on Van Richten's doorstep, and gives the good doctor his notes; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting the [[Created]].}}<ref>JWM Timeline p. 30: "VRGttC pg. 6: Estimate. “Years” after Madren wrote about his sister’s death"</ref> 

[[735 BC] - Dr. Van Richten is forced to kill his old friend [[Shauten]] in self-defense, when Shauten tries to sacrifice Rudolph in a bid for [[lichdom]]<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref><ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>. {{Spec|This "near-miss" may have inspired Van Richten to start recording his collected knowledge for heroes to come.}}<ref>JWM Timeline: "Speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6"</ref>

735 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''.<ref name="RLCS p.18">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.18</ref><ref name="RLPHB p.20">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.20</ref>

[[736 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''.

[[737 BC]] - The [[Vistana]] [[Cyrilla]]'s niece [[Vassa]] is [[kidnapped]] near [[Corvia]].<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 20: The golem appeared “the following year” after Vaasa’s soul is taken."</ref>

737 BC - [[Vassa]] returns as a [[clay golem]]; Cyrilla writes to Dr. Van Richten.<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 19 "just last year"</ref>

737 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''.

[[738 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''.

[[738 BC]] [[Emil Bollenbach]] engineers the [[kidnapping]] of Dr. Rudolph van Richten to the end of seizing his [[brain]] for [[transplantation]] into a super-golem. fortunately, several of Van Richten's friends intercede to thwart Dr. Bollenbach.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 33: "[[Children of the Night: The Created]] pg. 50; CT pg. 32 places this adventure 8 years after Emil’s disappearance (i.e., 746), but the dating used in CotN:C fits VR’s chronology better.</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] goes to [[Nartok]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 67-68">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.67-68</ref>

[[739 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and the adventuring band known as [[the Hand (Adventurer Band)|the Hand]] hunt and destroy [[the Gibbering Golem]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 265-276">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.265-276</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]] publishes ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''. This act earns him considerable ire from [[Agatha Clairmont]], whom sees it as an instruction manual to building [[dread golem]]s just much as it is hunting them.<ref name="Van Richten's Arsenal p. 149">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p. 149</ref>

[[740 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]'' (early spring).

740 BC - Dr. Van Richten inherits the [[library (Aimon Davidovitch)]] of [[Aimon Davidovitch]]. Dr. Van Richten starts studying tomes. (Sept)<ref>JWM Timeline p. 35 "Extrapolated from VRGtF pg. 4"</ref>

[[741 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]], [[Davvyd]], [[Samuel]] and [[Dr. Ottelie Farringer]] battle the fiend [[Drigor]]. Only Dr. van Richten survives. (Feb.)<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 79-85">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p. 79-85</ref>

741 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]]''.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Book)]] p.4</ref>

741 BC - [[Van Richten]] stumbles into the clutches of [[the nameless Amnizu]] and [[the nameless Barbazu]] infesting [[Chateaufaux]]. He is captured. However, he manages to join with some [[adventurer]]s to route the [[devil]]s from the town.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.72-73; Note that the encounter with these [[fiend]]s doesn't appear in the original uncompiled Van Richten's Guide to Fiends. Therefore, the encounter with the [[Fiends of Chateaufaux]] took place after took place after the first VRGtF was published.</ref><ref>[[Gazetteer III]] p.30-31, "just over 15 years ago"</ref>

741 BC<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> - Dr. Van Richten is [[depressed]]; he consults with the [[diviner]], [[Inarin Alster]]; Rudolph realizes he had been laboring under a [[curse]] all these years; Dr. Van Richten spends a year with [[Arturi Radanavich]] studying the Vistani.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]] p.5-7; 87-89</ref>

[[742 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten writes his ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]'' and retires.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> (Oct.)

[[750 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten dies in [[Richten Haus|Bleak House]] in the fight against [[Madame Radanavich]]<ref>[[Domains of Dread]] p. 17, as told in [[Bleak House]], particularly [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 58-63</ref> Meanwhile, all that is known to most, including the [[Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]] is that he [[disappeared]].<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

{{ref}}

[[category:Character]] [[category:NPC]]
[[category:2nd Edition Character]]
[[category:3rd Edition Character]]
[[category:4th Edition Character]]
[[category:5th Edition Character]]
[[category:Abused]]
[[category:Betrayed]]
[[Category:Cursed]]
[[category:Cursed by the Vistani]]
[[Category:Darkonian]]
[[Category:Demonologist]]
[[category:Energy Drained]]
[[Category:Filicide]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Rivalis]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Nartok]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Forest of Shadows]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Darkon]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordentshire]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordent]]
[[Category:Former Patients of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Dominia]]
[[Category:Former Medical Student]]
[[Category:Former Student of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[category:Gaslighted]]
[[category:Giogoto]]
[[Category:Ghost]]
[[Category:Graduate of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Graduate]]
[[Category:Herbalist]]
[[Category:Human]]
[[category:healer]]
[[category:Hero]]
[[Category:Hunter Of Monsters]]
[[Category:Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[category:Intellectual]]
[[Category:Kidnapped]]
[[category:Killer]]
[[category:Lorist]]
[[Category:Male]]
[[category:Mass Murderer]]
[[category:Medical Doctor]]
[[category:Medical Professional]]
[[category:Mentor]]
[[category:Murderer]]
[[Category:Necrologist]]
[[category:Old]]
[[Category:Planar Mechanic]]
[[category:Polymath]]
[[category:Posthumous Character]]
[[category:Potential Darklord]]
[[Category:Proprietor]]
[[category:Professional Killer]]
[[category:Punished]]
[[category:Ravenloft Lorist]]
[[Category:Ravenloft Loremaster]]
[[category:Redeemed]]
[[category:Reformed]]
[[category:Repentant]]
[[category:Researcher]]
[[category:Retired]]
[[Category:Rogue]]
[[category:Sage]]
[[category:Seduced]]
[[Category:Stasis]]
[[category:Tempted]]
[[category:Transgressed]]
[[category:Transgressor]]
[[Category:Van Richten Family]]
[[category:Victim of Medical Malpractice]]
[[Category:Victim of the van Richten Curse]]
[[category:Victimized]]
[[Category:Widowed]]
[[Category:writer]]
[[category:Births in 671 BC]]
[[category:Deaths in 750 BC]]
<references/>

==Data from the Ravenloft Catalogue==



{|
|-valign="top"
|[[Image:rldb_npc.jpg]]
|[[Image:rldb_primary.gif]]
|
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' 
''[[Bleak House]]''
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_art.gif]]
|
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - p4 
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - cover, p4 
''[[Bleak House:Homecoming]]'' - p4,p16 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - p7,8 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p92 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - p114 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 5,11 
''[[The Created]]'' - p13 
''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]'' - p5
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_stats.gif]]
|
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - pp4-5 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p91 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 3
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_desc.gif]]
|
''[[Ravenloft Third Edition]]'' - pp14,17-18,27,176 
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - throughout 
''[[Bleak House]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to The Created]]'' - throughout 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]'' - throughout 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - pp91-93 
''[[Tales of Ravenloft: The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]'' - pp1-17 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - pp 2-3 
''[[Heroes of Light]]'' - p64 
''[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]]'' - pp1-4, pp9-13, pp304-310
|-valign="top"
|}

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Article)

2022-01-29T21:21:45Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* Box Sets */

DR. RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN

Medium humanoid (human), Lawful Good

Armor Class: 17 (half plate of flowing sanctity)

Hit Points: 77 (14d8 +14)

Speed: 30 ft.

Strength: 9 (-1)

Dexterity: 13 (+1)

Constitution: 13 (+1)

Intelligence: 17 (+3)

Wisdom: 18 (+4)

Charisma: 16 (+3)

Saving Throws: Con +5, Wis +8, Cha +7

Skills: Arcana +7, Deception +7, Insight +12,
Investigation +7, Medicine +8, Perception +12,
Religion +6, Sleight of Hand +4

Condition Immunities: charmed

Senses: darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 22

Languages: Abyssal, Celestial, Common, Draconic, Dwarvish, Elvish, Gundarak, Infernal, Sylvan

Challenge: 9 (5,000 XP)

SPECIAL EQUIPMENT:

In addition to his +1 sword cane and light crossbow, Van Richten wears a hat of disguise, goggles of night, and a ring of mind shielding, and he carries a spell scroll of raise dead.

Half Plate of Flowing Sanctity +1 mithril half plate. Once a day, a flask of water placed in the belt of armor becomes holy water.

ACTIONS:

Spellcasting: Van Richter is a 9th level Cleric of Helm, 1st level Wizard. His spellcasting ability is Wisdom (save DC 15, +7 to hit with spell attacks). Van Richten has the following Cleric and Wizard spells prepared:

Cantrips (at will): light, mage hand, mending, minor illusion, prestidigitation, sacred flame, thaumaturgy, toll the dead

1st level (4 slots): alarm, bless, cure wounds, detect evil and good, feather fall, find familiar, healing word, identify, protection from evil and good, shield, sleep

2nd level (3 slots): augury, beacon of hope, lesser restoration, protection from poison, silence, spiritual weapon warding bond, zone of truth

3rd level (3 slots): glyph of warding, magic circle, mass healing word, revivify, speak with dead, spirit guardians

4th level (3 slots): death ward, freedom of movement

5th level (3 slots): dawn, greater restoration, mass cure wounds, raise dead

Skulker: Van Richten can hide when he is lightly obscured from the creature from which he is hiding. When he’s hidden from a creature and misses it with a ranged weapon attack, making the attack doesn’t reveal his position. Dim light doesn’t impose disadvantage on his Wisdom (Perception) checks relying on sight.

Undead Slayer: When Van Richten hits an undead with a weapon attack, the undead takes an extra 10 (3d6) damage of weapon’s type.

Cunning Action: Van Richten can use a bonus action to take the Dash, Disengage or Hide action.

Sneak Attack: When Van Richten surprises a target, has advantage on an attack roll, or an enemy is within 5 ft. of the target, Van Richten deals and extra 7 damage.

Assassin Proficiencies: Van Richten is proficient with Disguise and Poisoner’s Kits.

Assassinate: When Van Richten hits a surprised enemy, it’s automatically a critical hit. When he attacks an enemy that hasn’t yet had a turn, he gains advantage on the attack.

Channel Divinity: Turn Undead: Undead within 30 ft. of Van Richten must make a Wisdom saving throw. If the creature fails its saving throw, they are turned for 1 minute or until they take damage. A turned creature must spend its turns trying to move as far away from him as it can, and it can’t willingly move to a space within 30 ft. of him. It also can’t take reactions. For its action, it can use only the Dash action or try to escape from an effect that prevents it from moving. If there’s nowhere to move, the creature can use the Dodge action. Undead with CR 1 or less are automatically destroyed on a failed save.

Preserve Life: As an action, Van Richten can distribute 45 hit points. This feature can restore a creature to no more than half of its hit point maximum and has no effect on an undead or construct.

Multiattack: Van Richten makes two attacks with his sword cane or light crossbow.

Sword Cane: Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 6 (1d6 +2) bludgeon damage (wooden cane) or piercing damage (silvered sword).

Light Crossbow: Ranged Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, range 80/320 ft., one target. Hit: 7 (1d8 +2) piercing damage.

Healer: As an action, Van Richten can spend one use of a Healer’s Kit to tend to a creature and restore 1d6 +4 hit points to it, plus additional hit points equal to the creature’s maximum number of Hit Dice. The creature can’t regain hit points from this feat again until it finishes a short or long rest.

REACTIONS:

Final Ward: Van Richten has a permanent glyph of warding tattooed on his neck that activates when he’s bitten there and chooses to say “Erasmus, I’m coming home” in Celestial. All targets in a 20 ft. radius must make a Dexterity saving throw or take 5d8 +5 radiant damage on a failed save or half as much (rounded up) on a successful one. Van Richten automatically fails the save and is disintegrated along with all of the items on his person.

RICTAVIO:

Several months ago a colorfully dressed half-elf bard came to Barovia in a carnival wagon, with a pet monkey on his shoulder. He took over an abandoned tower on Lake Baratok before rolling into town of Vallaki several months later. Claiming to be a carnival ringmaster in search of new actors, he began regaling locals with tales of distant lands.

MONSTER HUNTER:

The half-elf ringmaster is, in fact, the legendary human monster hunter named Rudolph Van Richten. Van Richten’s tale is a sad one. A scholar and doctor from a land called Darkon, he married his childhood sweetheart, Ingrid and together they had a son, Erasmus. When he was fourteen, Erasmus was stolen away by Vistani and sold to a vampire named Baron Metus to be used as a companion. By the time Van Richten found his son, it was too late: the Baron had already transformed Erasmus into a vampire spawn. Erasmus begged his father to end his suffering, which Van Richten did by pounding a wooden stake through his son’s chest. Baron Metus avenged that death by killing Van Richten’s wife, and Van Richten has lived with the horror of his family’s destruction ever since. After destroying Baron Metus in turn, Van Richten sought revenge against the Vistani and took up a life of hunting evil monsters.

THE WAITING GAME:

Van Richten isn’t a young man anymore. He knows his road is coming to an end, but his work isn’t done. He has come to Barovia to kill Strahd Von Zarovich, the greatest vampire of them all. Van Richten has studied Strahd for years and knows he can’t hope to best the vampire in a straight-up confrontation: he must wait for the right moment to strike. He has good evidence to suggest that Strahd periodically hibernates in his coffin, sometimes for years, when all is quite in the realm. While he bides his time, Van Richten hides in plain sight with the aid of a hat of disguise, his thoughts protected by a ring of mind shielding. He is trying to learn more about the Keepers of the Feather—a society of wereravens that oppose Strahd—while trying not to expose the secret society to their mutual enemy. He thinks the wereravens might prove helpful when the time comes. Van Richten also wants to take out as many of Strahd’s spies as he can, starting with the Vistani.

MAN WITH A PLAN:

Van Richten doesn’t know that his former protégé, a good-aligned Vistani named Ezmerelda d’Avenir, has come to Barovia looking for him. He taught her many of his monster-hunting techniques, but she doesn’t know all of his tricks and disguises. So far, their paths haven’t crossed. In the event that Van Richten becomes aware of Ezmerelda’s presence, he does his utmost to protect her without putting his own plans in jeopardy. If he can manipulate a party of adventurers into keeping an eye on her, he will do so.

VAN RICHTEN WORKS ALONE:

A curse placed on him long ago by a Vistani seer brings doom to those he befriends (see ‘Role Playing Notes’ for details). Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure. Consequently, if he thinks he’s in danger of being unmasked, he retreats to the Tower of Khazan (chapter 11) or some other quiet corner of Strahd’s domain to plan further.

TRAITS:

Ideal. “Evil cannot go unchallenged.”

Bond. “To protect those I love, I must keep them distant and hidden from my enemies.”

Flaw. “I am cursed. Thus, I will never have peace.”

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

A CURSED MAN:

Van Richten suffers a curse bestowed on him by a Vistani:

Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws.

Its effect on him can best be summarized with this statement: "Van Richten Dies Last." This curse is both a boon and a bane to him. The curse is a large part of why he has lived so long--how he has accumulated so much experience and expertise. He is cursed to always see his friends and allies die--which means he has to live long enough to see it happen.

For a long time, he was unaware of the exact nature of the curse on him, but he is apparently aware of it now.

• Van Richten feels guilty. For decades he fought alongside others with monsters, completely unaware that he was a doombringer among them. Now that he knows, he is burdened by all the deaths he feels that his presence caused.

• Van Richten isolates himself. He doesn't let people get close to him for fear that his curse will take them out.

• If Van Richten is traveling with the party, he has excellent odds of surviving--if someone is going to die in the party, it'll be someone other than him.

• Van Richten's curse should have a tangible impact if he’s traveling with the party: he is a doombringer of the highest order. His mere presence among the party should invite tragedy and disaster.

The Tragedy of Ezmerelda and Van Richten. In the backstory that created Ezmerelda d’Avenir (Appendix D: Monsters and NPCs pages 230-231), there's a tragedy in there: Van Richten's curse could have been lifted years ago.

By Ravenloft Lore, the strongest of curses laid down by a Vistani can only be lifted by the Vistani who placed it, or a blood relative of that Vistani. Van Richten's curse was a Death Curse laid on him by Ezmerelda's mother. Only Ezmerelda has the ability to revoke the curse. But here's the problem...
Ezmerelda is Vistani...by nature; they are secretive about their abilities. Beyond that, Van Richten doesn't trust Vistani and likely commanded Ezmerelda to not use her Vistani abilities in his presence. As a result, Van Richten doesn't know how Vistani curses work--he doesn't know that they can be revoked by a blood relative of the one who laid it. He's a Cleric, he has undoubtedly tried remove curse on himself and it failed. As far as he knows, the curse is permanent.
Van Richten is also secretive and, as mentioned, doesn't trust the Vistani. He kept Ezmerelda at arm's length as best he could both because he couldn't trust her, but also to try to protect her from the curse...and even if he was aware of the curse when they traveled together, he never told her about it.

If either one of them had been less secretive, more open, his curse would have been revoked a long time ago.

If the players want to help Van Richten break the curse, here's the backstory:

The story of Ezmerelda and Van Richten's history was written in the Van Richten's Journal (Appendix F: Handouts pages 254-255). It involves him destroying Ezmerelda's caravan while she was very, very young. She survived the undead assault and later got picked up by another caravan of Vistani (it was actually the Zarovan tribe--Madam Eva's caravan). She originally wanted revenge on Van Richten, but time with Eva (and the presence of the most powerful Vistani of them all) showed her the tragedy of what had happened from an outside perspective. Ezmerelda realized that the whole thing was a horrible tragedy and wrongs had been committed on both sides. She, thus, set out to try to find Van Richten and try to make things right...though Eva never told her about the curse her mother had laid on Van Richten.

Van Richten and Ezmerelda must travel to the place the curse was first laid...a small clearing in the forests of Barovia where the ruins of Ezmerelda's caravan still lie. Both must verbally acknowledge the wrong that had been done and verbally forgive one another for it...then the remains of Ezmerelda's caravan must be burned.

THE DISGUISE:

Van Richten got the idea for “Rictavio” from his exposure to Ezmerelda and her occasional methods for blending in when going somewhere that didn't like Vistani. In short: "Sometimes the best disguise is being the most obvious thing in the room." As mentioned above, Ezmerelda has never encountered the Rictavio disguise and Van Richten isn't familiar with any of the disguises Ezmerelda is currently using.

It is a rather perfect disguise. Van Richten is known as a grim and serious individual, a dour old man who roves the world slaying monsters. “Rictavio” is a flamboyant fop who tells ludicrous stories, commits crimes against music, and is constantly trying to recruit people to his Circus of Wonders. He should be portrayed as extremely over the top and completely harmless. It should be very jarring to your players if he drops the act and reveals who he truly is.
Furthermore, Rictavio knows that even if someone suspects he's hiding something, they are extremely unlikely to guess the truth. If a player rolls well on Insight against him and figures out he's full of crap, that only tells them that he's lying about something...not what he is lying about. And his response is to just carry on and ignore accusations. Sure, the PCs may figure out that he's full of it (his stories are obvious fabrications) but he just carries right along, sticking to his guns even though the players know it’s a load of BS.

The players should have a hard time to get a serious read on Rictavio's personality. He strikes them as so straight forward--a carnie who is spinning tall tales for amusement. So they shouldn’t suspect that he's any more than what he appears to be.

A HARD MAN TO PIN DOWN:

Van Richten is a man with a plan for killing Strahd Von Zarovich, and it's a plan that plays well to his aged capabilities: "wait til Strahd takes a long nap, then stake him in his sleep." Of anyone in the valley, Van Richten knows how deadly Strahd is. He has fought elder vampires before and Strahd is the greatest of them all. He may very well believe that trying to fight him head on is pure folly, but he’s the one most capable of doing so.

It's important to note: Most of the "Destined Allies" the party can draw from Madame Eva’s Tarokka card reading have notes about how the PCs can get that individual to join them. Van Richten has no such notes. Instead, it says this...

Van Richten works alone. [...] Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure.

Van Richten is aware of Madame Eva but (unlike many others in the valley) he won't immediately cave to her prophecies, drop everything he has been working on, and throw his lot in with the PCs. Here are a few important things to keep in mind if the party is trying to recruit him...

• Van Richten is quite certain that if he drops his disguise, Strahd will find him and set out to kill him. (This is one of Strahd's Primary Goals as listed in Chapter 1)

• Van Richten's disguise is magically augmented. As long as the party can't get his hat off, they cannot prove that he’s not a carnie ringmaster

• Van Richten's disguise is only useful against Strahd as long as no one knows who he really is. The ring of mind shielding only works on him...it doesn't work on the PCs. He knows that if anyone else finds out, Strahd can charm them, read their mind or otherwise extract that information from them.

• Van Richten is fully aware of his curse. He will avoid physically joining up with the party for fear that he will get them all killed.

• Van Richten does not talk about his curse. He knows well the bravery of adventurers and that telling them about his curse tends to result in responses like "Oh, you don't need to worry about us, we're strong!" followed shortly by ":dying noises:." Rebuffing their advances without mentioning the curse is much more effective at getting them to stay away from him so his curse doesn't kill them.

• Even if Van Richten consents to offer them aid, it should be indirect as much as possible. He has his plan, he's set in his ways, and he’s not going to go gallivanting off with a bunch of young adventurers. And, he should stay in character as much as possible...blowing his cover will only bring Strahd down on him AND the PCs.

Ideally, even if the party can convince him to help...his help should primarily take the form of a surprisingly knowledgeable carnival ringmaster who is "certainly not going to go out and fight monsters with you. I'm a ringmaster, not an adventurer!"

He may lend the party his carnival wagon to travel around in (once he finds somewhere else to stash his saber-toothed tiger that has been trained to hunt Vistani, or he may lend them the tiger), give them helpful advice--possibly using ravens to stay in touch over long-distance if the PCs make friends with the Keepers of the Feather, and provide the sort of support that a Carnie could offer. But, it should take rather extreme circumstances for him to actually be honest with the PCs...and they may have to do something about his curse before he'll actually travel with them.

GETTING HIM TO JOIN UP:

Van Richten wants to stay under cover...so how does the party get him to change his mind?

Easy: Ruin his plan.

If Van Richten's cover is blown, his plan is a wash. The whole plan depends on his identity staying a secret until Strahd goes into hibernation. If Strahd identifies Van Richten before then, he will try to kill him and Van Richten is pretty sure he can't take Strahd in a straight-up fight. Thus...if Van Richten’s cover is blown, he is stuck with two bad choices: Either he tries to keep going it alone, possibly getting killed by Strahd, and fails his “final mission,” or he accepts the risk to the PCs and joins them to try to take Strahd down directly. A few example ways to blow his cover...

• Knock his hat off. A hat of disguise only works as long as it stays on your head, so if something happens that knocks his hat off; “Rictavio” is replaced by Van Richten.

• Let the Tyger Tyger event happen (chapter 5). When Rictavio flees to the Tower of Khazan, he's inside an antimagic field and cannot disguise himself.

• Even if Van Richten is distorting his voice, if the PCs have already befriended Ezmerelda, she may still recognize it...even if what she recognizes is the cadence his voice adopts when he's explaining something.

ABILITY LOADOUT:

Van Richten is a Cleric...and his listed prepared spells speaks more of a support caster than a monster hunter who has gone solo. But, because he's a Cleric, he can swap out his prepared spells at will to any other spells on the Cleric list. Here are a few notes on spells for him to use...

• Dawn creates sunlight. If he can lock a vampire down within the area of effect, they will be dust in short order.

• Dispel Evil and Good breaks a vampire's charm. However...things can't really leave Barovia, so the dismissal part of that spell won't be terribly effective here.

• Geas is useful when he needs to find something. For example, capture a werewolf then place a geas on it to lead them to the den.

• Lesser and Greater Restoration are enormously useful, as is remove curse.

• Guiding Bolt is a great weapon against Vampires. Shuts down their regeneration, and gives the next attack advantage.

• Hallow: If Van Richten can get his hands on the material components for this, he can create holy ground to help protect the PCs. Create a bubble of hallowed ground around the antimagic field that covers the Tower of Khazan....talk about a fortress. Sure, you'll have a bubble of non-hallowed ground where the antimagic field zone is...but the territory around the tower itself will be holy ground.

• Given his skill at predicting his foes...dropping sanctuary on a creature they are about to attack can completely trash their attempts.

• Spirit Guardians is another spell that is just....awesome.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Appearances==
===[[Campaign Setting]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[Ravenloft: Realm of Terror]]
**[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting (Box)]]

===[[Modules]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[The Nightmare Lands (Boxed Set)]] (referenced only)
**[[Chilling Tales]]
**[[Dungeon Magazine #55]]: [[The Sea Wolf]]
**[[Bleak House: The Death of Rudolph Van Richten]]
*[[5th Edition]]
**[[Curse of Strahd]]
**[[Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft]]

===[[Novels]]===

*[[Tales of Ravenloft]]: [[The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Article)

2022-01-29T21:20:19Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* Appearances */

DR. RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN

Medium humanoid (human), Lawful Good

Armor Class: 17 (half plate of flowing sanctity)

Hit Points: 77 (14d8 +14)

Speed: 30 ft.

Strength: 9 (-1)

Dexterity: 13 (+1)

Constitution: 13 (+1)

Intelligence: 17 (+3)

Wisdom: 18 (+4)

Charisma: 16 (+3)

Saving Throws: Con +5, Wis +8, Cha +7

Skills: Arcana +7, Deception +7, Insight +12,
Investigation +7, Medicine +8, Perception +12,
Religion +6, Sleight of Hand +4

Condition Immunities: charmed

Senses: darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 22

Languages: Abyssal, Celestial, Common, Draconic, Dwarvish, Elvish, Gundarak, Infernal, Sylvan

Challenge: 9 (5,000 XP)

SPECIAL EQUIPMENT:

In addition to his +1 sword cane and light crossbow, Van Richten wears a hat of disguise, goggles of night, and a ring of mind shielding, and he carries a spell scroll of raise dead.

Half Plate of Flowing Sanctity +1 mithril half plate. Once a day, a flask of water placed in the belt of armor becomes holy water.

ACTIONS:

Spellcasting: Van Richter is a 9th level Cleric of Helm, 1st level Wizard. His spellcasting ability is Wisdom (save DC 15, +7 to hit with spell attacks). Van Richten has the following Cleric and Wizard spells prepared:

Cantrips (at will): light, mage hand, mending, minor illusion, prestidigitation, sacred flame, thaumaturgy, toll the dead

1st level (4 slots): alarm, bless, cure wounds, detect evil and good, feather fall, find familiar, healing word, identify, protection from evil and good, shield, sleep

2nd level (3 slots): augury, beacon of hope, lesser restoration, protection from poison, silence, spiritual weapon warding bond, zone of truth

3rd level (3 slots): glyph of warding, magic circle, mass healing word, revivify, speak with dead, spirit guardians

4th level (3 slots): death ward, freedom of movement

5th level (3 slots): dawn, greater restoration, mass cure wounds, raise dead

Skulker: Van Richten can hide when he is lightly obscured from the creature from which he is hiding. When he’s hidden from a creature and misses it with a ranged weapon attack, making the attack doesn’t reveal his position. Dim light doesn’t impose disadvantage on his Wisdom (Perception) checks relying on sight.

Undead Slayer: When Van Richten hits an undead with a weapon attack, the undead takes an extra 10 (3d6) damage of weapon’s type.

Cunning Action: Van Richten can use a bonus action to take the Dash, Disengage or Hide action.

Sneak Attack: When Van Richten surprises a target, has advantage on an attack roll, or an enemy is within 5 ft. of the target, Van Richten deals and extra 7 damage.

Assassin Proficiencies: Van Richten is proficient with Disguise and Poisoner’s Kits.

Assassinate: When Van Richten hits a surprised enemy, it’s automatically a critical hit. When he attacks an enemy that hasn’t yet had a turn, he gains advantage on the attack.

Channel Divinity: Turn Undead: Undead within 30 ft. of Van Richten must make a Wisdom saving throw. If the creature fails its saving throw, they are turned for 1 minute or until they take damage. A turned creature must spend its turns trying to move as far away from him as it can, and it can’t willingly move to a space within 30 ft. of him. It also can’t take reactions. For its action, it can use only the Dash action or try to escape from an effect that prevents it from moving. If there’s nowhere to move, the creature can use the Dodge action. Undead with CR 1 or less are automatically destroyed on a failed save.

Preserve Life: As an action, Van Richten can distribute 45 hit points. This feature can restore a creature to no more than half of its hit point maximum and has no effect on an undead or construct.

Multiattack: Van Richten makes two attacks with his sword cane or light crossbow.

Sword Cane: Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 6 (1d6 +2) bludgeon damage (wooden cane) or piercing damage (silvered sword).

Light Crossbow: Ranged Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, range 80/320 ft., one target. Hit: 7 (1d8 +2) piercing damage.

Healer: As an action, Van Richten can spend one use of a Healer’s Kit to tend to a creature and restore 1d6 +4 hit points to it, plus additional hit points equal to the creature’s maximum number of Hit Dice. The creature can’t regain hit points from this feat again until it finishes a short or long rest.

REACTIONS:

Final Ward: Van Richten has a permanent glyph of warding tattooed on his neck that activates when he’s bitten there and chooses to say “Erasmus, I’m coming home” in Celestial. All targets in a 20 ft. radius must make a Dexterity saving throw or take 5d8 +5 radiant damage on a failed save or half as much (rounded up) on a successful one. Van Richten automatically fails the save and is disintegrated along with all of the items on his person.

RICTAVIO:

Several months ago a colorfully dressed half-elf bard came to Barovia in a carnival wagon, with a pet monkey on his shoulder. He took over an abandoned tower on Lake Baratok before rolling into town of Vallaki several months later. Claiming to be a carnival ringmaster in search of new actors, he began regaling locals with tales of distant lands.

MONSTER HUNTER:

The half-elf ringmaster is, in fact, the legendary human monster hunter named Rudolph Van Richten. Van Richten’s tale is a sad one. A scholar and doctor from a land called Darkon, he married his childhood sweetheart, Ingrid and together they had a son, Erasmus. When he was fourteen, Erasmus was stolen away by Vistani and sold to a vampire named Baron Metus to be used as a companion. By the time Van Richten found his son, it was too late: the Baron had already transformed Erasmus into a vampire spawn. Erasmus begged his father to end his suffering, which Van Richten did by pounding a wooden stake through his son’s chest. Baron Metus avenged that death by killing Van Richten’s wife, and Van Richten has lived with the horror of his family’s destruction ever since. After destroying Baron Metus in turn, Van Richten sought revenge against the Vistani and took up a life of hunting evil monsters.

THE WAITING GAME:

Van Richten isn’t a young man anymore. He knows his road is coming to an end, but his work isn’t done. He has come to Barovia to kill Strahd Von Zarovich, the greatest vampire of them all. Van Richten has studied Strahd for years and knows he can’t hope to best the vampire in a straight-up confrontation: he must wait for the right moment to strike. He has good evidence to suggest that Strahd periodically hibernates in his coffin, sometimes for years, when all is quite in the realm. While he bides his time, Van Richten hides in plain sight with the aid of a hat of disguise, his thoughts protected by a ring of mind shielding. He is trying to learn more about the Keepers of the Feather—a society of wereravens that oppose Strahd—while trying not to expose the secret society to their mutual enemy. He thinks the wereravens might prove helpful when the time comes. Van Richten also wants to take out as many of Strahd’s spies as he can, starting with the Vistani.

MAN WITH A PLAN:

Van Richten doesn’t know that his former protégé, a good-aligned Vistani named Ezmerelda d’Avenir, has come to Barovia looking for him. He taught her many of his monster-hunting techniques, but she doesn’t know all of his tricks and disguises. So far, their paths haven’t crossed. In the event that Van Richten becomes aware of Ezmerelda’s presence, he does his utmost to protect her without putting his own plans in jeopardy. If he can manipulate a party of adventurers into keeping an eye on her, he will do so.

VAN RICHTEN WORKS ALONE:

A curse placed on him long ago by a Vistani seer brings doom to those he befriends (see ‘Role Playing Notes’ for details). Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure. Consequently, if he thinks he’s in danger of being unmasked, he retreats to the Tower of Khazan (chapter 11) or some other quiet corner of Strahd’s domain to plan further.

TRAITS:

Ideal. “Evil cannot go unchallenged.”

Bond. “To protect those I love, I must keep them distant and hidden from my enemies.”

Flaw. “I am cursed. Thus, I will never have peace.”

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

A CURSED MAN:

Van Richten suffers a curse bestowed on him by a Vistani:

Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws.

Its effect on him can best be summarized with this statement: "Van Richten Dies Last." This curse is both a boon and a bane to him. The curse is a large part of why he has lived so long--how he has accumulated so much experience and expertise. He is cursed to always see his friends and allies die--which means he has to live long enough to see it happen.

For a long time, he was unaware of the exact nature of the curse on him, but he is apparently aware of it now.

• Van Richten feels guilty. For decades he fought alongside others with monsters, completely unaware that he was a doombringer among them. Now that he knows, he is burdened by all the deaths he feels that his presence caused.

• Van Richten isolates himself. He doesn't let people get close to him for fear that his curse will take them out.

• If Van Richten is traveling with the party, he has excellent odds of surviving--if someone is going to die in the party, it'll be someone other than him.

• Van Richten's curse should have a tangible impact if he’s traveling with the party: he is a doombringer of the highest order. His mere presence among the party should invite tragedy and disaster.

The Tragedy of Ezmerelda and Van Richten. In the backstory that created Ezmerelda d’Avenir (Appendix D: Monsters and NPCs pages 230-231), there's a tragedy in there: Van Richten's curse could have been lifted years ago.

By Ravenloft Lore, the strongest of curses laid down by a Vistani can only be lifted by the Vistani who placed it, or a blood relative of that Vistani. Van Richten's curse was a Death Curse laid on him by Ezmerelda's mother. Only Ezmerelda has the ability to revoke the curse. But here's the problem...
Ezmerelda is Vistani...by nature; they are secretive about their abilities. Beyond that, Van Richten doesn't trust Vistani and likely commanded Ezmerelda to not use her Vistani abilities in his presence. As a result, Van Richten doesn't know how Vistani curses work--he doesn't know that they can be revoked by a blood relative of the one who laid it. He's a Cleric, he has undoubtedly tried remove curse on himself and it failed. As far as he knows, the curse is permanent.
Van Richten is also secretive and, as mentioned, doesn't trust the Vistani. He kept Ezmerelda at arm's length as best he could both because he couldn't trust her, but also to try to protect her from the curse...and even if he was aware of the curse when they traveled together, he never told her about it.

If either one of them had been less secretive, more open, his curse would have been revoked a long time ago.

If the players want to help Van Richten break the curse, here's the backstory:

The story of Ezmerelda and Van Richten's history was written in the Van Richten's Journal (Appendix F: Handouts pages 254-255). It involves him destroying Ezmerelda's caravan while she was very, very young. She survived the undead assault and later got picked up by another caravan of Vistani (it was actually the Zarovan tribe--Madam Eva's caravan). She originally wanted revenge on Van Richten, but time with Eva (and the presence of the most powerful Vistani of them all) showed her the tragedy of what had happened from an outside perspective. Ezmerelda realized that the whole thing was a horrible tragedy and wrongs had been committed on both sides. She, thus, set out to try to find Van Richten and try to make things right...though Eva never told her about the curse her mother had laid on Van Richten.

Van Richten and Ezmerelda must travel to the place the curse was first laid...a small clearing in the forests of Barovia where the ruins of Ezmerelda's caravan still lie. Both must verbally acknowledge the wrong that had been done and verbally forgive one another for it...then the remains of Ezmerelda's caravan must be burned.

THE DISGUISE:

Van Richten got the idea for “Rictavio” from his exposure to Ezmerelda and her occasional methods for blending in when going somewhere that didn't like Vistani. In short: "Sometimes the best disguise is being the most obvious thing in the room." As mentioned above, Ezmerelda has never encountered the Rictavio disguise and Van Richten isn't familiar with any of the disguises Ezmerelda is currently using.

It is a rather perfect disguise. Van Richten is known as a grim and serious individual, a dour old man who roves the world slaying monsters. “Rictavio” is a flamboyant fop who tells ludicrous stories, commits crimes against music, and is constantly trying to recruit people to his Circus of Wonders. He should be portrayed as extremely over the top and completely harmless. It should be very jarring to your players if he drops the act and reveals who he truly is.
Furthermore, Rictavio knows that even if someone suspects he's hiding something, they are extremely unlikely to guess the truth. If a player rolls well on Insight against him and figures out he's full of crap, that only tells them that he's lying about something...not what he is lying about. And his response is to just carry on and ignore accusations. Sure, the PCs may figure out that he's full of it (his stories are obvious fabrications) but he just carries right along, sticking to his guns even though the players know it’s a load of BS.

The players should have a hard time to get a serious read on Rictavio's personality. He strikes them as so straight forward--a carnie who is spinning tall tales for amusement. So they shouldn’t suspect that he's any more than what he appears to be.

A HARD MAN TO PIN DOWN:

Van Richten is a man with a plan for killing Strahd Von Zarovich, and it's a plan that plays well to his aged capabilities: "wait til Strahd takes a long nap, then stake him in his sleep." Of anyone in the valley, Van Richten knows how deadly Strahd is. He has fought elder vampires before and Strahd is the greatest of them all. He may very well believe that trying to fight him head on is pure folly, but he’s the one most capable of doing so.

It's important to note: Most of the "Destined Allies" the party can draw from Madame Eva’s Tarokka card reading have notes about how the PCs can get that individual to join them. Van Richten has no such notes. Instead, it says this...

Van Richten works alone. [...] Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure.

Van Richten is aware of Madame Eva but (unlike many others in the valley) he won't immediately cave to her prophecies, drop everything he has been working on, and throw his lot in with the PCs. Here are a few important things to keep in mind if the party is trying to recruit him...

• Van Richten is quite certain that if he drops his disguise, Strahd will find him and set out to kill him. (This is one of Strahd's Primary Goals as listed in Chapter 1)

• Van Richten's disguise is magically augmented. As long as the party can't get his hat off, they cannot prove that he’s not a carnie ringmaster

• Van Richten's disguise is only useful against Strahd as long as no one knows who he really is. The ring of mind shielding only works on him...it doesn't work on the PCs. He knows that if anyone else finds out, Strahd can charm them, read their mind or otherwise extract that information from them.

• Van Richten is fully aware of his curse. He will avoid physically joining up with the party for fear that he will get them all killed.

• Van Richten does not talk about his curse. He knows well the bravery of adventurers and that telling them about his curse tends to result in responses like "Oh, you don't need to worry about us, we're strong!" followed shortly by ":dying noises:." Rebuffing their advances without mentioning the curse is much more effective at getting them to stay away from him so his curse doesn't kill them.

• Even if Van Richten consents to offer them aid, it should be indirect as much as possible. He has his plan, he's set in his ways, and he’s not going to go gallivanting off with a bunch of young adventurers. And, he should stay in character as much as possible...blowing his cover will only bring Strahd down on him AND the PCs.

Ideally, even if the party can convince him to help...his help should primarily take the form of a surprisingly knowledgeable carnival ringmaster who is "certainly not going to go out and fight monsters with you. I'm a ringmaster, not an adventurer!"

He may lend the party his carnival wagon to travel around in (once he finds somewhere else to stash his saber-toothed tiger that has been trained to hunt Vistani, or he may lend them the tiger), give them helpful advice--possibly using ravens to stay in touch over long-distance if the PCs make friends with the Keepers of the Feather, and provide the sort of support that a Carnie could offer. But, it should take rather extreme circumstances for him to actually be honest with the PCs...and they may have to do something about his curse before he'll actually travel with them.

GETTING HIM TO JOIN UP:

Van Richten wants to stay under cover...so how does the party get him to change his mind?

Easy: Ruin his plan.

If Van Richten's cover is blown, his plan is a wash. The whole plan depends on his identity staying a secret until Strahd goes into hibernation. If Strahd identifies Van Richten before then, he will try to kill him and Van Richten is pretty sure he can't take Strahd in a straight-up fight. Thus...if Van Richten’s cover is blown, he is stuck with two bad choices: Either he tries to keep going it alone, possibly getting killed by Strahd, and fails his “final mission,” or he accepts the risk to the PCs and joins them to try to take Strahd down directly. A few example ways to blow his cover...

• Knock his hat off. A hat of disguise only works as long as it stays on your head, so if something happens that knocks his hat off; “Rictavio” is replaced by Van Richten.

• Let the Tyger Tyger event happen (chapter 5). When Rictavio flees to the Tower of Khazan, he's inside an antimagic field and cannot disguise himself.

• Even if Van Richten is distorting his voice, if the PCs have already befriended Ezmerelda, she may still recognize it...even if what she recognizes is the cadence his voice adopts when he's explaining something.

ABILITY LOADOUT:

Van Richten is a Cleric...and his listed prepared spells speaks more of a support caster than a monster hunter who has gone solo. But, because he's a Cleric, he can swap out his prepared spells at will to any other spells on the Cleric list. Here are a few notes on spells for him to use...

• Dawn creates sunlight. If he can lock a vampire down within the area of effect, they will be dust in short order.

• Dispel Evil and Good breaks a vampire's charm. However...things can't really leave Barovia, so the dismissal part of that spell won't be terribly effective here.

• Geas is useful when he needs to find something. For example, capture a werewolf then place a geas on it to lead them to the den.

• Lesser and Greater Restoration are enormously useful, as is remove curse.

• Guiding Bolt is a great weapon against Vampires. Shuts down their regeneration, and gives the next attack advantage.

• Hallow: If Van Richten can get his hands on the material components for this, he can create holy ground to help protect the PCs. Create a bubble of hallowed ground around the antimagic field that covers the Tower of Khazan....talk about a fortress. Sure, you'll have a bubble of non-hallowed ground where the antimagic field zone is...but the territory around the tower itself will be holy ground.

• Given his skill at predicting his foes...dropping sanctuary on a creature they are about to attack can completely trash their attempts.

• Spirit Guardians is another spell that is just....awesome.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Appearances==
===[[Box Sets]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[Ravenloft: Realm of Terror]]
**[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting (Box)]]
===[[Modules]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[The Nightmare Lands (Boxed Set)]] (referenced only)
**[[Chilling Tales]]
**[[Dungeon Magazine #55]]: [[The Sea Wolf]]
**[[Bleak House: The Death of Rudolph Van Richten]]
*[[5th Edition]]
**[[Curse of Strahd]]
**[[Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft]]

===[[Novels]]===

*[[Tales of Ravenloft]]: [[The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Article)

2022-01-29T21:17:53Z

Blade Runner Rock:

DR. RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN

Medium humanoid (human), Lawful Good

Armor Class: 17 (half plate of flowing sanctity)

Hit Points: 77 (14d8 +14)

Speed: 30 ft.

Strength: 9 (-1)

Dexterity: 13 (+1)

Constitution: 13 (+1)

Intelligence: 17 (+3)

Wisdom: 18 (+4)

Charisma: 16 (+3)

Saving Throws: Con +5, Wis +8, Cha +7

Skills: Arcana +7, Deception +7, Insight +12,
Investigation +7, Medicine +8, Perception +12,
Religion +6, Sleight of Hand +4

Condition Immunities: charmed

Senses: darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 22

Languages: Abyssal, Celestial, Common, Draconic, Dwarvish, Elvish, Gundarak, Infernal, Sylvan

Challenge: 9 (5,000 XP)

SPECIAL EQUIPMENT:

In addition to his +1 sword cane and light crossbow, Van Richten wears a hat of disguise, goggles of night, and a ring of mind shielding, and he carries a spell scroll of raise dead.

Half Plate of Flowing Sanctity +1 mithril half plate. Once a day, a flask of water placed in the belt of armor becomes holy water.

ACTIONS:

Spellcasting: Van Richter is a 9th level Cleric of Helm, 1st level Wizard. His spellcasting ability is Wisdom (save DC 15, +7 to hit with spell attacks). Van Richten has the following Cleric and Wizard spells prepared:

Cantrips (at will): light, mage hand, mending, minor illusion, prestidigitation, sacred flame, thaumaturgy, toll the dead

1st level (4 slots): alarm, bless, cure wounds, detect evil and good, feather fall, find familiar, healing word, identify, protection from evil and good, shield, sleep

2nd level (3 slots): augury, beacon of hope, lesser restoration, protection from poison, silence, spiritual weapon warding bond, zone of truth

3rd level (3 slots): glyph of warding, magic circle, mass healing word, revivify, speak with dead, spirit guardians

4th level (3 slots): death ward, freedom of movement

5th level (3 slots): dawn, greater restoration, mass cure wounds, raise dead

Skulker: Van Richten can hide when he is lightly obscured from the creature from which he is hiding. When he’s hidden from a creature and misses it with a ranged weapon attack, making the attack doesn’t reveal his position. Dim light doesn’t impose disadvantage on his Wisdom (Perception) checks relying on sight.

Undead Slayer: When Van Richten hits an undead with a weapon attack, the undead takes an extra 10 (3d6) damage of weapon’s type.

Cunning Action: Van Richten can use a bonus action to take the Dash, Disengage or Hide action.

Sneak Attack: When Van Richten surprises a target, has advantage on an attack roll, or an enemy is within 5 ft. of the target, Van Richten deals and extra 7 damage.

Assassin Proficiencies: Van Richten is proficient with Disguise and Poisoner’s Kits.

Assassinate: When Van Richten hits a surprised enemy, it’s automatically a critical hit. When he attacks an enemy that hasn’t yet had a turn, he gains advantage on the attack.

Channel Divinity: Turn Undead: Undead within 30 ft. of Van Richten must make a Wisdom saving throw. If the creature fails its saving throw, they are turned for 1 minute or until they take damage. A turned creature must spend its turns trying to move as far away from him as it can, and it can’t willingly move to a space within 30 ft. of him. It also can’t take reactions. For its action, it can use only the Dash action or try to escape from an effect that prevents it from moving. If there’s nowhere to move, the creature can use the Dodge action. Undead with CR 1 or less are automatically destroyed on a failed save.

Preserve Life: As an action, Van Richten can distribute 45 hit points. This feature can restore a creature to no more than half of its hit point maximum and has no effect on an undead or construct.

Multiattack: Van Richten makes two attacks with his sword cane or light crossbow.

Sword Cane: Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 6 (1d6 +2) bludgeon damage (wooden cane) or piercing damage (silvered sword).

Light Crossbow: Ranged Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, range 80/320 ft., one target. Hit: 7 (1d8 +2) piercing damage.

Healer: As an action, Van Richten can spend one use of a Healer’s Kit to tend to a creature and restore 1d6 +4 hit points to it, plus additional hit points equal to the creature’s maximum number of Hit Dice. The creature can’t regain hit points from this feat again until it finishes a short or long rest.

REACTIONS:

Final Ward: Van Richten has a permanent glyph of warding tattooed on his neck that activates when he’s bitten there and chooses to say “Erasmus, I’m coming home” in Celestial. All targets in a 20 ft. radius must make a Dexterity saving throw or take 5d8 +5 radiant damage on a failed save or half as much (rounded up) on a successful one. Van Richten automatically fails the save and is disintegrated along with all of the items on his person.

RICTAVIO:

Several months ago a colorfully dressed half-elf bard came to Barovia in a carnival wagon, with a pet monkey on his shoulder. He took over an abandoned tower on Lake Baratok before rolling into town of Vallaki several months later. Claiming to be a carnival ringmaster in search of new actors, he began regaling locals with tales of distant lands.

MONSTER HUNTER:

The half-elf ringmaster is, in fact, the legendary human monster hunter named Rudolph Van Richten. Van Richten’s tale is a sad one. A scholar and doctor from a land called Darkon, he married his childhood sweetheart, Ingrid and together they had a son, Erasmus. When he was fourteen, Erasmus was stolen away by Vistani and sold to a vampire named Baron Metus to be used as a companion. By the time Van Richten found his son, it was too late: the Baron had already transformed Erasmus into a vampire spawn. Erasmus begged his father to end his suffering, which Van Richten did by pounding a wooden stake through his son’s chest. Baron Metus avenged that death by killing Van Richten’s wife, and Van Richten has lived with the horror of his family’s destruction ever since. After destroying Baron Metus in turn, Van Richten sought revenge against the Vistani and took up a life of hunting evil monsters.

THE WAITING GAME:

Van Richten isn’t a young man anymore. He knows his road is coming to an end, but his work isn’t done. He has come to Barovia to kill Strahd Von Zarovich, the greatest vampire of them all. Van Richten has studied Strahd for years and knows he can’t hope to best the vampire in a straight-up confrontation: he must wait for the right moment to strike. He has good evidence to suggest that Strahd periodically hibernates in his coffin, sometimes for years, when all is quite in the realm. While he bides his time, Van Richten hides in plain sight with the aid of a hat of disguise, his thoughts protected by a ring of mind shielding. He is trying to learn more about the Keepers of the Feather—a society of wereravens that oppose Strahd—while trying not to expose the secret society to their mutual enemy. He thinks the wereravens might prove helpful when the time comes. Van Richten also wants to take out as many of Strahd’s spies as he can, starting with the Vistani.

MAN WITH A PLAN:

Van Richten doesn’t know that his former protégé, a good-aligned Vistani named Ezmerelda d’Avenir, has come to Barovia looking for him. He taught her many of his monster-hunting techniques, but she doesn’t know all of his tricks and disguises. So far, their paths haven’t crossed. In the event that Van Richten becomes aware of Ezmerelda’s presence, he does his utmost to protect her without putting his own plans in jeopardy. If he can manipulate a party of adventurers into keeping an eye on her, he will do so.

VAN RICHTEN WORKS ALONE:

A curse placed on him long ago by a Vistani seer brings doom to those he befriends (see ‘Role Playing Notes’ for details). Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure. Consequently, if he thinks he’s in danger of being unmasked, he retreats to the Tower of Khazan (chapter 11) or some other quiet corner of Strahd’s domain to plan further.

TRAITS:

Ideal. “Evil cannot go unchallenged.”

Bond. “To protect those I love, I must keep them distant and hidden from my enemies.”

Flaw. “I am cursed. Thus, I will never have peace.”

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

A CURSED MAN:

Van Richten suffers a curse bestowed on him by a Vistani:

Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws.

Its effect on him can best be summarized with this statement: "Van Richten Dies Last." This curse is both a boon and a bane to him. The curse is a large part of why he has lived so long--how he has accumulated so much experience and expertise. He is cursed to always see his friends and allies die--which means he has to live long enough to see it happen.

For a long time, he was unaware of the exact nature of the curse on him, but he is apparently aware of it now.

• Van Richten feels guilty. For decades he fought alongside others with monsters, completely unaware that he was a doombringer among them. Now that he knows, he is burdened by all the deaths he feels that his presence caused.

• Van Richten isolates himself. He doesn't let people get close to him for fear that his curse will take them out.

• If Van Richten is traveling with the party, he has excellent odds of surviving--if someone is going to die in the party, it'll be someone other than him.

• Van Richten's curse should have a tangible impact if he’s traveling with the party: he is a doombringer of the highest order. His mere presence among the party should invite tragedy and disaster.

The Tragedy of Ezmerelda and Van Richten. In the backstory that created Ezmerelda d’Avenir (Appendix D: Monsters and NPCs pages 230-231), there's a tragedy in there: Van Richten's curse could have been lifted years ago.

By Ravenloft Lore, the strongest of curses laid down by a Vistani can only be lifted by the Vistani who placed it, or a blood relative of that Vistani. Van Richten's curse was a Death Curse laid on him by Ezmerelda's mother. Only Ezmerelda has the ability to revoke the curse. But here's the problem...
Ezmerelda is Vistani...by nature; they are secretive about their abilities. Beyond that, Van Richten doesn't trust Vistani and likely commanded Ezmerelda to not use her Vistani abilities in his presence. As a result, Van Richten doesn't know how Vistani curses work--he doesn't know that they can be revoked by a blood relative of the one who laid it. He's a Cleric, he has undoubtedly tried remove curse on himself and it failed. As far as he knows, the curse is permanent.
Van Richten is also secretive and, as mentioned, doesn't trust the Vistani. He kept Ezmerelda at arm's length as best he could both because he couldn't trust her, but also to try to protect her from the curse...and even if he was aware of the curse when they traveled together, he never told her about it.

If either one of them had been less secretive, more open, his curse would have been revoked a long time ago.

If the players want to help Van Richten break the curse, here's the backstory:

The story of Ezmerelda and Van Richten's history was written in the Van Richten's Journal (Appendix F: Handouts pages 254-255). It involves him destroying Ezmerelda's caravan while she was very, very young. She survived the undead assault and later got picked up by another caravan of Vistani (it was actually the Zarovan tribe--Madam Eva's caravan). She originally wanted revenge on Van Richten, but time with Eva (and the presence of the most powerful Vistani of them all) showed her the tragedy of what had happened from an outside perspective. Ezmerelda realized that the whole thing was a horrible tragedy and wrongs had been committed on both sides. She, thus, set out to try to find Van Richten and try to make things right...though Eva never told her about the curse her mother had laid on Van Richten.

Van Richten and Ezmerelda must travel to the place the curse was first laid...a small clearing in the forests of Barovia where the ruins of Ezmerelda's caravan still lie. Both must verbally acknowledge the wrong that had been done and verbally forgive one another for it...then the remains of Ezmerelda's caravan must be burned.

THE DISGUISE:

Van Richten got the idea for “Rictavio” from his exposure to Ezmerelda and her occasional methods for blending in when going somewhere that didn't like Vistani. In short: "Sometimes the best disguise is being the most obvious thing in the room." As mentioned above, Ezmerelda has never encountered the Rictavio disguise and Van Richten isn't familiar with any of the disguises Ezmerelda is currently using.

It is a rather perfect disguise. Van Richten is known as a grim and serious individual, a dour old man who roves the world slaying monsters. “Rictavio” is a flamboyant fop who tells ludicrous stories, commits crimes against music, and is constantly trying to recruit people to his Circus of Wonders. He should be portrayed as extremely over the top and completely harmless. It should be very jarring to your players if he drops the act and reveals who he truly is.
Furthermore, Rictavio knows that even if someone suspects he's hiding something, they are extremely unlikely to guess the truth. If a player rolls well on Insight against him and figures out he's full of crap, that only tells them that he's lying about something...not what he is lying about. And his response is to just carry on and ignore accusations. Sure, the PCs may figure out that he's full of it (his stories are obvious fabrications) but he just carries right along, sticking to his guns even though the players know it’s a load of BS.

The players should have a hard time to get a serious read on Rictavio's personality. He strikes them as so straight forward--a carnie who is spinning tall tales for amusement. So they shouldn’t suspect that he's any more than what he appears to be.

A HARD MAN TO PIN DOWN:

Van Richten is a man with a plan for killing Strahd Von Zarovich, and it's a plan that plays well to his aged capabilities: "wait til Strahd takes a long nap, then stake him in his sleep." Of anyone in the valley, Van Richten knows how deadly Strahd is. He has fought elder vampires before and Strahd is the greatest of them all. He may very well believe that trying to fight him head on is pure folly, but he’s the one most capable of doing so.

It's important to note: Most of the "Destined Allies" the party can draw from Madame Eva’s Tarokka card reading have notes about how the PCs can get that individual to join them. Van Richten has no such notes. Instead, it says this...

Van Richten works alone. [...] Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure.

Van Richten is aware of Madame Eva but (unlike many others in the valley) he won't immediately cave to her prophecies, drop everything he has been working on, and throw his lot in with the PCs. Here are a few important things to keep in mind if the party is trying to recruit him...

• Van Richten is quite certain that if he drops his disguise, Strahd will find him and set out to kill him. (This is one of Strahd's Primary Goals as listed in Chapter 1)

• Van Richten's disguise is magically augmented. As long as the party can't get his hat off, they cannot prove that he’s not a carnie ringmaster

• Van Richten's disguise is only useful against Strahd as long as no one knows who he really is. The ring of mind shielding only works on him...it doesn't work on the PCs. He knows that if anyone else finds out, Strahd can charm them, read their mind or otherwise extract that information from them.

• Van Richten is fully aware of his curse. He will avoid physically joining up with the party for fear that he will get them all killed.

• Van Richten does not talk about his curse. He knows well the bravery of adventurers and that telling them about his curse tends to result in responses like "Oh, you don't need to worry about us, we're strong!" followed shortly by ":dying noises:." Rebuffing their advances without mentioning the curse is much more effective at getting them to stay away from him so his curse doesn't kill them.

• Even if Van Richten consents to offer them aid, it should be indirect as much as possible. He has his plan, he's set in his ways, and he’s not going to go gallivanting off with a bunch of young adventurers. And, he should stay in character as much as possible...blowing his cover will only bring Strahd down on him AND the PCs.

Ideally, even if the party can convince him to help...his help should primarily take the form of a surprisingly knowledgeable carnival ringmaster who is "certainly not going to go out and fight monsters with you. I'm a ringmaster, not an adventurer!"

He may lend the party his carnival wagon to travel around in (once he finds somewhere else to stash his saber-toothed tiger that has been trained to hunt Vistani, or he may lend them the tiger), give them helpful advice--possibly using ravens to stay in touch over long-distance if the PCs make friends with the Keepers of the Feather, and provide the sort of support that a Carnie could offer. But, it should take rather extreme circumstances for him to actually be honest with the PCs...and they may have to do something about his curse before he'll actually travel with them.

GETTING HIM TO JOIN UP:

Van Richten wants to stay under cover...so how does the party get him to change his mind?

Easy: Ruin his plan.

If Van Richten's cover is blown, his plan is a wash. The whole plan depends on his identity staying a secret until Strahd goes into hibernation. If Strahd identifies Van Richten before then, he will try to kill him and Van Richten is pretty sure he can't take Strahd in a straight-up fight. Thus...if Van Richten’s cover is blown, he is stuck with two bad choices: Either he tries to keep going it alone, possibly getting killed by Strahd, and fails his “final mission,” or he accepts the risk to the PCs and joins them to try to take Strahd down directly. A few example ways to blow his cover...

• Knock his hat off. A hat of disguise only works as long as it stays on your head, so if something happens that knocks his hat off; “Rictavio” is replaced by Van Richten.

• Let the Tyger Tyger event happen (chapter 5). When Rictavio flees to the Tower of Khazan, he's inside an antimagic field and cannot disguise himself.

• Even if Van Richten is distorting his voice, if the PCs have already befriended Ezmerelda, she may still recognize it...even if what she recognizes is the cadence his voice adopts when he's explaining something.

ABILITY LOADOUT:

Van Richten is a Cleric...and his listed prepared spells speaks more of a support caster than a monster hunter who has gone solo. But, because he's a Cleric, he can swap out his prepared spells at will to any other spells on the Cleric list. Here are a few notes on spells for him to use...

• Dawn creates sunlight. If he can lock a vampire down within the area of effect, they will be dust in short order.

• Dispel Evil and Good breaks a vampire's charm. However...things can't really leave Barovia, so the dismissal part of that spell won't be terribly effective here.

• Geas is useful when he needs to find something. For example, capture a werewolf then place a geas on it to lead them to the den.

• Lesser and Greater Restoration are enormously useful, as is remove curse.

• Guiding Bolt is a great weapon against Vampires. Shuts down their regeneration, and gives the next attack advantage.

• Hallow: If Van Richten can get his hands on the material components for this, he can create holy ground to help protect the PCs. Create a bubble of hallowed ground around the antimagic field that covers the Tower of Khazan....talk about a fortress. Sure, you'll have a bubble of non-hallowed ground where the antimagic field zone is...but the territory around the tower itself will be holy ground.

• Given his skill at predicting his foes...dropping sanctuary on a creature they are about to attack can completely trash their attempts.

• Spirit Guardians is another spell that is just....awesome.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Appearances==
===[[Box Sets]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[Ravenloft: Realm of Terror]]
**[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting (Box)]]
===[[Modules]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[The Nightmare Lands (Boxed Set)]] (referenced only)
**[[Chilling Tales]]
**[[Dungeon Magazine #55]]: [[The Sea Wolf]]
**[[Bleak House: The Death of Rudolph Van Richten]]
*[[5th Edition]]
**[[Curse of Strahd]]
**[[Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft]]

===[[Novels]]===

*[[Tales of Ravenloft]]: [[The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph Van Richten]]

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Article)

2022-01-29T21:16:52Z

Blade Runner Rock:

DR. RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN

Medium humanoid (human), Lawful Good

Armor Class: 17 (half plate of flowing sanctity)

Hit Points: 77 (14d8 +14)

Speed: 30 ft.

Strength: 9 (-1)

Dexterity: 13 (+1)

Constitution: 13 (+1)

Intelligence: 17 (+3)

Wisdom: 18 (+4)

Charisma: 16 (+3)

Saving Throws: Con +5, Wis +8, Cha +7

Skills: Arcana +7, Deception +7, Insight +12,
Investigation +7, Medicine +8, Perception +12,
Religion +6, Sleight of Hand +4

Condition Immunities: charmed

Senses: darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 22

Languages: Abyssal, Celestial, Common, Draconic, Dwarvish, Elvish, Gundarak, Infernal, Sylvan

Challenge: 9 (5,000 XP)

SPECIAL EQUIPMENT:

In addition to his +1 sword cane and light crossbow, Van Richten wears a hat of disguise, goggles of night, and a ring of mind shielding, and he carries a spell scroll of raise dead.

Half Plate of Flowing Sanctity +1 mithril half plate. Once a day, a flask of water placed in the belt of armor becomes holy water.

ACTIONS:

Spellcasting: Van Richter is a 9th level Cleric of Helm, 1st level Wizard. His spellcasting ability is Wisdom (save DC 15, +7 to hit with spell attacks). Van Richten has the following Cleric and Wizard spells prepared:

Cantrips (at will): light, mage hand, mending, minor illusion, prestidigitation, sacred flame, thaumaturgy, toll the dead

1st level (4 slots): alarm, bless, cure wounds, detect evil and good, feather fall, find familiar, healing word, identify, protection from evil and good, shield, sleep

2nd level (3 slots): augury, beacon of hope, lesser restoration, protection from poison, silence, spiritual weapon warding bond, zone of truth

3rd level (3 slots): glyph of warding, magic circle, mass healing word, revivify, speak with dead, spirit guardians

4th level (3 slots): death ward, freedom of movement

5th level (3 slots): dawn, greater restoration, mass cure wounds, raise dead

Skulker: Van Richten can hide when he is lightly obscured from the creature from which he is hiding. When he’s hidden from a creature and misses it with a ranged weapon attack, making the attack doesn’t reveal his position. Dim light doesn’t impose disadvantage on his Wisdom (Perception) checks relying on sight.

Undead Slayer: When Van Richten hits an undead with a weapon attack, the undead takes an extra 10 (3d6) damage of weapon’s type.

Cunning Action: Van Richten can use a bonus action to take the Dash, Disengage or Hide action.

Sneak Attack: When Van Richten surprises a target, has advantage on an attack roll, or an enemy is within 5 ft. of the target, Van Richten deals and extra 7 damage.

Assassin Proficiencies: Van Richten is proficient with Disguise and Poisoner’s Kits.

Assassinate: When Van Richten hits a surprised enemy, it’s automatically a critical hit. When he attacks an enemy that hasn’t yet had a turn, he gains advantage on the attack.

Channel Divinity: Turn Undead: Undead within 30 ft. of Van Richten must make a Wisdom saving throw. If the creature fails its saving throw, they are turned for 1 minute or until they take damage. A turned creature must spend its turns trying to move as far away from him as it can, and it can’t willingly move to a space within 30 ft. of him. It also can’t take reactions. For its action, it can use only the Dash action or try to escape from an effect that prevents it from moving. If there’s nowhere to move, the creature can use the Dodge action. Undead with CR 1 or less are automatically destroyed on a failed save.

Preserve Life: As an action, Van Richten can distribute 45 hit points. This feature can restore a creature to no more than half of its hit point maximum and has no effect on an undead or construct.

Multiattack: Van Richten makes two attacks with his sword cane or light crossbow.

Sword Cane: Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 6 (1d6 +2) bludgeon damage (wooden cane) or piercing damage (silvered sword).

Light Crossbow: Ranged Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, range 80/320 ft., one target. Hit: 7 (1d8 +2) piercing damage.

Healer: As an action, Van Richten can spend one use of a Healer’s Kit to tend to a creature and restore 1d6 +4 hit points to it, plus additional hit points equal to the creature’s maximum number of Hit Dice. The creature can’t regain hit points from this feat again until it finishes a short or long rest.

REACTIONS:

Final Ward: Van Richten has a permanent glyph of warding tattooed on his neck that activates when he’s bitten there and chooses to say “Erasmus, I’m coming home” in Celestial. All targets in a 20 ft. radius must make a Dexterity saving throw or take 5d8 +5 radiant damage on a failed save or half as much (rounded up) on a successful one. Van Richten automatically fails the save and is disintegrated along with all of the items on his person.

RICTAVIO:

Several months ago a colorfully dressed half-elf bard came to Barovia in a carnival wagon, with a pet monkey on his shoulder. He took over an abandoned tower on Lake Baratok before rolling into town of Vallaki several months later. Claiming to be a carnival ringmaster in search of new actors, he began regaling locals with tales of distant lands.

MONSTER HUNTER:

The half-elf ringmaster is, in fact, the legendary human monster hunter named Rudolph Van Richten. Van Richten’s tale is a sad one. A scholar and doctor from a land called Darkon, he married his childhood sweetheart, Ingrid and together they had a son, Erasmus. When he was fourteen, Erasmus was stolen away by Vistani and sold to a vampire named Baron Metus to be used as a companion. By the time Van Richten found his son, it was too late: the Baron had already transformed Erasmus into a vampire spawn. Erasmus begged his father to end his suffering, which Van Richten did by pounding a wooden stake through his son’s chest. Baron Metus avenged that death by killing Van Richten’s wife, and Van Richten has lived with the horror of his family’s destruction ever since. After destroying Baron Metus in turn, Van Richten sought revenge against the Vistani and took up a life of hunting evil monsters.

THE WAITING GAME:

Van Richten isn’t a young man anymore. He knows his road is coming to an end, but his work isn’t done. He has come to Barovia to kill Strahd Von Zarovich, the greatest vampire of them all. Van Richten has studied Strahd for years and knows he can’t hope to best the vampire in a straight-up confrontation: he must wait for the right moment to strike. He has good evidence to suggest that Strahd periodically hibernates in his coffin, sometimes for years, when all is quite in the realm. While he bides his time, Van Richten hides in plain sight with the aid of a hat of disguise, his thoughts protected by a ring of mind shielding. He is trying to learn more about the Keepers of the Feather—a society of wereravens that oppose Strahd—while trying not to expose the secret society to their mutual enemy. He thinks the wereravens might prove helpful when the time comes. Van Richten also wants to take out as many of Strahd’s spies as he can, starting with the Vistani.

MAN WITH A PLAN:

Van Richten doesn’t know that his former protégé, a good-aligned Vistani named Ezmerelda d’Avenir, has come to Barovia looking for him. He taught her many of his monster-hunting techniques, but she doesn’t know all of his tricks and disguises. So far, their paths haven’t crossed. In the event that Van Richten becomes aware of Ezmerelda’s presence, he does his utmost to protect her without putting his own plans in jeopardy. If he can manipulate a party of adventurers into keeping an eye on her, he will do so.

VAN RICHTEN WORKS ALONE:

A curse placed on him long ago by a Vistani seer brings doom to those he befriends (see ‘Role Playing Notes’ for details). Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure. Consequently, if he thinks he’s in danger of being unmasked, he retreats to the Tower of Khazan (chapter 11) or some other quiet corner of Strahd’s domain to plan further.

TRAITS:

Ideal. “Evil cannot go unchallenged.”

Bond. “To protect those I love, I must keep them distant and hidden from my enemies.”

Flaw. “I am cursed. Thus, I will never have peace.”

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

A CURSED MAN:

Van Richten suffers a curse bestowed on him by a Vistani:

Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws.

Its effect on him can best be summarized with this statement: "Van Richten Dies Last." This curse is both a boon and a bane to him. The curse is a large part of why he has lived so long--how he has accumulated so much experience and expertise. He is cursed to always see his friends and allies die--which means he has to live long enough to see it happen.

For a long time, he was unaware of the exact nature of the curse on him, but he is apparently aware of it now.

• Van Richten feels guilty. For decades he fought alongside others with monsters, completely unaware that he was a doombringer among them. Now that he knows, he is burdened by all the deaths he feels that his presence caused.

• Van Richten isolates himself. He doesn't let people get close to him for fear that his curse will take them out.

• If Van Richten is traveling with the party, he has excellent odds of surviving--if someone is going to die in the party, it'll be someone other than him.

• Van Richten's curse should have a tangible impact if he’s traveling with the party: he is a doombringer of the highest order. His mere presence among the party should invite tragedy and disaster.

The Tragedy of Ezmerelda and Van Richten. In the backstory that created Ezmerelda d’Avenir (Appendix D: Monsters and NPCs pages 230-231), there's a tragedy in there: Van Richten's curse could have been lifted years ago.

By Ravenloft Lore, the strongest of curses laid down by a Vistani can only be lifted by the Vistani who placed it, or a blood relative of that Vistani. Van Richten's curse was a Death Curse laid on him by Ezmerelda's mother. Only Ezmerelda has the ability to revoke the curse. But here's the problem...
Ezmerelda is Vistani...by nature; they are secretive about their abilities. Beyond that, Van Richten doesn't trust Vistani and likely commanded Ezmerelda to not use her Vistani abilities in his presence. As a result, Van Richten doesn't know how Vistani curses work--he doesn't know that they can be revoked by a blood relative of the one who laid it. He's a Cleric, he has undoubtedly tried remove curse on himself and it failed. As far as he knows, the curse is permanent.
Van Richten is also secretive and, as mentioned, doesn't trust the Vistani. He kept Ezmerelda at arm's length as best he could both because he couldn't trust her, but also to try to protect her from the curse...and even if he was aware of the curse when they traveled together, he never told her about it.

If either one of them had been less secretive, more open, his curse would have been revoked a long time ago.

If the players want to help Van Richten break the curse, here's the backstory:

The story of Ezmerelda and Van Richten's history was written in the Van Richten's Journal (Appendix F: Handouts pages 254-255). It involves him destroying Ezmerelda's caravan while she was very, very young. She survived the undead assault and later got picked up by another caravan of Vistani (it was actually the Zarovan tribe--Madam Eva's caravan). She originally wanted revenge on Van Richten, but time with Eva (and the presence of the most powerful Vistani of them all) showed her the tragedy of what had happened from an outside perspective. Ezmerelda realized that the whole thing was a horrible tragedy and wrongs had been committed on both sides. She, thus, set out to try to find Van Richten and try to make things right...though Eva never told her about the curse her mother had laid on Van Richten.

Van Richten and Ezmerelda must travel to the place the curse was first laid...a small clearing in the forests of Barovia where the ruins of Ezmerelda's caravan still lie. Both must verbally acknowledge the wrong that had been done and verbally forgive one another for it...then the remains of Ezmerelda's caravan must be burned.

THE DISGUISE:

Van Richten got the idea for “Rictavio” from his exposure to Ezmerelda and her occasional methods for blending in when going somewhere that didn't like Vistani. In short: "Sometimes the best disguise is being the most obvious thing in the room." As mentioned above, Ezmerelda has never encountered the Rictavio disguise and Van Richten isn't familiar with any of the disguises Ezmerelda is currently using.

It is a rather perfect disguise. Van Richten is known as a grim and serious individual, a dour old man who roves the world slaying monsters. “Rictavio” is a flamboyant fop who tells ludicrous stories, commits crimes against music, and is constantly trying to recruit people to his Circus of Wonders. He should be portrayed as extremely over the top and completely harmless. It should be very jarring to your players if he drops the act and reveals who he truly is.
Furthermore, Rictavio knows that even if someone suspects he's hiding something, they are extremely unlikely to guess the truth. If a player rolls well on Insight against him and figures out he's full of crap, that only tells them that he's lying about something...not what he is lying about. And his response is to just carry on and ignore accusations. Sure, the PCs may figure out that he's full of it (his stories are obvious fabrications) but he just carries right along, sticking to his guns even though the players know it’s a load of BS.

The players should have a hard time to get a serious read on Rictavio's personality. He strikes them as so straight forward--a carnie who is spinning tall tales for amusement. So they shouldn’t suspect that he's any more than what he appears to be.

A HARD MAN TO PIN DOWN:

Van Richten is a man with a plan for killing Strahd Von Zarovich, and it's a plan that plays well to his aged capabilities: "wait til Strahd takes a long nap, then stake him in his sleep." Of anyone in the valley, Van Richten knows how deadly Strahd is. He has fought elder vampires before and Strahd is the greatest of them all. He may very well believe that trying to fight him head on is pure folly, but he’s the one most capable of doing so.

It's important to note: Most of the "Destined Allies" the party can draw from Madame Eva’s Tarokka card reading have notes about how the PCs can get that individual to join them. Van Richten has no such notes. Instead, it says this...

Van Richten works alone. [...] Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure.

Van Richten is aware of Madame Eva but (unlike many others in the valley) he won't immediately cave to her prophecies, drop everything he has been working on, and throw his lot in with the PCs. Here are a few important things to keep in mind if the party is trying to recruit him...

• Van Richten is quite certain that if he drops his disguise, Strahd will find him and set out to kill him. (This is one of Strahd's Primary Goals as listed in Chapter 1)

• Van Richten's disguise is magically augmented. As long as the party can't get his hat off, they cannot prove that he’s not a carnie ringmaster

• Van Richten's disguise is only useful against Strahd as long as no one knows who he really is. The ring of mind shielding only works on him...it doesn't work on the PCs. He knows that if anyone else finds out, Strahd can charm them, read their mind or otherwise extract that information from them.

• Van Richten is fully aware of his curse. He will avoid physically joining up with the party for fear that he will get them all killed.

• Van Richten does not talk about his curse. He knows well the bravery of adventurers and that telling them about his curse tends to result in responses like "Oh, you don't need to worry about us, we're strong!" followed shortly by ":dying noises:." Rebuffing their advances without mentioning the curse is much more effective at getting them to stay away from him so his curse doesn't kill them.

• Even if Van Richten consents to offer them aid, it should be indirect as much as possible. He has his plan, he's set in his ways, and he’s not going to go gallivanting off with a bunch of young adventurers. And, he should stay in character as much as possible...blowing his cover will only bring Strahd down on him AND the PCs.

Ideally, even if the party can convince him to help...his help should primarily take the form of a surprisingly knowledgeable carnival ringmaster who is "certainly not going to go out and fight monsters with you. I'm a ringmaster, not an adventurer!"

He may lend the party his carnival wagon to travel around in (once he finds somewhere else to stash his saber-toothed tiger that has been trained to hunt Vistani, or he may lend them the tiger), give them helpful advice--possibly using ravens to stay in touch over long-distance if the PCs make friends with the Keepers of the Feather, and provide the sort of support that a Carnie could offer. But, it should take rather extreme circumstances for him to actually be honest with the PCs...and they may have to do something about his curse before he'll actually travel with them.

GETTING HIM TO JOIN UP:

Van Richten wants to stay under cover...so how does the party get him to change his mind?

Easy: Ruin his plan.

If Van Richten's cover is blown, his plan is a wash. The whole plan depends on his identity staying a secret until Strahd goes into hibernation. If Strahd identifies Van Richten before then, he will try to kill him and Van Richten is pretty sure he can't take Strahd in a straight-up fight. Thus...if Van Richten’s cover is blown, he is stuck with two bad choices: Either he tries to keep going it alone, possibly getting killed by Strahd, and fails his “final mission,” or he accepts the risk to the PCs and joins them to try to take Strahd down directly. A few example ways to blow his cover...

• Knock his hat off. A hat of disguise only works as long as it stays on your head, so if something happens that knocks his hat off; “Rictavio” is replaced by Van Richten.

• Let the Tyger Tyger event happen (chapter 5). When Rictavio flees to the Tower of Khazan, he's inside an antimagic field and cannot disguise himself.

• Even if Van Richten is distorting his voice, if the PCs have already befriended Ezmerelda, she may still recognize it...even if what she recognizes is the cadence his voice adopts when he's explaining something.

ABILITY LOADOUT:

Van Richten is a Cleric...and his listed prepared spells speaks more of a support caster than a monster hunter who has gone solo. But, because he's a Cleric, he can swap out his prepared spells at will to any other spells on the Cleric list. Here are a few notes on spells for him to use...

• Dawn creates sunlight. If he can lock a vampire down within the area of effect, they will be dust in short order.

• Dispel Evil and Good breaks a vampire's charm. However...things can't really leave Barovia, so the dismissal part of that spell won't be terribly effective here.

• Geas is useful when he needs to find something. For example, capture a werewolf then place a geas on it to lead them to the den.

• Lesser and Greater Restoration are enormously useful, as is remove curse.

• Guiding Bolt is a great weapon against Vampires. Shuts down their regeneration, and gives the next attack advantage.

• Hallow: If Van Richten can get his hands on the material components for this, he can create holy ground to help protect the PCs. Create a bubble of hallowed ground around the antimagic field that covers the Tower of Khazan....talk about a fortress. Sure, you'll have a bubble of non-hallowed ground where the antimagic field zone is...but the territory around the tower itself will be holy ground.

• Given his skill at predicting his foes...dropping sanctuary on a creature they are about to attack can completely trash their attempts.

• Spirit Guardians is another spell that is just....awesome.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Appearances==
===[[Box Sets]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[Ravenloft: Realms of Terror]]
**[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting (Box)]]
===[[Modules]]===
*[[2nd Edition]]
**[[The Nightmare Lands (Boxed Set)]] (referenced only)
**[[Chilling Tales]]
**[[Dungeon Magazine #55]]: [[The Sea Wolf]]
**[[Bleak House: The Death of Rudolph Van Richten]]
*[[5th Edition]]
**[[Curse of Strahd]]
**[[Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft]]

===[[Novels]]===

*[[Tales of Ravenloft]]: [[The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph Van Richten]]

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (5th Edition)

2022-01-29T18:49:49Z

Blade Runner Rock:

{{canon}}

NOTE: This entry is for the [[5th Edition]] version of Dr. Rudolph van Richten presented in [[Curse of Strahd]]. For the older edition character, see [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten (NPC)]].

Dr. van Richten makes a notable appearance in the [[5th Edition]] [[module]], [[Curse of Strahd]], though not in his [[famous]] persona as the monster hunter and [[writer]] of the [[Van Richten's Guide]]s he is notable for in previous Ravenloft products. Instead, he adopts the guise of [[Rictavio]], a traveling [[half-elf]] [[bard]], [[storyteller]], and [[ringmaster]] gathering stories and watching out for talent. In reality he is gathering formation and waiting for an optimal time to strike at [[Strahd]], preferably when the vampire lord is in [[hibernation]]. Unlike other versions of van Richten, the Curse of Strahd van Richten is a [[loner]] because he knows the full extent of his [[curse]].<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref>

==History==
Much of Dr. van Richten's early history before he came a monster hunter remains the same. One key difference is that he did not wholesale murder the [[Vistani]] that [[kidnapped]] his son [[Erasmus van Richten]]. In fact, one of them, [[Ezmerelda d'Avenir]] appeared to him one day and expressed her remorse, eventually becoming van Richten's student in monster hunting. However, their relationship frayed after a couple of years, and at, Ezmerelda's suggestion, they left each other's company amicably.<ref name="CoS p. 230-231">CoS p. 230-231</ref>

At some point in his adventuring career, a [[Vistani]] [[seer]] [[cursed]] van Richten, dooming his friends to die. ''Curse of Strahd'' is not specific to when in his adventuring career or why van Richten's curse was put upon him, though he is aware of it.<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> In contrast, in the traditional van Richten story, van Richten is [[cursed]] by [[Madame Radanavich]] early on in his career but does not realize how it has effected him until [[741 BC]] (the year before he retires). He thus operates as a [[loner]], to not cause the death of any friends or allies he would work with.<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref>

Eventually, Dr. van Richten set his sights upon the destruction of Strahd. By now having adopted the identity of Rictavio, van Richten eventually encountered [[Yan]], an [[exile]]d [[Vistani]]. Once Yan discovered van Richten's intentions to go to [[Barovia]] and seek out the Vistani there, Yan tried to make off with [[Rictavio's Wagon]] along with [[Piccolo]]. Van Richten caught him and [[killed]] the [[thief]], removed his head, and preserved it with special magic oils to be used with [[speak with dead]] later on.<ref>CoS p. 171</ref>

Rictavio came to [[Barovia]] in the guise of [[Rictavio]]<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> and set up shop at a then [[abandoned]] tower formerly belonging to the [[wizard]] [[Khazan]]. Dr. van Richten made [[Van Richten's Tower|Khazan's old tower]] his own for a time, before moving on to [[Vallaki]] and setting up shop there.<ref name="CoS p. 167">CoS p. 167</ref> In the meantime, Ezmerelda heard [[rumor]]s about her former mentor's travel to [[Barovia]] to take out Strahd, and she traveled to Barovia to find van Richten, eventually setting up shop in his old tower.<ref>CoS p. 231</ref>

About a month prior to the current point in the timeline of the module, "Rictavio" came to Vallaki. There he met and purchased a [[doll]] of a [[Vistani]] from [[Gadof Blinsky]]. Noting the toymaker's loneliness and despair, van Richten left his [[pet]] [[monkey]], [[Piccolo]] with Blinsky for company.<ref name="Curse of Strahd p. 118">CoS p. 118</ref> Dr. van Richten has stayed at the [[Blue Water Inn]] and received generous treatment from the charitable [[Urwin Martikov]].<ref>CoS p. 100</ref>. Dr. van Richten keeps his wagon (and [[Rictavio's saber-toothed tiger|his sabre-toothed tiger]]) inside the [[Arasek Stockyards]], bribing off its owners to prevent any details from leaking out.<ref name="CoS p. 115-116">CoS p. 115-116</ref>

==Modus Operandi==
As previously mentioned, Dr. van Richten is a [[loner]], posing in his [[Rictavio]] guise to gather information until the time is right to strike against Strahd. Van Richten drives [[Rictavio's Carnival wagon|a carnival wagon]]<ref>CoS p. 115-116</ref> pulled by a [[horse]]] named [[Drusilla (Horse)|Drusilla]].<ref>CoS p. 101-102</ref> Dr. van Richten uses [[Rictavio's saber-toothed tiger|his sabre-toothed tiger]] to hunt [[evil]] [[Vistani]], for which it is especially trained to do.<ref name="CoS p. 115-116">CoS p. 115-116</ref> Currently, van Richten is gathering information on both a)the [[Keepers of the Feather]] to learn their allegiances/membership and b)the [[evil]] [[Vistani]] of [[Arrigal's Clan]] at the [[Vistani camp near Vallaki]]. Van Richten plans on sending the tiger after the evil Vistani in the camp.

==Art==
p. 238

==Game Statistics==
Van Richten has his own [[NPC]] game statistics block.

DR. RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN

Medium humanoid (human), Lawful Good

Armor Class: 17 (half plate of flowing sanctity)

Hit Points: 77 (14d8 +14)

Speed: 30 ft.

Strength: 9 (-1)

Dexterity: 13 (+1)

Constitution: 13 (+1)

Intelligence: 17 (+3)

Wisdom: 18 (+4)

Charisma: 16 (+3)

Saving Throws: Con +5, Wis +8, Cha +7

Skills: Arcana +7, Deception +7, Insight +12,
Investigation +7, Medicine +8, Perception +12,
Religion +6, Sleight of Hand +4

Condition Immunities: charmed

Senses: darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 22

Languages: Abyssal, Celestial, Common, Draconic, Dwarvish, Elvish, Gundarak, Infernal, Sylvan

Challenge: 9 (5,000 XP)

SPECIAL EQUIPMENT:

In addition to his +1 sword cane and light crossbow, Van Richten wears a hat of disguise, goggles of night, and a ring of mind shielding, and he carries a spell scroll of raise dead.

Half Plate of Flowing Sanctity +1 mithril half plate. Once a day, a flask of water placed in the belt of armor becomes holy water.

ACTIONS:

Spellcasting: Van Richter is a 9th level Cleric of Helm, 1st level Wizard. His spellcasting ability is Wisdom (save DC 15, +7 to hit with spell attacks). Van Richten has the following Cleric and Wizard spells prepared:

Cantrips (at will): light, mage hand, mending, minor illusion, prestidigitation, sacred flame, thaumaturgy, toll the dead

1st level (4 slots): alarm, bless, cure wounds, detect evil and good, feather fall, find familiar, healing word, identify, protection from evil and good, shield, sleep

2nd level (3 slots): augury, beacon of hope, lesser restoration, protection from poison, silence, spiritual weapon warding bond, zone of truth

3rd level (3 slots): glyph of warding, magic circle, mass healing word, revivify, speak with dead, spirit guardians

4th level (3 slots): death ward, freedom of movement

5th level (3 slots): dawn, greater restoration, mass cure wounds, raise dead

Skulker: Van Richten can hide when he is lightly obscured from the creature from which he is hiding. When he’s hidden from a creature and misses it with a ranged weapon attack, making the attack doesn’t reveal his position. Dim light doesn’t impose disadvantage on his Wisdom (Perception) checks relying on sight.

Undead Slayer: When Van Richten hits an undead with a weapon attack, the undead takes an extra 10 (3d6) damage of weapon’s type.

Cunning Action: Van Richten can use a bonus action to take the Dash, Disengage or Hide action.

Sneak Attack: When Van Richten surprises a target, has advantage on an attack roll, or an enemy is within 5 ft. of the target, Van Richten deals and extra 7 damage.

Assassin Proficiencies: Van Richten is proficient with Disguise and Poisoner’s Kits.

Assassinate: When Van Richten hits a surprised enemy, it’s automatically a critical hit. When he attacks an enemy that hasn’t yet had a turn, he gains advantage on the attack.

Channel Divinity: Turn Undead: Undead within 30 ft. of Van Richten must make a Wisdom saving throw. If the creature fails its saving throw, they are turned for 1 minute or until they take damage. A turned creature must spend its turns trying to move as far away from him as it can, and it can’t willingly move to a space within 30 ft. of him. It also can’t take reactions. For its action, it can use only the Dash action or try to escape from an effect that prevents it from moving. If there’s nowhere to move, the creature can use the Dodge action. Undead with CR 1 or less are automatically destroyed on a failed save.

Preserve Life: As an action, Van Richten can distribute 45 hit points. This feature can restore a creature to no more than half of its hit point maximum and has no effect on an undead or construct.

Multiattack: Van Richten makes two attacks with his sword cane or light crossbow.

Sword Cane: Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 6 (1d6 +2) bludgeon damage (wooden cane) or piercing damage (silvered sword).

Light Crossbow: Ranged Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, range 80/320 ft., one target. Hit: 7 (1d8 +2) piercing damage.

Healer: As an action, Van Richten can spend one use of a Healer’s Kit to tend to a creature and restore 1d6 +4 hit points to it, plus additional hit points equal to the creature’s maximum number of Hit Dice. The creature can’t regain hit points from this feat again until it finishes a short or long rest.

REACTIONS:

Final Ward: Van Richten has a permanent glyph of warding tattooed on his neck that activates when he’s bitten there and chooses to say “Erasmus, I’m coming home” in Celestial. All targets in a 20 ft. radius must make a Dexterity saving throw or take 5d8 +5 radiant damage on a failed save or half as much (rounded up) on a successful one. Van Richten automatically fails the save and is disintegrated along with all of the items on his person.

RICTAVIO:

Several months ago a colorfully dressed half-elf bard came to Barovia in a carnival wagon, with a pet monkey on his shoulder. He took over an abandoned tower on Lake Baratok before rolling into town of Vallaki several months later. Claiming to be a carnival ringmaster in search of new actors, he began regaling locals with tales of distant lands.

MONSTER HUNTER:

The half-elf ringmaster is, in fact, the legendary human monster hunter named Rudolph Van Richten. Van Richten’s tale is a sad one. A scholar and doctor from a land called Darkon, he married his childhood sweetheart, Ingrid and together they had a son, Erasmus. When he was fourteen, Erasmus was stolen away by Vistani and sold to a vampire named Baron Metus to be used as a companion. By the time Van Richten found his son, it was too late: the Baron had already transformed Erasmus into a vampire spawn. Erasmus begged his father to end his suffering, which Van Richten did by pounding a wooden stake through his son’s chest. Baron Metus avenged that death by killing Van Richten’s wife, and Van Richten has lived with the horror of his family’s destruction ever since. After destroying Baron Metus in turn, Van Richten sought revenge against the Vistani and took up a life of hunting evil monsters.

THE WAITING GAME:

Van Richten isn’t a young man anymore. He knows his road is coming to an end, but his work isn’t done. He has come to Barovia to kill Strahd Von Zarovich, the greatest vampire of them all. Van Richten has studied Strahd for years and knows he can’t hope to best the vampire in a straight-up confrontation: he must wait for the right moment to strike. He has good evidence to suggest that Strahd periodically hibernates in his coffin, sometimes for years, when all is quite in the realm. While he bides his time, Van Richten hides in plain sight with the aid of a hat of disguise, his thoughts protected by a ring of mind shielding. He is trying to learn more about the Keepers of the Feather—a society of wereravens that oppose Strahd—while trying not to expose the secret society to their mutual enemy. He thinks the wereravens might prove helpful when the time comes. Van Richten also wants to take out as many of Strahd’s spies as he can, starting with the Vistani.

MAN WITH A PLAN:

Van Richten doesn’t know that his former protégé, a good-aligned Vistani named Ezmerelda d’Avenir, has come to Barovia looking for him. He taught her many of his monster-hunting techniques, but she doesn’t know all of his tricks and disguises. So far, their paths haven’t crossed. In the event that Van Richten becomes aware of Ezmerelda’s presence, he does his utmost to protect her without putting his own plans in jeopardy. If he can manipulate a party of adventurers into keeping an eye on her, he will do so.

VAN RICHTEN WORKS ALONE:

A curse placed on him long ago by a Vistani seer brings doom to those he befriends (see ‘Role Playing Notes’ for details). Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure. Consequently, if he thinks he’s in danger of being unmasked, he retreats to the Tower of Khazan (chapter 11) or some other quiet corner of Strahd’s domain to plan further.

TRAITS:

Ideal. “Evil cannot go unchallenged.”

Bond. “To protect those I love, I must keep them distant and hidden from my enemies.”

Flaw. “I am cursed. Thus, I will never have peace.”

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

A CURSED MAN:

Van Richten suffers a curse bestowed on him by a Vistani:

Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws.

Its effect on him can best be summarized with this statement: "Van Richten Dies Last." This curse is both a boon and a bane to him. The curse is a large part of why he has lived so long--how he has accumulated so much experience and expertise. He is cursed to always see his friends and allies die--which means he has to live long enough to see it happen.

For a long time, he was unaware of the exact nature of the curse on him, but he is apparently aware of it now.

• Van Richten feels guilty. For decades he fought alongside others with monsters, completely unaware that he was a doombringer among them. Now that he knows, he is burdened by all the deaths he feels that his presence caused.

• Van Richten isolates himself. He doesn't let people get close to him for fear that his curse will take them out.

• If Van Richten is traveling with the party, he has excellent odds of surviving--if someone is going to die in the party, it'll be someone other than him.

• Van Richten's curse should have a tangible impact if he’s traveling with the party: he is a doombringer of the highest order. His mere presence among the party should invite tragedy and disaster.

The Tragedy of Ezmerelda and Van Richten. In the backstory that created Ezmerelda d’Avenir (Appendix D: Monsters and NPCs pages 230-231), there's a tragedy in there: Van Richten's curse could have been lifted years ago.

By Ravenloft Lore, the strongest of curses laid down by a Vistani can only be lifted by the Vistani who placed it, or a blood relative of that Vistani. Van Richten's curse was a Death Curse laid on him by Ezmerelda's mother. Only Ezmerelda has the ability to revoke the curse. But here's the problem...
Ezmerelda is Vistani...by nature; they are secretive about their abilities. Beyond that, Van Richten doesn't trust Vistani and likely commanded Ezmerelda to not use her Vistani abilities in his presence. As a result, Van Richten doesn't know how Vistani curses work--he doesn't know that they can be revoked by a blood relative of the one who laid it. He's a Cleric, he has undoubtedly tried remove curse on himself and it failed. As far as he knows, the curse is permanent.
Van Richten is also secretive and, as mentioned, doesn't trust the Vistani. He kept Ezmerelda at arm's length as best he could both because he couldn't trust her, but also to try to protect her from the curse...and even if he was aware of the curse when they traveled together, he never told her about it.

If either one of them had been less secretive, more open, his curse would have been revoked a long time ago.

If the players want to help Van Richten break the curse, here's the backstory:

The story of Ezmerelda and Van Richten's history was written in the Van Richten's Journal (Appendix F: Handouts pages 254-255). It involves him destroying Ezmerelda's caravan while she was very, very young. She survived the undead assault and later got picked up by another caravan of Vistani (it was actually the Zarovan tribe--Madam Eva's caravan). She originally wanted revenge on Van Richten, but time with Eva (and the presence of the most powerful Vistani of them all) showed her the tragedy of what had happened from an outside perspective. Ezmerelda realized that the whole thing was a horrible tragedy and wrongs had been committed on both sides. She, thus, set out to try to find Van Richten and try to make things right...though Eva never told her about the curse her mother had laid on Van Richten.

Van Richten and Ezmerelda must travel to the place the curse was first laid...a small clearing in the forests of Barovia where the ruins of Ezmerelda's caravan still lie. Both must verbally acknowledge the wrong that had been done and verbally forgive one another for it...then the remains of Ezmerelda's caravan must be burned.

THE DISGUISE:

Van Richten got the idea for “Rictavio” from his exposure to Ezmerelda and her occasional methods for blending in when going somewhere that didn't like Vistani. In short: "Sometimes the best disguise is being the most obvious thing in the room." As mentioned above, Ezmerelda has never encountered the Rictavio disguise and Van Richten isn't familiar with any of the disguises Ezmerelda is currently using.

It is a rather perfect disguise. Van Richten is known as a grim and serious individual, a dour old man who roves the world slaying monsters. “Rictavio” is a flamboyant fop who tells ludicrous stories, commits crimes against music, and is constantly trying to recruit people to his Circus of Wonders. He should be portrayed as extremely over the top and completely harmless. It should be very jarring to your players if he drops the act and reveals who he truly is.
Furthermore, Rictavio knows that even if someone suspects he's hiding something, they are extremely unlikely to guess the truth. If a player rolls well on Insight against him and figures out he's full of crap, that only tells them that he's lying about something...not what he is lying about. And his response is to just carry on and ignore accusations. Sure, the PCs may figure out that he's full of it (his stories are obvious fabrications) but he just carries right along, sticking to his guns even though the players know it’s a load of BS.

The players should have a hard time to get a serious read on Rictavio's personality. He strikes them as so straight forward--a carnie who is spinning tall tales for amusement. So they shouldn’t suspect that he's any more than what he appears to be.

A HARD MAN TO PIN DOWN:

Van Richten is a man with a plan for killing Strahd Von Zarovich, and it's a plan that plays well to his aged capabilities: "wait til Strahd takes a long nap, then stake him in his sleep." Of anyone in the valley, Van Richten knows how deadly Strahd is. He has fought elder vampires before and Strahd is the greatest of them all. He may very well believe that trying to fight him head on is pure folly, but he’s the one most capable of doing so.

It's important to note: Most of the "Destined Allies" the party can draw from Madame Eva’s Tarokka card reading have notes about how the PCs can get that individual to join them. Van Richten has no such notes. Instead, it says this...

Van Richten works alone. [...] Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure.

Van Richten is aware of Madame Eva but (unlike many others in the valley) he won't immediately cave to her prophecies, drop everything he has been working on, and throw his lot in with the PCs. Here are a few important things to keep in mind if the party is trying to recruit him...

• Van Richten is quite certain that if he drops his disguise, Strahd will find him and set out to kill him. (This is one of Strahd's Primary Goals as listed in Chapter 1)

• Van Richten's disguise is magically augmented. As long as the party can't get his hat off, they cannot prove that he’s not a carnie ringmaster

• Van Richten's disguise is only useful against Strahd as long as no one knows who he really is. The ring of mind shielding only works on him...it doesn't work on the PCs. He knows that if anyone else finds out, Strahd can charm them, read their mind or otherwise extract that information from them.

• Van Richten is fully aware of his curse. He will avoid physically joining up with the party for fear that he will get them all killed.

• Van Richten does not talk about his curse. He knows well the bravery of adventurers and that telling them about his curse tends to result in responses like "Oh, you don't need to worry about us, we're strong!" followed shortly by ":dying noises:." Rebuffing their advances without mentioning the curse is much more effective at getting them to stay away from him so his curse doesn't kill them.

• Even if Van Richten consents to offer them aid, it should be indirect as much as possible. He has his plan, he's set in his ways, and he’s not going to go gallivanting off with a bunch of young adventurers. And, he should stay in character as much as possible...blowing his cover will only bring Strahd down on him AND the PCs.

Ideally, even if the party can convince him to help...his help should primarily take the form of a surprisingly knowledgeable carnival ringmaster who is "certainly not going to go out and fight monsters with you. I'm a ringmaster, not an adventurer!"

He may lend the party his carnival wagon to travel around in (once he finds somewhere else to stash his saber-toothed tiger that has been trained to hunt Vistani, or he may lend them the tiger), give them helpful advice--possibly using ravens to stay in touch over long-distance if the PCs make friends with the Keepers of the Feather, and provide the sort of support that a Carnie could offer. But, it should take rather extreme circumstances for him to actually be honest with the PCs...and they may have to do something about his curse before he'll actually travel with them.

GETTING HIM TO JOIN UP:

Van Richten wants to stay under cover...so how does the party get him to change his mind?

Easy: Ruin his plan.

If Van Richten's cover is blown, his plan is a wash. The whole plan depends on his identity staying a secret until Strahd goes into hibernation. If Strahd identifies Van Richten before then, he will try to kill him and Van Richten is pretty sure he can't take Strahd in a straight-up fight. Thus...if Van Richten’s cover is blown, he is stuck with two bad choices: Either he tries to keep going it alone, possibly getting killed by Strahd, and fails his “final mission,” or he accepts the risk to the PCs and joins them to try to take Strahd down directly. A few example ways to blow his cover...

• Knock his hat off. A hat of disguise only works as long as it stays on your head, so if something happens that knocks his hat off; “Rictavio” is replaced by Van Richten.

• Let the Tyger Tyger event happen (chapter 5). When Rictavio flees to the Tower of Khazan, he's inside an antimagic field and cannot disguise himself.

• Even if Van Richten is distorting his voice, if the PCs have already befriended Ezmerelda, she may still recognize it...even if what she recognizes is the cadence his voice adopts when he's explaining something.

ABILITY LOADOUT:

Van Richten is a Cleric...and his listed prepared spells speaks more of a support caster than a monster hunter who has gone solo. But, because he's a Cleric, he can swap out his prepared spells at will to any other spells on the Cleric list. Here are a few notes on spells for him to use...

• Dawn creates sunlight. If he can lock a vampire down within the area of effect, they will be dust in short order.

• Dispel Evil and Good breaks a vampire's charm. However...things can't really leave Barovia, so the dismissal part of that spell won't be terribly effective here.

• Geas is useful when he needs to find something. For example, capture a werewolf then place a geas on it to lead them to the den.

• Lesser and Greater Restoration are enormously useful, as is remove curse.

• Guiding Bolt is a great weapon against Vampires. Shuts down their regeneration, and gives the next attack advantage.

• Hallow: If Van Richten can get his hands on the material components for this, he can create holy ground to help protect the PCs. Create a bubble of hallowed ground around the antimagic field that covers the Tower of Khazan....talk about a fortress. Sure, you'll have a bubble of non-hallowed ground where the antimagic field zone is...but the territory around the tower itself will be holy ground.

• Given his skill at predicting his foes...dropping sanctuary on a creature they are about to attack can completely trash their attempts.

• Spirit Guardians is another spell that is just....awesome.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Appearances==
*[[Curse of Strahd]]
*[[Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft]]

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (NPC)

2022-01-29T16:54:17Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* In Curse of Strahd */

[[File:Original VR.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
[[File:Rudolph van richten.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten and [[Strahd]] by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
{{canon}}
'''Dr. Rudolph Van Richten''' is the greatest monster hunter that has ever lived and the most well-known hero of the Lands of the Mists.

==History==
He was born in [[Rivalis]] in [[Darkon]] in [[671 BC]]. He took [[medicine]] at the [[University of Il Aluk]], completing his four or five year program of study in [[693 BC]]. This humble man was spurred into a life of monster hunting when his son [[Erasmus van Richten]] was kidnapped by the [[Radanavich clan]] and sold to [[Baron Metus]]. Metus turned Erasmus into a [[vampire groom]] and Van Richten was forced to slay his son. In revenge, Metus killed Rudolph's wife, [[Ingrid van Richten]]. Van Richten eventually slew Metus, and then, with the help of [[Azalin]], the entire [[Radanavich tribe]].

Until his disappearance in [[750 BC]], he resided in [[Mordentshire]], where he ran an [[Van Richten's Herbalist Shop|herbalist shop]], as well as wrote several of his famous [[Van Richten's Guides]], and mentored [[The Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]], who regarded him as an uncle and took up his work.

==In [[Curse of Strahd]]==
Dr. van Richten makes a notable appearance in the [[5th Edition]] [[module]], [[Curse of Strahd]], though not in his [[famous]] persona as the monster hunter and [[writer]] of the [[Van Richten's Guides]] he is notable for in previous Ravenloft products. Instead, he adopts the guise of [[Rictavio]], a traveling [[half-elf]] [[bard]], [[storyteller]], and [[ringmaster]] gathering stories and watching out for talent. In reality he is gathering formation and waiting for an optimal time to strike at [[Strahd]], preferably when the vampire lord is in [[hibernation]]. Unlike other versions of van Richten, the Curse of Strahd van Richten is a [[loner]] because he knows the full extent of his [[curse]].<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> For more details, see [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Curse of Strahd)]]

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Authored:==
* ''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Demons]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Witches (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Witches]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]''

Credited for marketing purposes with:
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Mists (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Mists]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]]''

==[[Associate of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]==

==Chronology==

[[671 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten born<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, son of Otto and Mrs. Van Richten
 
{{Spec|[[678 BC]] - Rudolph’s sister [[Maria Van Richten]] born.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 18 "Speculation based on BH. We only know that she is younger than Rudolph."</ref>
 

[[679 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten sent to boarding school in [[Nartok]]. A childhood friend is [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]].<ref name="VRMHCII p.25-26">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 25-26</ref>

[[680 BC]] - [[Casimir (of Richten Haus)|Casimir]] (not to be confused with [[Casimir Lukas|Harkon Lukas’ son]]) starts working at Richten Haus as the gate keeper.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 6">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 6</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[683 BC]] - The servants of [[Richten Haus]] are all killed while the family is away one day. (summer)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.18: "Speculation based on [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] pg. 15, 24: I’m going on the hunch that VR grows younger until he reaches the age he was at when this event occurred"</ref>
 

[[685 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten meets [[Robert Tatenna]], a fellow student at boarding school. (fall)<ref name="CT p.14">[[Chilling Tales]] p.14</ref>

[[688 BC]] - The [[The Crimson Death Epidemic | Crimson Death]] spreads across Darkon (winter); it claims Van Richten’s great aunt Helga, despite his efforts; Rudolph is even more driven into his medical studies.<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[689 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten attends the [[University of Il Aluk]]. While there, he meets a fellow student, [[Dr. Harmon Ruscheider]]. (fall)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]] pg. 15"</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[691 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten marries his childhood sweetheart, [[Ingrid van Richten|Ingrid]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "[[Realm of Terror]]; [[VRGtV]]: Give VR a good respectable year between their marriage and birth of Erasmus in 692"</ref>
 

[[692 BC]] - Rudolph and Ingrid Van Richten's son [[Erasmus van Richten|Erasmus]] is born.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]] p. 4; [[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 8, "fourteen summers" before [[706 BC]]</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[693 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten finishes his studies; opens his practice back home in [[Rivalis]].}},<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VR’s age, RoT; VRGtV; and ToDm pg. 86, which indicates it takes 4-5 years to get a medical education at the University of Il Aluk"</ref> 
 
{{Spec|693 BC - Dr. Van Richten travels to [[Lamordia]], hears of the [[Loud Man of Lamordia]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VRGtG pg. 9: “When I was young.”</ref> 

[[696 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Antonin Madren]] and becomes his mentor.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 21: "VRGttC pg. 6: Van Richten takes Madren on as a medical student, which implies Van Richten has time to offer such an education (which lasts up to 8 years), i.e., while he was still a simple doctor (693-706)."</ref>

[[706 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten suffers the wrath of the [[Radanavich clan]]; the Vistani steal his son Erasmus; they sell Erasmus to [[Baron Metus]]<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, a vampire from [[Richemulot]]; with the help of an amused [[Azalin]], Van Richten wipes out all but one member of the Radanavich caravan<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]</ref>; [[Madame Radanavich]] [[curse | curses]] Van Richten<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, although he doesn’t realize it until the end of his career.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

[[706 BC]] Van Richten puts his Erasmus, now a vampire, out of his misery, but in spite [[Baron Metus]] tears [[Ingrid van Richten]] to pieces; Dr. Van Richten destroys Baron Metus, starting his career of hunting evil. Unable to live with the memories in [[Richten Haus]], Van Richten moves to [[Corvia]].<ref name="VRA p. 5">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 5</ref>

[[707 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten researches vampires, and meets [[Aimon Davidovitch]], a fellow scholar of the arcane.<ref> from [[JWM Timeline]] p.22: "[[VRGtF]] pg. 4: VR knew him for “some 30-odd years”]</ref>

[[710 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten encounters his first werebeast near [[Varithne]], a small village in northern [[Darkon]]. Dr. Van Richten starts hunting werebeasts as well<ref name="VRMHC p. 109-110">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 109-110</ref>

[[711 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Gedlan Ironheart]], a fearless [[dwarven]] [[innkeeper]] in [[Corvia]]. Gedlan becomes a frequent hunting companion.<ref name="Bleah House p. 11">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p.11</ref>

[[712 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets the mage [[Shauten]]; they bond when they are attacked by one of Azalin's patrols. Shauten opens Van Richten's eyes to the existence of the [[Lich]].<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref>

[[713 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten is visited by the dying Dr. Ruscheider, who tells Rudolph all he can about several months spent as a lich's captive; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting liches.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p.111-112</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[714 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten receives a visit from his childhood friend, [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]], who is now a ghostly slave to Azalin; Dr. Van Richten learns the terrible truth about [[Azalin Rex]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on [[VRGtG]] pg. 22, [[VRMHCII]] pg. 24</ref>
 

{{Spec|714 BC - Dr. Van Richten moves to [[Mordentshire]], sensing it is politically unsafe for him to remain in [[Darkon]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on VRGttL pg. 22</ref>
 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[716 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 3 n1">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade after her death, but [[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[718 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and [[Shauten]] battle a creature they believe to be a priestly [[lich]]; it is actually Van Richten's first [[ancient dead]]}}.<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] "Speculation based on VRGAD pg. 5: “Some years ago,” and other markers. It happened after VR started hunting liches, but before he started hunting ghosts. (The latter conclusion taken from numerous references to Claudia in this Guide"</ref>
 
[[724 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten battles the [[Bog Monster of Hroth]], and meets [[Jameld of Hroth|Jameld]]. This is also Van Richten's first visit to both [[Kartakass]] and [[Sithicus]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p.153</ref> 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[726 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decade n1">[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades after her death but[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade</ref> 

{{Spec|726 BC - Dr. Van Richten visits [[Sanguinia]] with [[George Weathermay]] and [[Arametrius]]; they meet [[Claudia DeShanes]]; Claudia becomes Rudolph’s assistant, and it seems he had certain unspoken feelings for her.}}<ref>Speculation from JWM Timeline p.28: "Since Arametrius is probably [[Athasian]], Van Richten may have recently visited [[Kalidnay]] and encountered [[Ahmose Tanit]]. [VRGtG pg. 73. This is the earliest possible date for this event (due to George’s inclusion, and we know from this source and BH that VR starts hunting ghosts one year after this event. That leaves only 9 years between VR starting to hunt and writing his Guide on the subject. I chose to go with this date to keep as wide a margin of opportunity as possible.]"</ref>
 

[[727 BC]] - [[Merilee Markuza]], the Child [[Vampire]], kills Claudia. Van Richten pursues the creature relentlessly, but loses her in [[Lamordia]].<ref name="Darklords p. 63">[[Darklords]] p. 63</ref>

727 BC - While hunting the Child Vampire, Van Richten witnesses the [[Thundering Carriage]]; Van Richten decides he must put an end to these ghostly horrors, too.<ref name="Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts p. 6">[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 6</ref>

[[728 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten defeats the [[Phantom Army]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 91</ref>

[[729 BC]] - The fiend [[Elsepeth]] enters Ravenloft via [[transposition]] in a small village outside [[Stangengrad]], near the [[Grashen Falls]] (sept)<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.28: "[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] pg. 14: the diary is dated “twelve years ago.”</ref>

[[730 BC]] - {{Spec|[[Gedlan Ironheart]] killed while battling evil spirits.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: "VRGtG pg. 23: Gedlan is referred to as “Geddar” in this book. The date is an estimate based on the 727-736 available time span."</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] leaves [[Borca]], having lurked there for years.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] p. 66</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] writes to Van Richten about the death of Madren’s sister.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[734 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] shows up on Van Richten's doorstep, and gives the good doctor his notes; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting the [[Created]].}}<ref>JWM Timeline p. 30: "VRGttC pg. 6: Estimate. “Years” after Madren wrote about his sister’s death"</ref> 

[[735 BC] - Dr. Van Richten is forced to kill his old friend [[Shauten]] in self-defense, when Shauten tries to sacrifice Rudolph in a bid for [[lichdom]]<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref><ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>. {{Spec|This "near-miss" may have inspired Van Richten to start recording his collected knowledge for heroes to come.}}<ref>JWM Timeline: "Speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6"</ref>

735 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''.<ref name="RLCS p.18">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.18</ref><ref name="RLPHB p.20">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.20</ref>

[[736 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''.

[[737 BC]] - The [[Vistana]] [[Cyrilla]]'s niece [[Vassa]] is [[kidnapped]] near [[Corvia]].<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 20: The golem appeared “the following year” after Vaasa’s soul is taken."</ref>

737 BC - [[Vassa]] returns as a [[clay golem]]; Cyrilla writes to Dr. Van Richten.<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 19 "just last year"</ref>

737 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''.

[[738 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''.

[[738 BC]] [[Emil Bollenbach]] engineers the [[kidnapping]] of Dr. Rudolph van Richten to the end of seizing his [[brain]] for [[transplantation]] into a super-golem. fortunately, several of Van Richten's friends intercede to thwart Dr. Bollenbach.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 33: "[[Children of the Night: The Created]] pg. 50; CT pg. 32 places this adventure 8 years after Emil’s disappearance (i.e., 746), but the dating used in CotN:C fits VR’s chronology better.</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] goes to [[Nartok]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 67-68">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.67-68</ref>

[[739 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and the adventuring band known as [[the Hand (Adventurer Band)|the Hand]] hunt and destroy [[the Gibbering Golem]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 265-276">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.265-276</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]] publishes ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''. This act earns him considerable ire from [[Agatha Clairmont]], whom sees it as an instruction manual to building [[dread golem]]s just much as it is hunting them.<ref name="Van Richten's Arsenal p. 149">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p. 149</ref>

[[740 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]'' (early spring).

740 BC - Dr. Van Richten inherits the [[library (Aimon Davidovitch)]] of [[Aimon Davidovitch]]. Dr. Van Richten starts studying tomes. (Sept)<ref>JWM Timeline p. 35 "Extrapolated from VRGtF pg. 4"</ref>

[[741 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]], [[Davvyd]], [[Samuel]] and [[Dr. Ottelie Farringer]] battle the fiend [[Drigor]]. Only Dr. van Richten survives. (Feb.)<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 79-85">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p. 79-85</ref>

741 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]]''.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Book)]] p.4</ref>

741 BC - [[Van Richten]] stumbles into the clutches of [[the nameless Amnizu]] and [[the nameless Barbazu]] infesting [[Chateaufaux]]. He is captured. However, he manages to join with some [[adventurer]]s to route the [[devil]]s from the town.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.72-73; Note that the encounter with these [[fiend]]s doesn't appear in the original uncompiled Van Richten's Guide to Fiends. Therefore, the encounter with the [[Fiends of Chateaufaux]] took place after took place after the first VRGtF was published.</ref><ref>[[Gazetteer III]] p.30-31, "just over 15 years ago"</ref>

741 BC<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> - Dr. Van Richten is [[depressed]]; he consults with the [[diviner]], [[Inarin Alster]]; Rudolph realizes he had been laboring under a [[curse]] all these years; Dr. Van Richten spends a year with [[Arturi Radanavich]] studying the Vistani.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]] p.5-7; 87-89</ref>

[[742 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten writes his ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]'' and retires.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> (Oct.)

[[750 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten dies in [[Richten Haus|Bleak House]] in the fight against [[Madame Radanavich]]<ref>[[Domains of Dread]] p. 17, as told in [[Bleak House]], particularly [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 58-63</ref> Meanwhile, all that is known to most, including the [[Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]] is that he [[disappeared]].<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

{{ref}}

[[category:Character]] [[category:NPC]]
[[category:2nd Edition Character]]
[[category:3rd Edition Character]]
[[category:4th Edition Character]]
[[category:5th Edition Character]]
[[category:Abused]]
[[category:Betrayed]]
[[Category:Cursed]]
[[category:Cursed by the Vistani]]
[[Category:Darkonian]]
[[Category:Demonologist]]
[[category:Energy Drained]]
[[Category:Filicide]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Rivalis]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Nartok]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Forest of Shadows]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Darkon]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordentshire]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordent]]
[[Category:Former Patients of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Dominia]]
[[Category:Former Medical Student]]
[[Category:Former Student of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[category:Gaslighted]]
[[category:Giogoto]]
[[Category:Ghost]]
[[Category:Graduate of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Graduate]]
[[Category:Herbalist]]
[[Category:Human]]
[[category:healer]]
[[category:Hero]]
[[Category:Hunter Of Monsters]]
[[Category:Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[category:Intellectual]]
[[Category:Kidnapped]]
[[category:Killer]]
[[category:Lorist]]
[[Category:Male]]
[[category:Mass Murderer]]
[[category:Medical Doctor]]
[[category:Medical Professional]]
[[category:Mentor]]
[[category:Murderer]]
[[Category:Necrologist]]
[[category:Old]]
[[Category:Planar Mechanic]]
[[category:Polymath]]
[[category:Posthumous Character]]
[[category:Potential Darklord]]
[[Category:Proprietor]]
[[category:Professional Killer]]
[[category:Punished]]
[[category:Ravenloft Lorist]]
[[Category:Ravenloft Loremaster]]
[[category:Redeemed]]
[[category:Reformed]]
[[category:Repentant]]
[[category:Researcher]]
[[category:Retired]]
[[Category:Rogue]]
[[category:Sage]]
[[category:Seduced]]
[[Category:Stasis]]
[[category:Tempted]]
[[category:Transgressed]]
[[category:Transgressor]]
[[Category:Van Richten Family]]
[[category:Victim of Medical Malpractice]]
[[Category:Victim of the van Richten Curse]]
[[category:Victimized]]
[[Category:Widowed]]
[[Category:writer]]
[[category:Births in 671 BC]]
[[category:Deaths in 750 BC]]
<references/>

==Data from the Ravenloft Catalogue==



{|
|-valign="top"
|[[Image:rldb_npc.jpg]]
|[[Image:rldb_primary.gif]]
|
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' 
''[[Bleak House]]''
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_art.gif]]
|
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - p4 
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - cover, p4 
''[[Bleak House:Homecoming]]'' - p4,p16 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - p7,8 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p92 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - p114 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 5,11 
''[[The Created]]'' - p13 
''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]'' - p5
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_stats.gif]]
|
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - pp4-5 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p91 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 3
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_desc.gif]]
|
''[[Ravenloft Third Edition]]'' - pp14,17-18,27,176 
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - throughout 
''[[Bleak House]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to The Created]]'' - throughout 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]'' - throughout 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - pp91-93 
''[[Tales of Ravenloft: The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]'' - pp1-17 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - pp 2-3 
''[[Heroes of Light]]'' - p64 
''[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]]'' - pp1-4, pp9-13, pp304-310
|-valign="top"
|}

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (5th Edition)

2022-01-29T16:50:22Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* Game Statistics */

{{canon}}

NOTE: This entry is for the [[5th Edition]] version of Dr. Rudolph van Richten presented in [[Curse of Strahd]]. For the older edition character, see [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten (NPC)]].

Dr. van Richten makes a notable appearance in the [[5th Edition]] [[module]], [[Curse of Strahd]], though not in his [[famous]] persona as the monster hunter and [[writer]] of the [[Van Richten's Guide]]s he is notable for in previous Ravenloft products. Instead, he adopts the guise of [[Rictavio]], a traveling [[half-elf]] [[bard]], [[storyteller]], and [[ringmaster]] gathering stories and watching out for talent. In reality he is gathering formation and waiting for an optimal time to strike at [[Strahd]], preferably when the vampire lord is in [[hibernation]]. Unlike other versions of van Richten, the Curse of Strahd van Richten is a [[loner]] because he knows the full extent of his [[curse]].<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref>

==History==
Much of Dr. van Richten's early history before he came a monster hunter remains the same. One key difference is that he did not wholesale murder the [[Vistani]] that [[kidnapped]] his son [[Erasmus van Richten]]. In fact, one of them, [[Ezmerelda d'Avenir]] appeared to him one day and expressed her remorse, eventually becoming van Richten's student in monster hunting. However, their relationship frayed after a couple of years, and at, Ezmerelda's suggestion, they left each other's company amicably.<ref name="CoS p. 230-231">CoS p. 230-231</ref>

At some point in his adventuring career, a [[Vistani]] [[seer]] [[cursed]] van Richten, dooming his friends to die. ''Curse of Strahd'' is not specific to when in his adventuring career or why van Richten's curse was put upon him, though he is aware of it.<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> In contrast, in the traditional van Richten story, van Richten is [[cursed]] by [[Madame Radanavich]] early on in his career but does not realize how it has effected him until [[741 BC]] (the year before he retires). He thus operates as a [[loner]], to not cause the death of any friends or allies he would work with.<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref>

Eventually, Dr. van Richten set his sights upon the destruction of Strahd. By now having adopted the identity of Rictavio, van Richten eventually encountered [[Yan]], an [[exile]]d [[Vistani]]. Once Yan discovered van Richten's intentions to go to [[Barovia]] and seek out the Vistani there, Yan tried to make off with [[Rictavio's Wagon]] along with [[Piccolo]]. Van Richten caught him and [[killed]] the [[thief]], removed his head, and preserved it with special magic oils to be used with [[speak with dead]] later on.<ref>CoS p. 171</ref>

Rictavio came to [[Barovia]] in the guise of [[Rictavio]]<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> and set up shop at a then [[abandoned]] tower formerly belonging to the [[wizard]] [[Khazan]]. Dr. van Richten made [[Van Richten's Tower|Khazan's old tower]] his own for a time, before moving on to [[Vallaki]] and setting up shop there.<ref name="CoS p. 167">CoS p. 167</ref> In the meantime, Ezmerelda heard [[rumor]]s about her former mentor's travel to [[Barovia]] to take out Strahd, and she traveled to Barovia to find van Richten, eventually setting up shop in his old tower.<ref>CoS p. 231</ref>

About a month prior to the current point in the timeline of the module, "Rictavio" came to Vallaki. There he met and purchased a [[doll]] of a [[Vistani]] from [[Gadof Blinsky]]. Noting the toymaker's loneliness and despair, van Richten left his [[pet]] [[monkey]], [[Piccolo]] with Blinsky for company.<ref name="Curse of Strahd p. 118">CoS p. 118</ref> Dr. van Richten has stayed at the [[Blue Water Inn]] and received generous treatment from the charitable [[Urwin Martikov]].<ref>CoS p. 100</ref>. Dr. van Richten keeps his wagon (and [[Rictavio's saber-toothed tiger|his sabre-toothed tiger]]) inside the [[Arasek Stockyards]], bribing off its owners to prevent any details from leaking out.<ref name="CoS p. 115-116">CoS p. 115-116</ref>

==Modus Operandi==
As previously mentioned, Dr. van Richten is a [[loner]], posing in his [[Rictavio]] guise to gather information until the time is right to strike against Strahd. Van Richten drives [[Rictavio's Carnival wagon|a carnival wagon]]<ref>CoS p. 115-116</ref> pulled by a [[horse]]] named [[Drusilla (Horse)|Drusilla]].<ref>CoS p. 101-102</ref> Dr. van Richten uses [[Rictavio's saber-toothed tiger|his sabre-toothed tiger]] to hunt [[evil]] [[Vistani]], for which it is especially trained to do.<ref name="CoS p. 115-116">CoS p. 115-116</ref> Currently, van Richten is gathering information on both a)the [[Keepers of the Feather]] to learn their allegiances/membership and b)the [[evil]] [[Vistani]] of [[Arrigal's Clan]] at the [[Vistani camp near Vallaki]]. Van Richten plans on sending the tiger after the evil Vistani in the camp.

==Art==
p. 238

==Game Statistics==
Van Richten has his own [[NPC]] game statistics block.

DR. RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN

Medium humanoid (human), Lawful Good

Armor Class: 17 (half plate of flowing sanctity)

Hit Points: 77 (14d8 +14)

Speed: 30 ft.

Strength: 9 (-1)

Dexterity: 13 (+1)

Constitution: 13 (+1)

Intelligence: 17 (+3)

Wisdom: 18 (+4)

Charisma: 16 (+3)

Saving Throws: Con +5, Wis +8, Cha +7

Skills: Arcana +7, Deception +7, Insight +12,
Investigation +7, Medicine +8, Perception +12,
Religion +6, Sleight of Hand +4

Condition Immunities: charmed

Senses: darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 22

Languages: Abyssal, Celestial, Common, Draconic, Dwarvish, Elvish, Gundarak, Infernal, Sylvan

Challenge: 9 (5,000 XP)

SPECIAL EQUIPMENT:

In addition to his +1 sword cane and light crossbow, Van Richten wears a hat of disguise, goggles of night, and a ring of mind shielding, and he carries a spell scroll of raise dead.

Half Plate of Flowing Sanctity +1 mithril half plate. Once a day, a flask of water placed in the belt of armor becomes holy water.

ACTIONS:

Spellcasting: Van Richter is a 9th level Cleric of Helm, 1st level Wizard. His spellcasting ability is Wisdom (save DC 15, +7 to hit with spell attacks). Van Richten has the following Cleric and Wizard spells prepared:

Cantrips (at will): light, mage hand, mending, minor illusion, prestidigitation, sacred flame, thaumaturgy, toll the dead

1st level (4 slots): alarm, bless, cure wounds, detect evil and good, feather fall, find familiar, healing word, identify, protection from evil and good, shield, sleep

2nd level (3 slots): augury, beacon of hope, lesser restoration, protection from poison, silence, spiritual weapon warding bond, zone of truth

3rd level (3 slots): glyph of warding, magic circle, mass healing word, revivify, speak with dead, spirit guardians

4th level (3 slots): death ward, freedom of movement

5th level (3 slots): dawn, greater restoration, mass cure wounds, raise dead

Skulker: Van Richten can hide when he is lightly obscured from the creature from which he is hiding. When he’s hidden from a creature and misses it with a ranged weapon attack, making the attack doesn’t reveal his position. Dim light doesn’t impose disadvantage on his Wisdom (Perception) checks relying on sight.

Undead Slayer: When Van Richten hits an undead with a weapon attack, the undead takes an extra 10 (3d6) damage of weapon’s type.

Cunning Action: Van Richten can use a bonus action to take the Dash, Disengage or Hide action.

Sneak Attack: When Van Richten surprises a target, has advantage on an attack roll, or an enemy is within 5 ft. of the target, Van Richten deals and extra 7 damage.

Assassin Proficiencies: Van Richten is proficient with Disguise and Poisoner’s Kits.

Assassinate: When Van Richten hits a surprised enemy, it’s automatically a critical hit. When he attacks an enemy that hasn’t yet had a turn, he gains advantage on the attack.

Channel Divinity: Turn Undead: Undead within 30 ft. of Van Richten must make a Wisdom saving throw. If the creature fails its saving throw, they are turned for 1 minute or until they take damage. A turned creature must spend its turns trying to move as far away from him as it can, and it can’t willingly move to a space within 30 ft. of him. It also can’t take reactions. For its action, it can use only the Dash action or try to escape from an effect that prevents it from moving. If there’s nowhere to move, the creature can use the Dodge action. Undead with CR 1 or less are automatically destroyed on a failed save.

Preserve Life: As an action, Van Richten can distribute 45 hit points. This feature can restore a creature to no more than half of its hit point maximum and has no effect on an undead or construct.

Multiattack: Van Richten makes two attacks with his sword cane or light crossbow.

Sword Cane: Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 6 (1d6 +2) bludgeon damage (wooden cane) or piercing damage (silvered sword).

Light Crossbow: Ranged Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, range 80/320 ft., one target. Hit: 7 (1d8 +2) piercing damage.

Healer: As an action, Van Richten can spend one use of a Healer’s Kit to tend to a creature and restore 1d6 +4 hit points to it, plus additional hit points equal to the creature’s maximum number of Hit Dice. The creature can’t regain hit points from this feat again until it finishes a short or long rest.

REACTIONS:

Final Ward: Van Richten has a permanent glyph of warding tattooed on his neck that activates when he’s bitten there and chooses to say “Erasmus, I’m coming home” in Celestial. All targets in a 20 ft. radius must make a Dexterity saving throw or take 5d8 +5 radiant damage on a failed save or half as much (rounded up) on a successful one. Van Richten automatically fails the save and is disintegrated along with all of the items on his person.

RICTAVIO:

Several months ago a colorfully dressed half-elf bard came to Barovia in a carnival wagon, with a pet monkey on his shoulder. He took over an abandoned tower on Lake Baratok before rolling into town of Vallaki several months later. Claiming to be a carnival ringmaster in search of new actors, he began regaling locals with tales of distant lands.

MONSTER HUNTER:

The half-elf ringmaster is, in fact, the legendary human monster hunter named Rudolph Van Richten. Van Richten’s tale is a sad one. A scholar and doctor from a land called Darkon, he married his childhood sweetheart, Ingrid and together they had a son, Erasmus. When he was fourteen, Erasmus was stolen away by Vistani and sold to a vampire named Baron Metus to be used as a companion. By the time Van Richten found his son, it was too late: the Baron had already transformed Erasmus into a vampire spawn. Erasmus begged his father to end his suffering, which Van Richten did by pounding a wooden stake through his son’s chest. Baron Metus avenged that death by killing Van Richten’s wife, and Van Richten has lived with the horror of his family’s destruction ever since. After destroying Baron Metus in turn, Van Richten sought revenge against the Vistani and took up a life of hunting evil monsters.

THE WAITING GAME:

Van Richten isn’t a young man anymore. He knows his road is coming to an end, but his work isn’t done. He has come to Barovia to kill Strahd Von Zarovich, the greatest vampire of them all. Van Richten has studied Strahd for years and knows he can’t hope to best the vampire in a straight-up confrontation: he must wait for the right moment to strike. He has good evidence to suggest that Strahd periodically hibernates in his coffin, sometimes for years, when all is quite in the realm. While he bides his time, Van Richten hides in plain sight with the aid of a hat of disguise, his thoughts protected by a ring of mind shielding. He is trying to learn more about the Keepers of the Feather—a society of wereravens that oppose Strahd—while trying not to expose the secret society to their mutual enemy. He thinks the wereravens might prove helpful when the time comes. Van Richten also wants to take out as many of Strahd’s spies as he can, starting with the Vistani.

MAN WITH A PLAN:

Van Richten doesn’t know that his former protégé, a good-aligned Vistani named Ezmerelda d’Avenir, has come to Barovia looking for him. He taught her many of his monster-hunting techniques, but she doesn’t know all of his tricks and disguises. So far, their paths haven’t crossed. In the event that Van Richten becomes aware of Ezmerelda’s presence, he does his utmost to protect her without putting his own plans in jeopardy. If he can manipulate a party of adventurers into keeping an eye on her, he will do so.

VAN RICHTEN WORKS ALONE:

A curse placed on him long ago by a Vistani seer brings doom to those he befriends (see ‘Role Playing Notes’ for details). Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure. Consequently, if he thinks he’s in danger of being unmasked, he retreats to the Tower of Khazan (chapter 11) or some other quiet corner of Strahd’s domain to plan further.

TRAITS:

Ideal. “Evil cannot go unchallenged.”

Bond. “To protect those I love, I must keep them distant and hidden from my enemies.”

Flaw. “I am cursed. Thus, I will never have peace.”

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

A CURSED MAN:

Van Richten suffers a curse bestowed on him by a Vistani:

Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws.

Its effect on him can best be summarized with this statement: "Van Richten Dies Last." This curse is both a boon and a bane to him. The curse is a large part of why he has lived so long--how he has accumulated so much experience and expertise. He is cursed to always see his friends and allies die--which means he has to live long enough to see it happen.

For a long time, he was unaware of the exact nature of the curse on him, but he is apparently aware of it now.

• Van Richten feels guilty. For decades he fought alongside others with monsters, completely unaware that he was a doombringer among them. Now that he knows, he is burdened by all the deaths he feels that his presence caused.

• Van Richten isolates himself. He doesn't let people get close to him for fear that his curse will take them out.

• If Van Richten is traveling with the party, he has excellent odds of surviving--if someone is going to die in the party, it'll be someone other than him.

• Van Richten's curse should have a tangible impact if he’s traveling with the party: he is a doombringer of the highest order. His mere presence among the party should invite tragedy and disaster.

The Tragedy of Ezmerelda and Van Richten. In the backstory that created Ezmerelda d’Avenir (Appendix D: Monsters and NPCs pages 230-231), there's a tragedy in there: Van Richten's curse could have been lifted years ago.

By Ravenloft Lore, the strongest of curses laid down by a Vistani can only be lifted by the Vistani who placed it, or a blood relative of that Vistani. Van Richten's curse was a Death Curse laid on him by Ezmerelda's mother. Only Ezmerelda has the ability to revoke the curse. But here's the problem...
Ezmerelda is Vistani...by nature; they are secretive about their abilities. Beyond that, Van Richten doesn't trust Vistani and likely commanded Ezmerelda to not use her Vistani abilities in his presence. As a result, Van Richten doesn't know how Vistani curses work--he doesn't know that they can be revoked by a blood relative of the one who laid it. He's a Cleric, he has undoubtedly tried remove curse on himself and it failed. As far as he knows, the curse is permanent.
Van Richten is also secretive and, as mentioned, doesn't trust the Vistani. He kept Ezmerelda at arm's length as best he could both because he couldn't trust her, but also to try to protect her from the curse...and even if he was aware of the curse when they traveled together, he never told her about it.

If either one of them had been less secretive, more open, his curse would have been revoked a long time ago.

If the players want to help Van Richten break the curse, here's the backstory:

The story of Ezmerelda and Van Richten's history was written in the Van Richten's Journal (Appendix F: Handouts pages 254-255). It involves him destroying Ezmerelda's caravan while she was very, very young. She survived the undead assault and later got picked up by another caravan of Vistani (it was actually the Zarovan tribe--Madam Eva's caravan). She originally wanted revenge on Van Richten, but time with Eva (and the presence of the most powerful Vistani of them all) showed her the tragedy of what had happened from an outside perspective. Ezmerelda realized that the whole thing was a horrible tragedy and wrongs had been committed on both sides. She, thus, set out to try to find Van Richten and try to make things right...though Eva never told her about the curse her mother had laid on Van Richten.

Van Richten and Ezmerelda must travel to the place the curse was first laid...a small clearing in the forests of Barovia where the ruins of Ezmerelda's caravan still lie. Both must verbally acknowledge the wrong that had been done and verbally forgive one another for it...then the remains of Ezmerelda's caravan must be burned.

THE DISGUISE:

Van Richten got the idea for “Rictavio” from his exposure to Ezmerelda and her occasional methods for blending in when going somewhere that didn't like Vistani. In short: "Sometimes the best disguise is being the most obvious thing in the room." As mentioned above, Ezmerelda has never encountered the Rictavio disguise and Van Richten isn't familiar with any of the disguises Ezmerelda is currently using.

It is a rather perfect disguise. Van Richten is known as a grim and serious individual, a dour old man who roves the world slaying monsters. “Rictavio” is a flamboyant fop who tells ludicrous stories, commits crimes against music, and is constantly trying to recruit people to his Circus of Wonders. He should be portrayed as extremely over the top and completely harmless. It should be very jarring to your players if he drops the act and reveals who he truly is.
Furthermore, Rictavio knows that even if someone suspects he's hiding something, they are extremely unlikely to guess the truth. If a player rolls well on Insight against him and figures out he's full of crap, that only tells them that he's lying about something...not what he is lying about. And his response is to just carry on and ignore accusations. Sure, the PCs may figure out that he's full of it (his stories are obvious fabrications) but he just carries right along, sticking to his guns even though the players know it’s a load of BS.

The players should have a hard time to get a serious read on Rictavio's personality. He strikes them as so straight forward--a carnie who is spinning tall tales for amusement. So they shouldn’t suspect that he's any more than what he appears to be.

A HARD MAN TO PIN DOWN:

Van Richten is a man with a plan for killing Strahd Von Zarovich, and it's a plan that plays well to his aged capabilities: "wait til Strahd takes a long nap, then stake him in his sleep." Of anyone in the valley, Van Richten knows how deadly Strahd is. He has fought elder vampires before and Strahd is the greatest of them all. He may very well believe that trying to fight him head on is pure folly, but he’s the one most capable of doing so.

It's important to note: Most of the "Destined Allies" the party can draw from Madame Eva’s Tarokka card reading have notes about how the PCs can get that individual to join them. Van Richten has no such notes. Instead, it says this...

Van Richten works alone. [...] Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure.

Van Richten is aware of Madame Eva but (unlike many others in the valley) he won't immediately cave to her prophecies, drop everything he has been working on, and throw his lot in with the PCs. Here are a few important things to keep in mind if the party is trying to recruit him...

• Van Richten is quite certain that if he drops his disguise, Strahd will find him and set out to kill him. (This is one of Strahd's Primary Goals as listed in Chapter 1)

• Van Richten's disguise is magically augmented. As long as the party can't get his hat off, they cannot prove that he’s not a carnie ringmaster

• Van Richten's disguise is only useful against Strahd as long as no one knows who he really is. The ring of mind shielding only works on him...it doesn't work on the PCs. He knows that if anyone else finds out, Strahd can charm them, read their mind or otherwise extract that information from them.

• Van Richten is fully aware of his curse. He will avoid physically joining up with the party for fear that he will get them all killed.

• Van Richten does not talk about his curse. He knows well the bravery of adventurers and that telling them about his curse tends to result in responses like "Oh, you don't need to worry about us, we're strong!" followed shortly by ":dying noises:." Rebuffing their advances without mentioning the curse is much more effective at getting them to stay away from him so his curse doesn't kill them.

• Even if Van Richten consents to offer them aid, it should be indirect as much as possible. He has his plan, he's set in his ways, and he’s not going to go gallivanting off with a bunch of young adventurers. And, he should stay in character as much as possible...blowing his cover will only bring Strahd down on him AND the PCs.

Ideally, even if the party can convince him to help...his help should primarily take the form of a surprisingly knowledgeable carnival ringmaster who is "certainly not going to go out and fight monsters with you. I'm a ringmaster, not an adventurer!"

He may lend the party his carnival wagon to travel around in (once he finds somewhere else to stash his saber-toothed tiger that has been trained to hunt Vistani, or he may lend them the tiger), give them helpful advice--possibly using ravens to stay in touch over long-distance if the PCs make friends with the Keepers of the Feather, and provide the sort of support that a Carnie could offer. But, it should take rather extreme circumstances for him to actually be honest with the PCs...and they may have to do something about his curse before he'll actually travel with them.

GETTING HIM TO JOIN UP:

Van Richten wants to stay under cover...so how does the party get him to change his mind?

Easy: Ruin his plan.

If Van Richten's cover is blown, his plan is a wash. The whole plan depends on his identity staying a secret until Strahd goes into hibernation. If Strahd identifies Van Richten before then, he will try to kill him and Van Richten is pretty sure he can't take Strahd in a straight-up fight. Thus...if Van Richten’s cover is blown, he is stuck with two bad choices: Either he tries to keep going it alone, possibly getting killed by Strahd, and fails his “final mission,” or he accepts the risk to the PCs and joins them to try to take Strahd down directly. A few example ways to blow his cover...

• Knock his hat off. A hat of disguise only works as long as it stays on your head, so if something happens that knocks his hat off; “Rictavio” is replaced by Van Richten.

• Let the Tyger Tyger event happen (chapter 5). When Rictavio flees to the Tower of Khazan, he's inside an antimagic field and cannot disguise himself.

• Even if Van Richten is distorting his voice, if the PCs have already befriended Ezmerelda, she may still recognize it...even if what she recognizes is the cadence his voice adopts when he's explaining something.

ABILITY LOADOUT:

Van Richten is a Cleric...and his listed prepared spells speaks more of a support caster than a monster hunter who has gone solo. But, because he's a Cleric, he can swap out his prepared spells at will to any other spells on the Cleric list. Here are a few notes on spells for him to use...

• Dawn creates sunlight. If he can lock a vampire down within the area of effect, they will be dust in short order.

• Dispel Evil and Good breaks a vampire's charm. However...things can't really leave Barovia, so the dismissal part of that spell won't be terribly effective here.

• Geas is useful when he needs to find something. For example, capture a werewolf then place a geas on it to lead them to the den.

• Lesser and Greater Restoration are enormously useful, as is remove curse.

• Guiding Bolt is a great weapon against Vampires. Shuts down their regeneration, and gives the next attack advantage.

• Hallow: If Van Richten can get his hands on the material components for this, he can create holy ground to help protect the PCs. Create a bubble of hallowed ground around the antimagic field that covers the Tower of Khazan....talk about a fortress. Sure, you'll have a bubble of non-hallowed ground where the antimagic field zone is...but the territory around the tower itself will be holy ground.

• Given his skill at predicting his foes...dropping sanctuary on a creature they are about to attack can completely trash their attempts.

• Spirit Guardians is another spell that is just....awesome.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (5th Edition)

2022-01-29T16:48:42Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* Game Statistics */

{{canon}}

NOTE: This entry is for the [[5th Edition]] version of Dr. Rudolph van Richten presented in [[Curse of Strahd]]. For the older edition character, see [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten (NPC)]].

Dr. van Richten makes a notable appearance in the [[5th Edition]] [[module]], [[Curse of Strahd]], though not in his [[famous]] persona as the monster hunter and [[writer]] of the [[Van Richten's Guide]]s he is notable for in previous Ravenloft products. Instead, he adopts the guise of [[Rictavio]], a traveling [[half-elf]] [[bard]], [[storyteller]], and [[ringmaster]] gathering stories and watching out for talent. In reality he is gathering formation and waiting for an optimal time to strike at [[Strahd]], preferably when the vampire lord is in [[hibernation]]. Unlike other versions of van Richten, the Curse of Strahd van Richten is a [[loner]] because he knows the full extent of his [[curse]].<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref>

==History==
Much of Dr. van Richten's early history before he came a monster hunter remains the same. One key difference is that he did not wholesale murder the [[Vistani]] that [[kidnapped]] his son [[Erasmus van Richten]]. In fact, one of them, [[Ezmerelda d'Avenir]] appeared to him one day and expressed her remorse, eventually becoming van Richten's student in monster hunting. However, their relationship frayed after a couple of years, and at, Ezmerelda's suggestion, they left each other's company amicably.<ref name="CoS p. 230-231">CoS p. 230-231</ref>

At some point in his adventuring career, a [[Vistani]] [[seer]] [[cursed]] van Richten, dooming his friends to die. ''Curse of Strahd'' is not specific to when in his adventuring career or why van Richten's curse was put upon him, though he is aware of it.<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> In contrast, in the traditional van Richten story, van Richten is [[cursed]] by [[Madame Radanavich]] early on in his career but does not realize how it has effected him until [[741 BC]] (the year before he retires). He thus operates as a [[loner]], to not cause the death of any friends or allies he would work with.<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref>

Eventually, Dr. van Richten set his sights upon the destruction of Strahd. By now having adopted the identity of Rictavio, van Richten eventually encountered [[Yan]], an [[exile]]d [[Vistani]]. Once Yan discovered van Richten's intentions to go to [[Barovia]] and seek out the Vistani there, Yan tried to make off with [[Rictavio's Wagon]] along with [[Piccolo]]. Van Richten caught him and [[killed]] the [[thief]], removed his head, and preserved it with special magic oils to be used with [[speak with dead]] later on.<ref>CoS p. 171</ref>

Rictavio came to [[Barovia]] in the guise of [[Rictavio]]<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> and set up shop at a then [[abandoned]] tower formerly belonging to the [[wizard]] [[Khazan]]. Dr. van Richten made [[Van Richten's Tower|Khazan's old tower]] his own for a time, before moving on to [[Vallaki]] and setting up shop there.<ref name="CoS p. 167">CoS p. 167</ref> In the meantime, Ezmerelda heard [[rumor]]s about her former mentor's travel to [[Barovia]] to take out Strahd, and she traveled to Barovia to find van Richten, eventually setting up shop in his old tower.<ref>CoS p. 231</ref>

About a month prior to the current point in the timeline of the module, "Rictavio" came to Vallaki. There he met and purchased a [[doll]] of a [[Vistani]] from [[Gadof Blinsky]]. Noting the toymaker's loneliness and despair, van Richten left his [[pet]] [[monkey]], [[Piccolo]] with Blinsky for company.<ref name="Curse of Strahd p. 118">CoS p. 118</ref> Dr. van Richten has stayed at the [[Blue Water Inn]] and received generous treatment from the charitable [[Urwin Martikov]].<ref>CoS p. 100</ref>. Dr. van Richten keeps his wagon (and [[Rictavio's saber-toothed tiger|his sabre-toothed tiger]]) inside the [[Arasek Stockyards]], bribing off its owners to prevent any details from leaking out.<ref name="CoS p. 115-116">CoS p. 115-116</ref>

==Modus Operandi==
As previously mentioned, Dr. van Richten is a [[loner]], posing in his [[Rictavio]] guise to gather information until the time is right to strike against Strahd. Van Richten drives [[Rictavio's Carnival wagon|a carnival wagon]]<ref>CoS p. 115-116</ref> pulled by a [[horse]]] named [[Drusilla (Horse)|Drusilla]].<ref>CoS p. 101-102</ref> Dr. van Richten uses [[Rictavio's saber-toothed tiger|his sabre-toothed tiger]] to hunt [[evil]] [[Vistani]], for which it is especially trained to do.<ref name="CoS p. 115-116">CoS p. 115-116</ref> Currently, van Richten is gathering information on both a)the [[Keepers of the Feather]] to learn their allegiances/membership and b)the [[evil]] [[Vistani]] of [[Arrigal's Clan]] at the [[Vistani camp near Vallaki]]. Van Richten plans on sending the tiger after the evil Vistani in the camp.

==Art==
p. 238

==Game Statistics==
Van Richten has his own [[NPC]] game statistics block.

DR. RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN

Medium humanoid (human), Lawful Good

Armor Class: 17 (half plate of flowing sanctity)

Hit Points: 77 (14d8 +14)

Speed: 30 ft.

Strength: 9 (-1)

Dexterity: 13 (+1)

Constitution: 13 (+1)

Intelligence: 17 (+3)

Wisdom: 18 (+4)

Charisma: 16 (+3)

Saving Throws: Con +5, Wis +8, Cha +7

Skills: Arcana +7, Deception +7, Insight +12,
Investigation +7, Medicine +8, Perception +12,
Religion +6, Sleight of Hand +4

Condition Immunities: charmed

Senses: darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 22

Languages: Abyssal, Celestial, Common, Draconic, Dwarvish, Elvish, Gundarak, Infernal, Sylvan

Challenge: 9 (5,000 XP)

SPECIAL EQUIPMENT:

In addition to his +1 sword cane and light crossbow, Van Richten wears a hat of disguise, goggles of night, and a ring of mind shielding, and he carries a spell scroll of raise dead.

Half Plate of Flowing Sanctity +1 mithril half plate. Once a day, a flask of water placed in the belt of armor becomes holy water.

ACTIONS:

Spellcasting: Van Richter is a 9th level Cleric of Helm, 1st level Wizard. His spellcasting ability is Wisdom (save DC 15, +7 to hit with spell attacks). Van Richten has the following Cleric and Wizard spells prepared:

Cantrips (at will): light, mage hand, mending, minor illusion, prestidigitation, sacred flame, thaumaturgy, toll the dead

1st level (4 slots): alarm, bless, cure wounds, detect evil and good, feather fall, find familiar, healing word, identify, protection from evil and good, shield, sleep

2nd level (3 slots): augury, beacon of hope, lesser restoration, protection from poison, silence, spiritual weapon warding bond, zone of truth

3rd level (3 slots): glyph of warding, magic circle, mass healing word, revivify, speak with dead, spirit guardians

4th level (3 slots): death ward, freedom of movement

5th level (3 slots): dawn, greater restoration, mass cure wounds, raise dead

Skulker: Van Richten can hide when he is lightly obscured from the creature from which he is hiding. When he’s hidden from a creature and misses it with a ranged weapon attack, making the attack doesn’t reveal his position. Dim light doesn’t impose disadvantage on his Wisdom (Perception) checks relying on sight.

Undead Slayer: When Van Richten hits an undead with a weapon attack, the undead takes an extra 10 (3d6) damage of weapon’s type.

Cunning Action: Van Richten can use a bonus action to take the Dash, Disengage or Hide action.

Sneak Attack: When Van Richten surprises a target, has advantage on an attack roll, or an enemy is within 5 ft. of the target, Van Richten deals and extra 7 damage.

Assassin Proficiencies: Van Richten is proficient with Disguise and Poisoner’s Kits.

Assassinate: When Van Richten hits a surprised enemy, it’s automatically a critical hit. When he attacks an enemy that hasn’t yet had a turn, he gains advantage on the attack.

Channel Divinity: Turn Undead: Undead within 30 ft. of Van Richten must make a Wisdom saving throw. If the creature fails its saving throw, they are turned for 1 minute or until they take damage. A turned creature must spend its turns trying to move as far away from him as it can, and it can’t willingly move to a space within 30 ft. of him. It also can’t take reactions. For its action, it can use only the Dash action or try to escape from an effect that prevents it from moving. If there’s nowhere to move, the creature can use the Dodge action. Undead with CR 1 or less are automatically destroyed on a failed save.

Preserve Life: As an action, Van Richten can distribute 45 hit points. This feature can restore a creature to no more than half of its hit point maximum and has no effect on an undead or construct.

Multiattack: Van Richten makes two attacks with his sword cane or light crossbow.

Sword Cane: Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 6 (1d6 +2) bludgeon damage (wooden cane) or piercing damage (silvered sword).

Light Crossbow: Ranged Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, range 80/320 ft., one target. Hit: 7 (1d8 +2) piercing damage.

Healer: As an action, Van Richten can spend one use of a Healer’s Kit to tend to a creature and restore 1d6 +4 hit points to it, plus additional hit points equal to the creature’s maximum number of Hit Dice. The creature can’t regain hit points from this feat again until it finishes a short or long rest.

REACTIONS:

Final Ward: Van Richten has a permanent glyph of warding tattooed on his neck that activates when he’s bitten there and chooses to say “Erasmus, I’m coming home” in Celestial. All targets in a 20 ft. radius must make a Dexterity saving throw or take 5d8 +5 radiant damage on a failed save or half as much (rounded up) on a successful one. Van Richten automatically fails the save and is disintegrated along with all of the items on his person.

RICTAVIO:

Several months ago a colorfully dressed half-elf bard came to Barovia in a carnival wagon, with a pet monkey on his shoulder. He took over an abandoned tower on Lake Baratok before rolling into town of Vallaki several months later. Claiming to be a carnival ringmaster in search of new actors, he began regaling locals with tales of distant lands.

MONSTER HUNTER:

The half-elf ringmaster is, in fact, the legendary human monster hunter named Rudolph Van Richten. Van Richten’s tale is a sad one. A scholar and doctor from a land called Darkon, he married his childhood sweetheart, Ingrid and together they had a son, Erasmus. When he was fourteen, Erasmus was stolen away by Vistani and sold to a vampire named Baron Metus to be used as a companion. By the time Van Richten found his son, it was too late: the Baron had already transformed Erasmus into a vampire spawn. Erasmus begged his father to end his suffering, which Van Richten did by pounding a wooden stake through his son’s chest. Baron Metus avenged that death by killing Van Richten’s wife, and Van Richten has lived with the horror of his family’s destruction ever since. After destroying Baron Metus in turn, Van Richten sought revenge against the Vistani and took up a life of hunting evil monsters.

THE WAITING GAME:

Van Richten isn’t a young man anymore. He knows his road is coming to an end, but his work isn’t done. He has come to Barovia to kill Strahd Von Zarovich, the greatest vampire of them all. Van Richten has studied Strahd for years and knows he can’t hope to best the vampire in a straight-up confrontation: he must wait for the right moment to strike. He has good evidence to suggest that Strahd periodically hibernates in his coffin, sometimes for years, when all is quite in the realm. While he bides his time, Van Richten hides in plain sight with the aid of a hat of disguise, his thoughts protected by a ring of mind shielding. He is trying to learn more about the Keepers of the Feather—a society of wereravens that oppose Strahd—while trying not to expose the secret society to their mutual enemy. He thinks the wereravens might prove helpful when the time comes. Van Richten also wants to take out as many of Strahd’s spies as he can, starting with the Vistani.

MAN WITH A PLAN:

Van Richten doesn’t know that his former protégé, a good-aligned Vistani named Ezmerelda d’Avenir, has come to Barovia looking for him. He taught her many of his monster-hunting techniques, but she doesn’t know all of his tricks and disguises. So far, their paths haven’t crossed. In the event that Van Richten becomes aware of Ezmerelda’s presence, he does his utmost to protect her without putting his own plans in jeopardy. If he can manipulate a party of adventurers into keeping an eye on her, he will do so.

VAN RICHTEN WORKS ALONE:

A curse placed on him long ago by a Vistani seer brings doom to those he befriends (see ‘Role Playing Notes’ for details). Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure. Consequently, if he thinks he’s in danger of being unmasked, he retreats to the Tower of Khazan (chapter 11) or some other quiet corner of Strahd’s domain to plan further.

TRAITS:

Ideal. “Evil cannot go unchallenged.”

Bond. “To protect those I love, I must keep them distant and hidden from my enemies.”

Flaw. “I am cursed. Thus, I will never have peace.”

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

A CURSED MAN:

Van Richten suffers a curse bestowed on him by a Vistani:

Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws.

Its effect on him can best be summarized with this statement: "Van Richten Dies Last." This curse is both a boon and a bane to him. The curse is a large part of why he has lived so long--how he has accumulated so much experience and expertise. He is cursed to always see his friends and allies die--which means he has to live long enough to see it happen.

For a long time, he was unaware of the exact nature of the curse on him, but he is apparently aware of it now.

• Van Richten feels guilty. For decades he fought alongside others with monsters, completely unaware that he was a doombringer among them. Now that he knows, he is burdened by all the deaths he feels that his presence caused.

• Van Richten isolates himself. He doesn't let people get close to him for fear that his curse will take them out.

• If Van Richten is traveling with the party, he has excellent odds of surviving--if someone is going to die in the party, it'll be someone other than him.

• Van Richten's curse should have a tangible impact if he’s traveling with the party: he is a doombringer of the highest order. His mere presence among the party should invite tragedy and disaster.

The Tragedy of Ezmerelda and Van Richten. In the backstory that created Ezmerelda d’Avenir (Appendix D: Monsters and NPCs pages 230-231), there's a tragedy in there: Van Richten's curse could have been lifted years ago.

By Ravenloft Lore, the strongest of curses laid down by a Vistani can only be lifted by the Vistani who placed it, or a blood relative of that Vistani. Van Richten's curse was a Death Curse laid on him by Ezmerelda's mother. Only Ezmerelda has the ability to revoke the curse. But here's the problem...
Ezmerelda is Vistani...by nature; they are secretive about their abilities. Beyond that, Van Richten doesn't trust Vistani and likely commanded Ezmerelda to not use her Vistani abilities in his presence. As a result, Van Richten doesn't know how Vistani curses work--he doesn't know that they can be revoked by a blood relative of the one who laid it. He's a Cleric, he has undoubtedly tried remove curse on himself and it failed. As far as he knows, the curse is permanent.
Van Richten is also secretive and, as mentioned, doesn't trust the Vistani. He kept Ezmerelda at arm's length as best he could both because he couldn't trust her, but also to try to protect her from the curse...and even if he was aware of the curse when they traveled together, he never told her about it.

If either one of them had been less secretive, more open, his curse would have been revoked a long time ago.

If the players want to help Van Richten break the curse, here's the backstory:

The story of Ezmerelda and Van Richten's history was written in the Van Richten's Journal (Appendix F: Handouts pages 254-255). It involves him destroying Ezmerelda's caravan while she was very, very young. She survived the undead assault and later got picked up by another caravan of Vistani (it was actually the Zarovan tribe--Madam Eva's caravan). She originally wanted revenge on Van Richten, but time with Eva (and the presence of the most powerful Vistani of them all) showed her the tragedy of what had happened from an outside perspective. Ezmerelda realized that the whole thing was a horrible tragedy and wrongs had been committed on both sides. She, thus, set out to try to find Van Richten and try to make things right...though Eva never told her about the curse her mother had laid on Van Richten.

Van Richten and Ezmerelda must travel to the place the curse was first laid...a small clearing in the forests of Barovia where the ruins of Ezmerelda's caravan still lie. Both must verbally acknowledge the wrong that had been done and verbally forgive one another for it...then the remains of Ezmerelda's caravan must be burned.

THE DISGUISE:

Van Richten got the idea for “Rictavio” from his exposure to Ezmerelda and her occasional methods for blending in when going somewhere that didn't like Vistani. In short: "Sometimes the best disguise is being the most obvious thing in the room." As mentioned above, Ezmerelda has never encountered the Rictavio disguise and Van Richten isn't familiar with any of the disguises Ezmerelda is currently using.

It is a rather perfect disguise. Van Richten is known as a grim and serious individual, a dour old man who roves the world slaying monsters. “Rictavio” is a flamboyant fop who tells ludicrous stories, commits crimes against music, and is constantly trying to recruit people to his Circus of Wonders. He should be portrayed as extremely over the top and completely harmless. It should be very jarring to your players if he drops the act and reveals who he truly is.
Furthermore, Rictavio knows that even if someone suspects he's hiding something, they are extremely unlikely to guess the truth. If a player rolls well on Insight against him and figures out he's full of crap, that only tells them that he's lying about something...not what he is lying about. And his response is to just carry on and ignore accusations. Sure, the PCs may figure out that he's full of it (his stories are obvious fabrications) but he just carries right along, sticking to his guns even though the players know it’s a load of BS.

The players should have a hard time to get a serious read on Rictavio's personality. He strikes them as so straight forward--a carnie who is spinning tall tales for amusement. So they shouldn’t suspect that he's any more than what he appears to be.

A HARD MAN TO PIN DOWN:

Van Richten is a man with a plan for killing Strahd Von Zarovich, and it's a plan that plays well to his aged capabilities: "wait til Strahd takes a long nap, then stake him in his sleep." Of anyone in the valley, Van Richten knows how deadly Strahd is. He has fought elder vampires before and Strahd is the greatest of them all. He may very well believe that trying to fight him head on is pure folly, but he’s the one most capable of doing so.

It's important to note: Most of the "Destined Allies" the party can draw from Madame Eva’s Tarokka card reading have notes about how the PCs can get that individual to join them. Van Richten has no such notes. Instead, it says this...

Van Richten works alone. [...] Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure.

Van Richten is aware of Madame Eva but (unlike many others in the valley) he won't immediately cave to her prophecies, drop everything he has been working on, and throw his lot in with the PCs. Here are a few important things to keep in mind if the party is trying to recruit him...

• Van Richten is quite certain that if he drops his disguise, Strahd will find him and set out to kill him. (This is one of Strahd's Primary Goals as listed in Chapter 1)

• Van Richten's disguise is magically augmented. As long as the party can't get his hat off, they cannot prove that he’s not a carnie ringmaster

• Van Richten's disguise is only useful against Strahd as long as no one knows who he really is. The ring of mind shielding only works on him...it doesn't work on the PCs. He knows that if anyone else finds out, Strahd can charm them, read their mind or otherwise extract that information from them.

• Van Richten is fully aware of his curse. He will avoid physically joining up with the party for fear that he will get them all killed.

• Van Richten does not talk about his curse. He knows well the bravery of adventurers and that telling them about his curse tends to result in responses like "Oh, you don't need to worry about us, we're strong!" followed shortly by ":dying noises:." Rebuffing their advances without mentioning the curse is much more effective at getting them to stay away from him so his curse doesn't kill them.

• Even if Van Richten consents to offer them aid, it should be indirect as much as possible. He has his plan, he's set in his ways, and he’s not going to go gallivanting off with a bunch of young adventurers. And, he should stay in character as much as possible...blowing his cover will only bring Strahd down on him AND the PCs.

Ideally, even if the party can convince him to help...his help should primarily take the form of a surprisingly knowledgeable carnival ringmaster who is "certainly not going to go out and fight monsters with you. I'm a ringmaster, not an adventurer!"

He may lend the party his carnival wagon to travel around in (once he finds somewhere else to stash his saber-toothed tiger that has been trained to hunt Vistani, or he may lend them the tiger), give them helpful advice--possibly using ravens to stay in touch over long-distance if the PCs make friends with the Keepers of the Feather, and provide the sort of support that a Carnie could offer. But, it should take rather extreme circumstances for him to actually be honest with the PCs...and they may have to do something about his curse before he'll actually travel with them.

GETTING HIM TO JOIN UP:

Van Richten wants to stay under cover...so how does the party get him to change his mind?

Easy: Ruin his plan.

If Van Richten's cover is blown, his plan is a wash. The whole plan depends on his identity staying a secret until Strahd goes into hibernation. If Strahd identifies Van Richten before then, he will try to kill him and Van Richten is pretty sure he can't take Strahd in a straight-up fight. Thus...if Van Richten’s cover is blown, he is stuck with two bad choices: Either he tries to keep going it alone, possibly getting killed by Strahd, and fails his “final mission,” or he accepts the risk to the PCs and joins them to try to take Strahd down directly. A few example ways to blow his cover...

• Knock his hat off. A hat of disguise only works as long as it stays on your head, so if something happens that knocks his hat off; “Rictavio” is replaced by Van Richten.

• Let the Tyger Tyger event happen (chapter 5). When Rictavio flees to the Tower of Khazan, he's inside an antimagic field and cannot disguise himself.

• Even if Van Richten is distorting his voice, if the PCs have already befriended Ezmerelda, she may still recognize it...even if what she recognizes is the cadence his voice adopts when he's explaining something.

ABILITY LOADOUT:

Van Richten is a Cleric...and his listed prepared spells speaks more of a support caster than a monster hunter who has gone solo. But, because he's a Cleric, he can swap out his prepared spells at will to any other spells on the Cleric list. Here are a few notes on spells for him to use...

• Dawn creates sunlight. If he can lock a vampire down within the area of effect, they will be dust in short order.

• Dispel Evil and Good breaks a vampire's charm. However...things can't really leave Barovia, so the dismissal part of that spell won't be terribly effective here.

• Geas is useful when he needs to find something. For example, capture a werewolf then place a geas on it to lead them to the den.

• Lesser and Greater Restoration are enormously useful, as is remove curse.

• Guiding Bolt is a great weapon against Vampires. Shuts down their regeneration, and gives the next attack advantage.

• Hallow: If Van Richten can get his hands on the material components for this, he can create holy ground to help protect the PCs. Create a bubble of hallowed ground around the antimagic field that covers the Tower of Khazan....talk about a fortress. Sure, you'll have a bubble of non-hallowed ground where the antimagic field zone is...but the territory around the tower itself will be holy ground.

• Given his skill at predicting his foes...dropping sanctuary on a creature they are about to attack can completely trash their attempts.

• Spirit Guardians is another spell that is just....awesome.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

{{ref}}

[[category:character]][[category:NPC]]
[[category:5th Edition Character]]
[[category::Animal Handler]]
[[category:Arcane Loremaster]]
[[category:Barovian]]
[[category:Cleric]]
[[category:Cursed]]
[[category:Curse of Strahd Continuity]]
[[category:Darkonian]]
[[category:Deceiver]]
[[category:Discoverer]]
[[category:Disguised]]
[[category:Doctor]]
[[category:Driver]]
[[category:Famous]]
[[category:Former Inhabitants of Darkon]]
[[category:Former Student]]
[[category:Former Medical Student]]
[[category:Graduate]]
[[category:hero]]
[[category:human]]
[[category:Hunter Of Monsters]]
[[category:Imposter]]
[[category:Inhabitants of Barovia]]
[[category:Inhabitants of Vallaki]]
[[category:Investigator]]
[[category:Killer]]
[[category:Lawful Good]]
[[category:Liar]]
[[category:Loner]]
[[category:male]]
[[category:Medical Doctor]]
[[category:Medical Professional]]
[[category:Mentor]]
[[category:Murderer]]
[[category:professional Killer]]
[[category:Ravenloft Loremaster]]
[[category:Researcher]]
[[category:Scholar]]
[[category:Vistani Hunter]]
[[category:Undead Hunter]]
[[category:Vampire Hunter]]

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (5th Edition)

2022-01-29T16:48:20Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* Game Statistics */

{{canon}}

NOTE: This entry is for the [[5th Edition]] version of Dr. Rudolph van Richten presented in [[Curse of Strahd]]. For the older edition character, see [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten (NPC)]].

Dr. van Richten makes a notable appearance in the [[5th Edition]] [[module]], [[Curse of Strahd]], though not in his [[famous]] persona as the monster hunter and [[writer]] of the [[Van Richten's Guide]]s he is notable for in previous Ravenloft products. Instead, he adopts the guise of [[Rictavio]], a traveling [[half-elf]] [[bard]], [[storyteller]], and [[ringmaster]] gathering stories and watching out for talent. In reality he is gathering formation and waiting for an optimal time to strike at [[Strahd]], preferably when the vampire lord is in [[hibernation]]. Unlike other versions of van Richten, the Curse of Strahd van Richten is a [[loner]] because he knows the full extent of his [[curse]].<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref>

==History==
Much of Dr. van Richten's early history before he came a monster hunter remains the same. One key difference is that he did not wholesale murder the [[Vistani]] that [[kidnapped]] his son [[Erasmus van Richten]]. In fact, one of them, [[Ezmerelda d'Avenir]] appeared to him one day and expressed her remorse, eventually becoming van Richten's student in monster hunting. However, their relationship frayed after a couple of years, and at, Ezmerelda's suggestion, they left each other's company amicably.<ref name="CoS p. 230-231">CoS p. 230-231</ref>

At some point in his adventuring career, a [[Vistani]] [[seer]] [[cursed]] van Richten, dooming his friends to die. ''Curse of Strahd'' is not specific to when in his adventuring career or why van Richten's curse was put upon him, though he is aware of it.<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> In contrast, in the traditional van Richten story, van Richten is [[cursed]] by [[Madame Radanavich]] early on in his career but does not realize how it has effected him until [[741 BC]] (the year before he retires). He thus operates as a [[loner]], to not cause the death of any friends or allies he would work with.<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref>

Eventually, Dr. van Richten set his sights upon the destruction of Strahd. By now having adopted the identity of Rictavio, van Richten eventually encountered [[Yan]], an [[exile]]d [[Vistani]]. Once Yan discovered van Richten's intentions to go to [[Barovia]] and seek out the Vistani there, Yan tried to make off with [[Rictavio's Wagon]] along with [[Piccolo]]. Van Richten caught him and [[killed]] the [[thief]], removed his head, and preserved it with special magic oils to be used with [[speak with dead]] later on.<ref>CoS p. 171</ref>

Rictavio came to [[Barovia]] in the guise of [[Rictavio]]<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> and set up shop at a then [[abandoned]] tower formerly belonging to the [[wizard]] [[Khazan]]. Dr. van Richten made [[Van Richten's Tower|Khazan's old tower]] his own for a time, before moving on to [[Vallaki]] and setting up shop there.<ref name="CoS p. 167">CoS p. 167</ref> In the meantime, Ezmerelda heard [[rumor]]s about her former mentor's travel to [[Barovia]] to take out Strahd, and she traveled to Barovia to find van Richten, eventually setting up shop in his old tower.<ref>CoS p. 231</ref>

About a month prior to the current point in the timeline of the module, "Rictavio" came to Vallaki. There he met and purchased a [[doll]] of a [[Vistani]] from [[Gadof Blinsky]]. Noting the toymaker's loneliness and despair, van Richten left his [[pet]] [[monkey]], [[Piccolo]] with Blinsky for company.<ref name="Curse of Strahd p. 118">CoS p. 118</ref> Dr. van Richten has stayed at the [[Blue Water Inn]] and received generous treatment from the charitable [[Urwin Martikov]].<ref>CoS p. 100</ref>. Dr. van Richten keeps his wagon (and [[Rictavio's saber-toothed tiger|his sabre-toothed tiger]]) inside the [[Arasek Stockyards]], bribing off its owners to prevent any details from leaking out.<ref name="CoS p. 115-116">CoS p. 115-116</ref>

==Modus Operandi==
As previously mentioned, Dr. van Richten is a [[loner]], posing in his [[Rictavio]] guise to gather information until the time is right to strike against Strahd. Van Richten drives [[Rictavio's Carnival wagon|a carnival wagon]]<ref>CoS p. 115-116</ref> pulled by a [[horse]]] named [[Drusilla (Horse)|Drusilla]].<ref>CoS p. 101-102</ref> Dr. van Richten uses [[Rictavio's saber-toothed tiger|his sabre-toothed tiger]] to hunt [[evil]] [[Vistani]], for which it is especially trained to do.<ref name="CoS p. 115-116">CoS p. 115-116</ref> Currently, van Richten is gathering information on both a)the [[Keepers of the Feather]] to learn their allegiances/membership and b)the [[evil]] [[Vistani]] of [[Arrigal's Clan]] at the [[Vistani camp near Vallaki]]. Van Richten plans on sending the tiger after the evil Vistani in the camp.

==Art==
p. 238

==Game Statistics==
Van Richten has his own [[NPC]] game statistics block.

DR. RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN

Medium humanoid (human), Lawful Good

Armor Class: 17 (half plate of flowing sanctity)

Hit Points: 77 (14d8 +14)

Speed: 30 ft.

Strength: 9 (-1)

Dexterity: 13 (+1)

Constitution: 13 (+1)

Intelligence: 17 (+3)

Wisdom: 18 (+4)

Charisma: 16 (+3)

Saving Throws: Con +5, Wis +8, Cha +7

Skills: Arcana +7, Deception +7, Insight +12,
Investigation +7, Medicine +8, Perception +12,
Religion +6, Sleight of Hand +4

Condition Immunities: charmed

Senses: darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 22

Languages: Abyssal, Celestial, Common, Draconic, Dwarvish, Elvish, Gundarak, Infernal, Sylvan

Challenge: 9 (5,000 XP)

SPECIAL EQUIPMENT:

In addition to his +1 sword cane and light crossbow, Van Richten wears a hat of disguise, goggles of night, and a ring of mind shielding, and he carries a spell scroll of raise dead.

Half Plate of Flowing Sanctity +1 mithril half plate. Once a day, a flask of water placed in the belt of armor becomes holy water.

ACTIONS:

Spellcasting: Van Richter is a 9th level Cleric of Helm, 1st level Wizard. His spellcasting ability is Wisdom (save DC 15, +7 to hit with spell attacks). Van Richten has the following Cleric and Wizard spells prepared:

Cantrips (at will): light, mage hand, mending, minor illusion, prestidigitation, sacred flame, thaumaturgy, toll the dead

1st level (4 slots): alarm, bless, cure wounds, detect evil and good, feather fall, find familiar, healing word, identify, protection from evil and good, shield, sleep

2nd level (3 slots): augury, beacon of hope, lesser restoration, protection from poison, silence, spiritual weapon warding bond, zone of truth

3rd level (3 slots): glyph of warding, magic circle, mass healing word, revivify, speak with dead, spirit guardians

4th level (3 slots): death ward, freedom of movement

5th level (3 slots): dawn, greater restoration, mass cure wounds, raise dead

Skulker: Van Richten can hide when he is lightly obscured from the creature from which he is hiding. When he’s hidden from a creature and misses it with a ranged weapon attack, making the attack doesn’t reveal his position. Dim light doesn’t impose disadvantage on his Wisdom (Perception) checks relying on sight.

Undead Slayer: When Van Richten hits an undead with a weapon attack, the undead takes an extra 10 (3d6) damage of weapon’s type.

Cunning Action: Van Richten can use a bonus action to take the Dash, Disengage or Hide action.

Sneak Attack: When Van Richten surprises a target, has advantage on an attack roll, or an enemy is within 5 ft. of the target, Van Richten deals and extra 7 damage.

Assassin Proficiencies: Van Richten is proficient with Disguise and Poisoner’s Kits.

Assassinate: When Van Richten hits a surprised enemy, it’s automatically a critical hit. When he attacks an enemy that hasn’t yet had a turn, he gains advantage on the attack.

Channel Divinity: Turn Undead: Undead within 30 ft. of Van Richten must make a Wisdom saving throw. If the creature fails its saving throw, they are turned for 1 minute or until they take damage. A turned creature must spend its turns trying to move as far away from him as it can, and it can’t willingly move to a space within 30 ft. of him. It also can’t take reactions. For its action, it can use only the Dash action or try to escape from an effect that prevents it from moving. If there’s nowhere to move, the creature can use the Dodge action. Undead with CR 1 or less are automatically destroyed on a failed save.

Preserve Life: As an action, Van Richten can distribute 45 hit points. This feature can restore a creature to no more than half of its hit point maximum and has no effect on an undead or construct.

Multiattack: Van Richten makes two attacks with his sword cane or light crossbow.

Sword Cane: Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 6 (1d6 +2) bludgeon damage (wooden cane) or piercing damage (silvered sword).

Light Crossbow: Ranged Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, range 80/320 ft., one target. Hit: 7 (1d8 +2) piercing damage.

Healer: As an action, Van Richten can spend one use of a Healer’s Kit to tend to a creature and restore 1d6 +4 hit points to it, plus additional hit points equal to the creature’s maximum number of Hit Dice. The creature can’t regain hit points from this feat again until it finishes a short or long rest.

REACTIONS:

Final Ward: Van Richten has a permanent glyph of warding tattooed on his neck that activates when he’s bitten there and chooses to say “Erasmus, I’m coming home” in Celestial. All targets in a 20 ft. radius must make a Dexterity saving throw or take 5d8 +5 radiant damage on a failed save or half as much (rounded up) on a successful one. Van Richten automatically fails the save and is disintegrated along with all of the items on his person.

RICTAVIO:

Several months ago a colorfully dressed half-elf bard came to Barovia in a carnival wagon, with a pet monkey on his shoulder. He took over an abandoned tower on Lake Baratok before rolling into town of Vallaki several months later. Claiming to be a carnival ringmaster in search of new actors, he began regaling locals with tales of distant lands.

MONSTER HUNTER:

The half-elf ringmaster is, in fact, the legendary human monster hunter named Rudolph Van Richten. Van Richten’s tale is a sad one. A scholar and doctor from a land called Darkon, he married his childhood sweetheart, Ingrid and together they had a son, Erasmus. When he was fourteen, Erasmus was stolen away by Vistani and sold to a vampire named Baron Metus to be used as a companion. By the time Van Richten found his son, it was too late: the Baron had already transformed Erasmus into a vampire spawn. Erasmus begged his father to end his suffering, which Van Richten did by pounding a wooden stake through his son’s chest. Baron Metus avenged that death by killing Van Richten’s wife, and Van Richten has lived with the horror of his family’s destruction ever since. After destroying Baron Metus in turn, Van Richten sought revenge against the Vistani and took up a life of hunting evil monsters.

THE WAITING GAME:

Van Richten isn’t a young man anymore. He knows his road is coming to an end, but his work isn’t done. He has come to Barovia to kill Strahd Von Zarovich, the greatest vampire of them all. Van Richten has studied Strahd for years and knows he can’t hope to best the vampire in a straight-up confrontation: he must wait for the right moment to strike. He has good evidence to suggest that Strahd periodically hibernates in his coffin, sometimes for years, when all is quite in the realm. While he bides his time, Van Richten hides in plain sight with the aid of a hat of disguise, his thoughts protected by a ring of mind shielding. He is trying to learn more about the Keepers of the Feather—a society of wereravens that oppose Strahd—while trying not to expose the secret society to their mutual enemy. He thinks the wereravens might prove helpful when the time comes. Van Richten also wants to take out as many of Strahd’s spies as he can, starting with the Vistani.

MAN WITH A PLAN:

Van Richten doesn’t know that his former protégé, a good-aligned Vistani named Ezmerelda d’Avenir, has come to Barovia looking for him. He taught her many of his monster-hunting techniques, but she doesn’t know all of his tricks and disguises. So far, their paths haven’t crossed. In the event that Van Richten becomes aware of Ezmerelda’s presence, he does his utmost to protect her without putting his own plans in jeopardy. If he can manipulate a party of adventurers into keeping an eye on her, he will do so.

VAN RICHTEN WORKS ALONE:

A curse placed on him long ago by a Vistani seer brings doom to those he befriends (see ‘Role Playing Notes’ for details). Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure. Consequently, if he thinks he’s in danger of being unmasked, he retreats to the Tower of Khazan (chapter 11) or some other quiet corner of Strahd’s domain to plan further.

TRAITS:

Ideal. “Evil cannot go unchallenged.”

Bond. “To protect those I love, I must keep them distant and hidden from my enemies.”

Flaw. “I am cursed. Thus, I will never have peace.”

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

A CURSED MAN:

Van Richten suffers a curse bestowed on him by a Vistani:

Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws.

Its effect on him can best be summarized with this statement: "Van Richten Dies Last." This curse is both a boon and a bane to him. The curse is a large part of why he has lived so long--how he has accumulated so much experience and expertise. He is cursed to always see his friends and allies die--which means he has to live long enough to see it happen.

For a long time, he was unaware of the exact nature of the curse on him, but he is apparently aware of it now.

• Van Richten feels guilty. For decades he fought alongside others with monsters, completely unaware that he was a doombringer among them. Now that he knows, he is burdened by all the deaths he feels that his presence caused.

• Van Richten isolates himself. He doesn't let people get close to him for fear that his curse will take them out.

• If Van Richten is traveling with the party, he has excellent odds of surviving--if someone is going to die in the party, it'll be someone other than him.

• Van Richten's curse should have a tangible impact if he’s traveling with the party: he is a doombringer of the highest order. His mere presence among the party should invite tragedy and disaster.

The Tragedy of Ezmerelda and Van Richten. In the backstory that created Ezmerelda d’Avenir (Appendix D: Monsters and NPCs pages 230-231), there's a tragedy in there: Van Richten's curse could have been lifted years ago.

By Ravenloft Lore, the strongest of curses laid down by a Vistani can only be lifted by the Vistani who placed it, or a blood relative of that Vistani. Van Richten's curse was a Death Curse laid on him by Ezmerelda's mother. Only Ezmerelda has the ability to revoke the curse. But here's the problem...
Ezmerelda is Vistani...by nature; they are secretive about their abilities. Beyond that, Van Richten doesn't trust Vistani and likely commanded Ezmerelda to not use her Vistani abilities in his presence. As a result, Van Richten doesn't know how Vistani curses work--he doesn't know that they can be revoked by a blood relative of the one who laid it. He's a Cleric, he has undoubtedly tried remove curse on himself and it failed. As far as he knows, the curse is permanent.
Van Richten is also secretive and, as mentioned, doesn't trust the Vistani. He kept Ezmerelda at arm's length as best he could both because he couldn't trust her, but also to try to protect her from the curse...and even if he was aware of the curse when they traveled together, he never told her about it.

If either one of them had been less secretive, more open, his curse would have been revoked a long time ago.

If the players want to help Van Richten break the curse, here's the backstory:

The story of Ezmerelda and Van Richten's history was written in the Van Richten's Journal (Appendix F: Handouts pages 254-255). It involves him destroying Ezmerelda's caravan while she was very, very young. She survived the undead assault and later got picked up by another caravan of Vistani (it was actually the Zarovan tribe--Madam Eva's caravan). She originally wanted revenge on Van Richten, but time with Eva (and the presence of the most powerful Vistani of them all) showed her the tragedy of what had happened from an outside perspective. Ezmerelda realized that the whole thing was a horrible tragedy and wrongs had been committed on both sides. She, thus, set out to try to find Van Richten and try to make things right...though Eva never told her about the curse her mother had laid on Van Richten.

Van Richten and Ezmerelda must travel to the place the curse was first laid...a small clearing in the forests of Barovia where the ruins of Ezmerelda's caravan still lie. Both must verbally acknowledge the wrong that had been done and verbally forgive one another for it...then the remains of Ezmerelda's caravan must be burned.

THE DISGUISE:

Van Richten got the idea for “Rictavio” from his exposure to Ezmerelda and her occasional methods for blending in when going somewhere that didn't like Vistani. In short: "Sometimes the best disguise is being the most obvious thing in the room." As mentioned above, Ezmerelda has never encountered the Rictavio disguise and Van Richten isn't familiar with any of the disguises Ezmerelda is currently using.

It is a rather perfect disguise. Van Richten is known as a grim and serious individual, a dour old man who roves the world slaying monsters. “Rictavio” is a flamboyant fop who tells ludicrous stories, commits crimes against music, and is constantly trying to recruit people to his Circus of Wonders. He should be portrayed as extremely over the top and completely harmless. It should be very jarring to your players if he drops the act and reveals who he truly is.
Furthermore, Rictavio knows that even if someone suspects he's hiding something, they are extremely unlikely to guess the truth. If a player rolls well on Insight against him and figures out he's full of crap, that only tells them that he's lying about something...not what he is lying about. And his response is to just carry on and ignore accusations. Sure, the PCs may figure out that he's full of it (his stories are obvious fabrications) but he just carries right along, sticking to his guns even though the players know it’s a load of BS.

The players should have a hard time to get a serious read on Rictavio's personality. He strikes them as so straight forward--a carnie who is spinning tall tales for amusement. So they shouldn’t suspect that he's any more than what he appears to be.

A HARD MAN TO PIN DOWN:

Van Richten is a man with a plan for killing Strahd Von Zarovich, and it's a plan that plays well to his aged capabilities: "wait til Strahd takes a long nap, then stake him in his sleep." Of anyone in the valley, Van Richten knows how deadly Strahd is. He has fought elder vampires before and Strahd is the greatest of them all. He may very well believe that trying to fight him head on is pure folly, but he’s the one most capable of doing so.

It's important to note: Most of the "Destined Allies" the party can draw from Madame Eva’s Tarokka card reading have notes about how the PCs can get that individual to join them. Van Richten has no such notes. Instead, it says this...

Van Richten works alone. [...] Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure.

Van Richten is aware of Madame Eva but (unlike many others in the valley) he won't immediately cave to her prophecies, drop everything he has been working on, and throw his lot in with the PCs. Here are a few important things to keep in mind if the party is trying to recruit him...

• Van Richten is quite certain that if he drops his disguise, Strahd will find him and set out to kill him. (This is one of Strahd's Primary Goals as listed in Chapter 1)

• Van Richten's disguise is magically augmented. As long as the party can't get his hat off, they cannot prove that he’s not a carnie ringmaster

• Van Richten's disguise is only useful against Strahd as long as no one knows who he really is. The ring of mind shielding only works on him...it doesn't work on the PCs. He knows that if anyone else finds out, Strahd can charm them, read their mind or otherwise extract that information from them.

• Van Richten is fully aware of his curse. He will avoid physically joining up with the party for fear that he will get them all killed.

• Van Richten does not talk about his curse. He knows well the bravery of adventurers and that telling them about his curse tends to result in responses like "Oh, you don't need to worry about us, we're strong!" followed shortly by ":dying noises:." Rebuffing their advances without mentioning the curse is much more effective at getting them to stay away from him so his curse doesn't kill them.

• Even if Van Richten consents to offer them aid, it should be indirect as much as possible. He has his plan, he's set in his ways, and he’s not going to go gallivanting off with a bunch of young adventurers. And, he should stay in character as much as possible...blowing his cover will only bring Strahd down on him AND the PCs.

Ideally, even if the party can convince him to help...his help should primarily take the form of a surprisingly knowledgeable carnival ringmaster who is "certainly not going to go out and fight monsters with you. I'm a ringmaster, not an adventurer!"

He may lend the party his carnival wagon to travel around in (once he finds somewhere else to stash his saber-toothed tiger that has been trained to hunt Vistani, or he may lend them the tiger), give them helpful advice--possibly using ravens to stay in touch over long-distance if the PCs make friends with the Keepers of the Feather, and provide the sort of support that a Carnie could offer. But, it should take rather extreme circumstances for him to actually be honest with the PCs...and they may have to do something about his curse before he'll actually travel with them.

GETTING HIM TO JOIN UP:

Van Richten wants to stay under cover...so how does the party get him to change his mind?

Easy: Ruin his plan.

If Van Richten's cover is blown, his plan is a wash. The whole plan depends on his identity staying a secret until Strahd goes into hibernation. If Strahd identifies Van Richten before then, he will try to kill him and Van Richten is pretty sure he can't take Strahd in a straight-up fight. Thus...if Van Richten’s cover is blown, he is stuck with two bad choices: Either he tries to keep going it alone, possibly getting killed by Strahd, and fails his “final mission,” or he accepts the risk to the PCs and joins them to try to take Strahd down directly. A few example ways to blow his cover...

• Knock his hat off. A hat of disguise only works as long as it stays on your head, so if something happens that knocks his hat off; “Rictavio” is replaced by Van Richten.

• Let the Tyger Tyger event happen (chapter 5). When Rictavio flees to the Tower of Khazan, he's inside an antimagic field and cannot disguise himself.

• Even if Van Richten is distorting his voice, if the PCs have already befriended Ezmerelda, she may still recognize it...even if what she recognizes is the cadence his voice adopts when he's explaining something.

ABILITY LOADOUT:

Van Richten is a Cleric...and his listed prepared spells speaks more of a support caster than a monster hunter who has gone solo. But, because he's a Cleric, he can swap out his prepared spells at will to any other spells on the Cleric list. Here are a few notes on spells for him to use...

• Dawn creates sunlight. If he can lock a vampire down within the area of effect, they will be dust in short order.

• Dispel Evil and Good breaks a vampire's charm. However...things can't really leave Barovia, so the dismissal part of that spell won't be terribly effective here.

• Geas is useful when he needs to find something. For example, capture a werewolf then place a geas on it to lead them to the den.

• Lesser and Greater Restoration are enormously useful, as is remove curse.

• Guiding Bolt is a great weapon against Vampires. Shuts down their regeneration, and gives the next attack advantage.

• Hallow: If Van Richten can get his hands on the material components for this, he can create holy ground to help protect the PCs. Create a bubble of hallowed ground around the antimagic field that covers the Tower of Khazan....talk about a fortress. Sure, you'll have a bubble of non-hallowed ground where the antimagic field zone is...but the territory around the tower itself will be holy ground.

• Given his skill at predicting his foes...dropping sanctuary on a creature they are about to attack can completely trash their attempts.

• Spirit Guardians is another spell that is just....awesome.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

{{ref}}

[[category:character]][[category:NPC]]
[[category:5th Edition Character]]
[[category::Animal Handler]]
[[category:Arcane Loremaster]]
[[category:Barovian]]
[[category:Cleric]]
[[category:Cursed]]
[[category:Curse of Strahd Continuity]]
[[category:Darkonian]]
[[category:Deceiver]]
[[category:Discoverer]]
[[category:Disguised]]
[[category:Doctor]]
[[category:Driver]]
[[category:Famous]]
[[category:Former Inhabitants of Darkon]]
[[category:Former Student]]
[[category:Former Medical Student]]
[[category:Graduate]]
[[category:hero]]
[[category:human]]
[[category:Hunter Of Monsters]]
[[category:Imposter]]
[[category:Inhabitants of Barovia]]
[[category:Inhabitants of Vallaki]]
[[category:Investigator]]
[[category:Killer]]
[[category:Lawful Good]]
[[category:Liar]]
[[category:Loner]]
[[category:male]]
[[category:Medical Doctor]]
[[category:Medical Professional]]
[[category:Mentor]]
[[category:Murderer]]
[[category:professional Killer]]
[[category:Ravenloft Loremaster]]
[[category:Researcher]]
[[category:Scholar]]
[[category:Vistani Hunter]]
[[category:Undead Hunter]]
[[category:Vampire Hunter]]

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (NPC)

2022-01-29T16:43:36Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* In Curse of Strahd */

[[File:Original VR.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
[[File:Rudolph van richten.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten and [[Strahd]] by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
{{canon}}
'''Dr. Rudolph Van Richten''' is the greatest monster hunter that has ever lived and the most well-known hero of the Lands of the Mists.

==History==
He was born in [[Rivalis]] in [[Darkon]] in [[671 BC]]. He took [[medicine]] at the [[University of Il Aluk]], completing his four or five year program of study in [[693 BC]]. This humble man was spurred into a life of monster hunting when his son [[Erasmus van Richten]] was kidnapped by the [[Radanavich clan]] and sold to [[Baron Metus]]. Metus turned Erasmus into a [[vampire groom]] and Van Richten was forced to slay his son. In revenge, Metus killed Rudolph's wife, [[Ingrid van Richten]]. Van Richten eventually slew Metus, and then, with the help of [[Azalin]], the entire [[Radanavich tribe]].

Until his disappearance in [[750 BC]], he resided in [[Mordentshire]], where he ran an [[Van Richten's Herbalist Shop|herbalist shop]], as well as wrote several of his famous [[Van Richten's Guides]], and mentored [[The Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]], who regarded him as an uncle and took up his work.

==In [[Curse of Strahd]]==
Dr. van Richten makes a notable appearance in the [[5th Edition]] [[module]], [[Curse of Strahd]], though not in his [[famous]] persona as the monster hunter and [[writer]] of the [[Van Richten's Guides]] he is notable for in previous Ravenloft products. Instead, he adopts the guise of [[Rictavio]], a traveling [[half-elf]] [[bard]], [[storyteller]], and [[ringmaster]] gathering stories and watching out for talent. In reality he is gathering formation and waiting for an optimal time to strike at [[Strahd]], preferably when the vampire lord is in [[hibernation]]. Unlike other versions of van Richten, the Curse of Strahd van Richten is a [[loner]] because he knows the full extent of his [[curse]].<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> For more details, see [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Curse of Strahd)]]

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

A CURSED MAN:

Van Richten suffers a curse bestowed on him by a Vistani:

Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws.

Its effect on him can best be summarized with this statement: "Van Richten Dies Last." This curse is both a boon and a bane to him. The curse is a large part of why he has lived so long--how he has accumulated so much experience and expertise. He is cursed to always see his friends and allies die--which means he has to live long enough to see it happen.

For a long time, he was unaware of the exact nature of the curse on him, but he is apparently aware of it now.

• Van Richten feels guilty. For decades he fought alongside others with monsters, completely unaware that he was a doombringer among them. Now that he knows, he is burdened by all the deaths he feels that his presence caused.

• Van Richten isolates himself. He doesn't let people get close to him for fear that his curse will take them out.

• If Van Richten is traveling with the party, he has excellent odds of surviving--if someone is going to die in the party, it'll be someone other than him.

• Van Richten's curse should have a tangible impact if he’s traveling with the party: he is a doombringer of the highest order. His mere presence among the party should invite tragedy and disaster.

The Tragedy of Ezmerelda and Van Richten. In the backstory that created Ezmerelda d’Avenir (Appendix D: Monsters and NPCs pages 230-231), there's a tragedy in there: Van Richten's curse could have been lifted years ago.

By Ravenloft Lore, the strongest of curses laid down by a Vistani can only be lifted by the Vistani who placed it, or a blood relative of that Vistani. Van Richten's curse was a Death Curse laid on him by Ezmerelda's mother. Only Ezmerelda has the ability to revoke the curse. But here's the problem...
Ezmerelda is Vistani...by nature; they are secretive about their abilities. Beyond that, Van Richten doesn't trust Vistani and likely commanded Ezmerelda to not use her Vistani abilities in his presence. As a result, Van Richten doesn't know how Vistani curses work--he doesn't know that they can be revoked by a blood relative of the one who laid it. He's a Cleric, he has undoubtedly tried remove curse on himself and it failed. As far as he knows, the curse is permanent.
Van Richten is also secretive and, as mentioned, doesn't trust the Vistani. He kept Ezmerelda at arm's length as best he could both because he couldn't trust her, but also to try to protect her from the curse...and even if he was aware of the curse when they traveled together, he never told her about it.

If either one of them had been less secretive, more open, his curse would have been revoked a long time ago.

If the players want to help Van Richten break the curse, here's the backstory:

The story of Ezmerelda and Van Richten's history was written in the Van Richten's Journal (Appendix F: Handouts pages 254-255). It involves him destroying Ezmerelda's caravan while she was very, very young. She survived the undead assault and later got picked up by another caravan of Vistani (it was actually the Zarovan tribe--Madam Eva's caravan). She originally wanted revenge on Van Richten, but time with Eva (and the presence of the most powerful Vistani of them all) showed her the tragedy of what had happened from an outside perspective. Ezmerelda realized that the whole thing was a horrible tragedy and wrongs had been committed on both sides. She, thus, set out to try to find Van Richten and try to make things right...though Eva never told her about the curse her mother had laid on Van Richten.

Van Richten and Ezmerelda must travel to the place the curse was first laid...a small clearing in the forests of Barovia where the ruins of Ezmerelda's caravan still lie. Both must verbally acknowledge the wrong that had been done and verbally forgive one another for it...then the remains of Ezmerelda's caravan must be burned.

THE DISGUISE:

Van Richten got the idea for “Rictavio” from his exposure to Ezmerelda and her occasional methods for blending in when going somewhere that didn't like Vistani. In short: "Sometimes the best disguise is being the most obvious thing in the room." As mentioned above, Ezmerelda has never encountered the Rictavio disguise and Van Richten isn't familiar with any of the disguises Ezmerelda is currently using.

It is a rather perfect disguise. Van Richten is known as a grim and serious individual, a dour old man who roves the world slaying monsters. “Rictavio” is a flamboyant fop who tells ludicrous stories, commits crimes against music, and is constantly trying to recruit people to his Circus of Wonders. He should be portrayed as extremely over the top and completely harmless. It should be very jarring to your players if he drops the act and reveals who he truly is.
Furthermore, Rictavio knows that even if someone suspects he's hiding something, they are extremely unlikely to guess the truth. If a player rolls well on Insight against him and figures out he's full of crap, that only tells them that he's lying about something...not what he is lying about. And his response is to just carry on and ignore accusations. Sure, the PCs may figure out that he's full of it (his stories are obvious fabrications) but he just carries right along, sticking to his guns even though the players know it’s a load of BS.

The players should have a hard time to get a serious read on Rictavio's personality. He strikes them as so straight forward--a carnie who is spinning tall tales for amusement. So they shouldn’t suspect that he's any more than what he appears to be.

A HARD MAN TO PIN DOWN:

Van Richten is a man with a plan for killing Strahd Von Zarovich, and it's a plan that plays well to his aged capabilities: "wait til Strahd takes a long nap, then stake him in his sleep." Of anyone in the valley, Van Richten knows how deadly Strahd is. He has fought elder vampires before and Strahd is the greatest of them all. He may very well believe that trying to fight him head on is pure folly, but he’s the one most capable of doing so.

It's important to note: Most of the "Destined Allies" the party can draw from Madame Eva’s Tarokka card reading have notes about how the PCs can get that individual to join them. Van Richten has no such notes. Instead, it says this...

Van Richten works alone. [...] Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure.

Van Richten is aware of Madame Eva but (unlike many others in the valley) he won't immediately cave to her prophecies, drop everything he has been working on, and throw his lot in with the PCs. Here are a few important things to keep in mind if the party is trying to recruit him...

• Van Richten is quite certain that if he drops his disguise, Strahd will find him and set out to kill him. (This is one of Strahd's Primary Goals as listed in Chapter 1)

• Van Richten's disguise is magically augmented. As long as the party can't get his hat off, they cannot prove that he’s not a carnie ringmaster

• Van Richten's disguise is only useful against Strahd as long as no one knows who he really is. The ring of mind shielding only works on him...it doesn't work on the PCs. He knows that if anyone else finds out, Strahd can charm them, read their mind or otherwise extract that information from them.

• Van Richten is fully aware of his curse. He will avoid physically joining up with the party for fear that he will get them all killed.

• Van Richten does not talk about his curse. He knows well the bravery of adventurers and that telling them about his curse tends to result in responses like "Oh, you don't need to worry about us, we're strong!" followed shortly by ":dying noises:." Rebuffing their advances without mentioning the curse is much more effective at getting them to stay away from him so his curse doesn't kill them.

• Even if Van Richten consents to offer them aid, it should be indirect as much as possible. He has his plan, he's set in his ways, and he’s not going to go gallivanting off with a bunch of young adventurers. And, he should stay in character as much as possible...blowing his cover will only bring Strahd down on him AND the PCs.

Ideally, even if the party can convince him to help...his help should primarily take the form of a surprisingly knowledgeable carnival ringmaster who is "certainly not going to go out and fight monsters with you. I'm a ringmaster, not an adventurer!"

He may lend the party his carnival wagon to travel around in (once he finds somewhere else to stash his saber-toothed tiger that has been trained to hunt Vistani, or he may lend them the tiger), give them helpful advice--possibly using ravens to stay in touch over long-distance if the PCs make friends with the Keepers of the Feather, and provide the sort of support that a Carnie could offer. But, it should take rather extreme circumstances for him to actually be honest with the PCs...and they may have to do something about his curse before he'll actually travel with them.

GETTING HIM TO JOIN UP:

Van Richten wants to stay under cover...so how does the party get him to change his mind?

Easy: Ruin his plan.

If Van Richten's cover is blown, his plan is a wash. The whole plan depends on his identity staying a secret until Strahd goes into hibernation. If Strahd identifies Van Richten before then, he will try to kill him and Van Richten is pretty sure he can't take Strahd in a straight-up fight. Thus...if Van Richten’s cover is blown, he is stuck with two bad choices: Either he tries to keep going it alone, possibly getting killed by Strahd, and fails his “final mission,” or he accepts the risk to the PCs and joins them to try to take Strahd down directly. A few example ways to blow his cover...

• Knock his hat off. A hat of disguise only works as long as it stays on your head, so if something happens that knocks his hat off; “Rictavio” is replaced by Van Richten.

• Let the Tyger Tyger event happen (chapter 5). When Rictavio flees to the Tower of Khazan, he's inside an antimagic field and cannot disguise himself.

• Even if Van Richten is distorting his voice, if the PCs have already befriended Ezmerelda, she may still recognize it...even if what she recognizes is the cadence his voice adopts when he's explaining something.

ABILITY LOADOUT:

Van Richten is a Cleric...and his listed prepared spells speaks more of a support caster than a monster hunter who has gone solo. But, because he's a Cleric, he can swap out his prepared spells at will to any other spells on the Cleric list. Here are a few notes on spells for him to use...

• Dawn creates sunlight. If he can lock a vampire down within the area of effect, they will be dust in short order.

• Dispel Evil and Good breaks a vampire's charm. However...things can't really leave Barovia, so the dismissal part of that spell won't be terribly effective here.

• Geas is useful when he needs to find something. For example, capture a werewolf then place a geas on it to lead them to the den.

• Lesser and Greater Restoration are enormously useful, as is remove curse.

• Guiding Bolt is a great weapon against Vampires. Shuts down their regeneration, and gives the next attack advantage.

• Hallow: If Van Richten can get his hands on the material components for this, he can create holy ground to help protect the PCs. Create a bubble of hallowed ground around the antimagic field that covers the Tower of Khazan....talk about a fortress. Sure, you'll have a bubble of non-hallowed ground where the antimagic field zone is...but the territory around the tower itself will be holy ground.

• Given his skill at predicting his foes...dropping sanctuary on a creature they are about to attack can completely trash their attempts.

• Spirit Guardians is another spell that is just....awesome.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Authored:==
* ''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Demons]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Witches (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Witches]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]''

Credited for marketing purposes with:
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Mists (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Mists]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]]''

==[[Associate of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]==

==Chronology==

[[671 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten born<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, son of Otto and Mrs. Van Richten
 
{{Spec|[[678 BC]] - Rudolph’s sister [[Maria Van Richten]] born.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 18 "Speculation based on BH. We only know that she is younger than Rudolph."</ref>
 

[[679 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten sent to boarding school in [[Nartok]]. A childhood friend is [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]].<ref name="VRMHCII p.25-26">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 25-26</ref>

[[680 BC]] - [[Casimir (of Richten Haus)|Casimir]] (not to be confused with [[Casimir Lukas|Harkon Lukas’ son]]) starts working at Richten Haus as the gate keeper.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 6">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 6</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[683 BC]] - The servants of [[Richten Haus]] are all killed while the family is away one day. (summer)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.18: "Speculation based on [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] pg. 15, 24: I’m going on the hunch that VR grows younger until he reaches the age he was at when this event occurred"</ref>
 

[[685 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten meets [[Robert Tatenna]], a fellow student at boarding school. (fall)<ref name="CT p.14">[[Chilling Tales]] p.14</ref>

[[688 BC]] - The [[The Crimson Death Epidemic | Crimson Death]] spreads across Darkon (winter); it claims Van Richten’s great aunt Helga, despite his efforts; Rudolph is even more driven into his medical studies.<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[689 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten attends the [[University of Il Aluk]]. While there, he meets a fellow student, [[Dr. Harmon Ruscheider]]. (fall)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]] pg. 15"</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[691 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten marries his childhood sweetheart, [[Ingrid van Richten|Ingrid]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "[[Realm of Terror]]; [[VRGtV]]: Give VR a good respectable year between their marriage and birth of Erasmus in 692"</ref>
 

[[692 BC]] - Rudolph and Ingrid Van Richten's son [[Erasmus van Richten|Erasmus]] is born.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]] p. 4; [[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 8, "fourteen summers" before [[706 BC]]</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[693 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten finishes his studies; opens his practice back home in [[Rivalis]].}},<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VR’s age, RoT; VRGtV; and ToDm pg. 86, which indicates it takes 4-5 years to get a medical education at the University of Il Aluk"</ref> 
 
{{Spec|693 BC - Dr. Van Richten travels to [[Lamordia]], hears of the [[Loud Man of Lamordia]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VRGtG pg. 9: “When I was young.”</ref> 

[[696 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Antonin Madren]] and becomes his mentor.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 21: "VRGttC pg. 6: Van Richten takes Madren on as a medical student, which implies Van Richten has time to offer such an education (which lasts up to 8 years), i.e., while he was still a simple doctor (693-706)."</ref>

[[706 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten suffers the wrath of the [[Radanavich clan]]; the Vistani steal his son Erasmus; they sell Erasmus to [[Baron Metus]]<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, a vampire from [[Richemulot]]; with the help of an amused [[Azalin]], Van Richten wipes out all but one member of the Radanavich caravan<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]</ref>; [[Madame Radanavich]] [[curse | curses]] Van Richten<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, although he doesn’t realize it until the end of his career.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

[[706 BC]] Van Richten puts his Erasmus, now a vampire, out of his misery, but in spite [[Baron Metus]] tears [[Ingrid van Richten]] to pieces; Dr. Van Richten destroys Baron Metus, starting his career of hunting evil. Unable to live with the memories in [[Richten Haus]], Van Richten moves to [[Corvia]].<ref name="VRA p. 5">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 5</ref>

[[707 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten researches vampires, and meets [[Aimon Davidovitch]], a fellow scholar of the arcane.<ref> from [[JWM Timeline]] p.22: "[[VRGtF]] pg. 4: VR knew him for “some 30-odd years”]</ref>

[[710 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten encounters his first werebeast near [[Varithne]], a small village in northern [[Darkon]]. Dr. Van Richten starts hunting werebeasts as well<ref name="VRMHC p. 109-110">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 109-110</ref>

[[711 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Gedlan Ironheart]], a fearless [[dwarven]] [[innkeeper]] in [[Corvia]]. Gedlan becomes a frequent hunting companion.<ref name="Bleah House p. 11">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p.11</ref>

[[712 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets the mage [[Shauten]]; they bond when they are attacked by one of Azalin's patrols. Shauten opens Van Richten's eyes to the existence of the [[Lich]].<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref>

[[713 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten is visited by the dying Dr. Ruscheider, who tells Rudolph all he can about several months spent as a lich's captive; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting liches.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p.111-112</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[714 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten receives a visit from his childhood friend, [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]], who is now a ghostly slave to Azalin; Dr. Van Richten learns the terrible truth about [[Azalin Rex]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on [[VRGtG]] pg. 22, [[VRMHCII]] pg. 24</ref>
 

{{Spec|714 BC - Dr. Van Richten moves to [[Mordentshire]], sensing it is politically unsafe for him to remain in [[Darkon]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on VRGttL pg. 22</ref>
 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[716 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 3 n1">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade after her death, but [[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[718 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and [[Shauten]] battle a creature they believe to be a priestly [[lich]]; it is actually Van Richten's first [[ancient dead]]}}.<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] "Speculation based on VRGAD pg. 5: “Some years ago,” and other markers. It happened after VR started hunting liches, but before he started hunting ghosts. (The latter conclusion taken from numerous references to Claudia in this Guide"</ref>
 
[[724 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten battles the [[Bog Monster of Hroth]], and meets [[Jameld of Hroth|Jameld]]. This is also Van Richten's first visit to both [[Kartakass]] and [[Sithicus]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p.153</ref> 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[726 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decade n1">[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades after her death but[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade</ref> 

{{Spec|726 BC - Dr. Van Richten visits [[Sanguinia]] with [[George Weathermay]] and [[Arametrius]]; they meet [[Claudia DeShanes]]; Claudia becomes Rudolph’s assistant, and it seems he had certain unspoken feelings for her.}}<ref>Speculation from JWM Timeline p.28: "Since Arametrius is probably [[Athasian]], Van Richten may have recently visited [[Kalidnay]] and encountered [[Ahmose Tanit]]. [VRGtG pg. 73. This is the earliest possible date for this event (due to George’s inclusion, and we know from this source and BH that VR starts hunting ghosts one year after this event. That leaves only 9 years between VR starting to hunt and writing his Guide on the subject. I chose to go with this date to keep as wide a margin of opportunity as possible.]"</ref>
 

[[727 BC]] - [[Merilee Markuza]], the Child [[Vampire]], kills Claudia. Van Richten pursues the creature relentlessly, but loses her in [[Lamordia]].<ref name="Darklords p. 63">[[Darklords]] p. 63</ref>

727 BC - While hunting the Child Vampire, Van Richten witnesses the [[Thundering Carriage]]; Van Richten decides he must put an end to these ghostly horrors, too.<ref name="Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts p. 6">[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 6</ref>

[[728 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten defeats the [[Phantom Army]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 91</ref>

[[729 BC]] - The fiend [[Elsepeth]] enters Ravenloft via [[transposition]] in a small village outside [[Stangengrad]], near the [[Grashen Falls]] (sept)<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.28: "[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] pg. 14: the diary is dated “twelve years ago.”</ref>

[[730 BC]] - {{Spec|[[Gedlan Ironheart]] killed while battling evil spirits.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: "VRGtG pg. 23: Gedlan is referred to as “Geddar” in this book. The date is an estimate based on the 727-736 available time span."</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] leaves [[Borca]], having lurked there for years.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] p. 66</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] writes to Van Richten about the death of Madren’s sister.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[734 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] shows up on Van Richten's doorstep, and gives the good doctor his notes; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting the [[Created]].}}<ref>JWM Timeline p. 30: "VRGttC pg. 6: Estimate. “Years” after Madren wrote about his sister’s death"</ref> 

[[735 BC] - Dr. Van Richten is forced to kill his old friend [[Shauten]] in self-defense, when Shauten tries to sacrifice Rudolph in a bid for [[lichdom]]<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref><ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>. {{Spec|This "near-miss" may have inspired Van Richten to start recording his collected knowledge for heroes to come.}}<ref>JWM Timeline: "Speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6"</ref>

735 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''.<ref name="RLCS p.18">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.18</ref><ref name="RLPHB p.20">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.20</ref>

[[736 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''.

[[737 BC]] - The [[Vistana]] [[Cyrilla]]'s niece [[Vassa]] is [[kidnapped]] near [[Corvia]].<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 20: The golem appeared “the following year” after Vaasa’s soul is taken."</ref>

737 BC - [[Vassa]] returns as a [[clay golem]]; Cyrilla writes to Dr. Van Richten.<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 19 "just last year"</ref>

737 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''.

[[738 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''.

[[738 BC]] [[Emil Bollenbach]] engineers the [[kidnapping]] of Dr. Rudolph van Richten to the end of seizing his [[brain]] for [[transplantation]] into a super-golem. fortunately, several of Van Richten's friends intercede to thwart Dr. Bollenbach.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 33: "[[Children of the Night: The Created]] pg. 50; CT pg. 32 places this adventure 8 years after Emil’s disappearance (i.e., 746), but the dating used in CotN:C fits VR’s chronology better.</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] goes to [[Nartok]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 67-68">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.67-68</ref>

[[739 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and the adventuring band known as [[the Hand (Adventurer Band)|the Hand]] hunt and destroy [[the Gibbering Golem]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 265-276">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.265-276</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]] publishes ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''. This act earns him considerable ire from [[Agatha Clairmont]], whom sees it as an instruction manual to building [[dread golem]]s just much as it is hunting them.<ref name="Van Richten's Arsenal p. 149">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p. 149</ref>

[[740 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]'' (early spring).

740 BC - Dr. Van Richten inherits the [[library (Aimon Davidovitch)]] of [[Aimon Davidovitch]]. Dr. Van Richten starts studying tomes. (Sept)<ref>JWM Timeline p. 35 "Extrapolated from VRGtF pg. 4"</ref>

[[741 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]], [[Davvyd]], [[Samuel]] and [[Dr. Ottelie Farringer]] battle the fiend [[Drigor]]. Only Dr. van Richten survives. (Feb.)<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 79-85">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p. 79-85</ref>

741 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]]''.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Book)]] p.4</ref>

741 BC - [[Van Richten]] stumbles into the clutches of [[the nameless Amnizu]] and [[the nameless Barbazu]] infesting [[Chateaufaux]]. He is captured. However, he manages to join with some [[adventurer]]s to route the [[devil]]s from the town.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.72-73; Note that the encounter with these [[fiend]]s doesn't appear in the original uncompiled Van Richten's Guide to Fiends. Therefore, the encounter with the [[Fiends of Chateaufaux]] took place after took place after the first VRGtF was published.</ref><ref>[[Gazetteer III]] p.30-31, "just over 15 years ago"</ref>

741 BC<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> - Dr. Van Richten is [[depressed]]; he consults with the [[diviner]], [[Inarin Alster]]; Rudolph realizes he had been laboring under a [[curse]] all these years; Dr. Van Richten spends a year with [[Arturi Radanavich]] studying the Vistani.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]] p.5-7; 87-89</ref>

[[742 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten writes his ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]'' and retires.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> (Oct.)

[[750 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten dies in [[Richten Haus|Bleak House]] in the fight against [[Madame Radanavich]]<ref>[[Domains of Dread]] p. 17, as told in [[Bleak House]], particularly [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 58-63</ref> Meanwhile, all that is known to most, including the [[Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]] is that he [[disappeared]].<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

{{ref}}

[[category:Character]] [[category:NPC]]
[[category:2nd Edition Character]]
[[category:3rd Edition Character]]
[[category:4th Edition Character]]
[[category:5th Edition Character]]
[[category:Abused]]
[[category:Betrayed]]
[[Category:Cursed]]
[[category:Cursed by the Vistani]]
[[Category:Darkonian]]
[[Category:Demonologist]]
[[category:Energy Drained]]
[[Category:Filicide]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Rivalis]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Nartok]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Forest of Shadows]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Darkon]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordentshire]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordent]]
[[Category:Former Patients of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Dominia]]
[[Category:Former Medical Student]]
[[Category:Former Student of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[category:Gaslighted]]
[[category:Giogoto]]
[[Category:Ghost]]
[[Category:Graduate of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Graduate]]
[[Category:Herbalist]]
[[Category:Human]]
[[category:healer]]
[[category:Hero]]
[[Category:Hunter Of Monsters]]
[[Category:Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[category:Intellectual]]
[[Category:Kidnapped]]
[[category:Killer]]
[[category:Lorist]]
[[Category:Male]]
[[category:Mass Murderer]]
[[category:Medical Doctor]]
[[category:Medical Professional]]
[[category:Mentor]]
[[category:Murderer]]
[[Category:Necrologist]]
[[category:Old]]
[[Category:Planar Mechanic]]
[[category:Polymath]]
[[category:Posthumous Character]]
[[category:Potential Darklord]]
[[Category:Proprietor]]
[[category:Professional Killer]]
[[category:Punished]]
[[category:Ravenloft Lorist]]
[[Category:Ravenloft Loremaster]]
[[category:Redeemed]]
[[category:Reformed]]
[[category:Repentant]]
[[category:Researcher]]
[[category:Retired]]
[[Category:Rogue]]
[[category:Sage]]
[[category:Seduced]]
[[Category:Stasis]]
[[category:Tempted]]
[[category:Transgressed]]
[[category:Transgressor]]
[[Category:Van Richten Family]]
[[category:Victim of Medical Malpractice]]
[[Category:Victim of the van Richten Curse]]
[[category:Victimized]]
[[Category:Widowed]]
[[Category:writer]]
[[category:Births in 671 BC]]
[[category:Deaths in 750 BC]]
<references/>

==Data from the Ravenloft Catalogue==



{|
|-valign="top"
|[[Image:rldb_npc.jpg]]
|[[Image:rldb_primary.gif]]
|
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' 
''[[Bleak House]]''
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_art.gif]]
|
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - p4 
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - cover, p4 
''[[Bleak House:Homecoming]]'' - p4,p16 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - p7,8 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p92 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - p114 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 5,11 
''[[The Created]]'' - p13 
''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]'' - p5
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_stats.gif]]
|
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - pp4-5 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p91 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 3
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_desc.gif]]
|
''[[Ravenloft Third Edition]]'' - pp14,17-18,27,176 
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - throughout 
''[[Bleak House]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to The Created]]'' - throughout 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]'' - throughout 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - pp91-93 
''[[Tales of Ravenloft: The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]'' - pp1-17 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - pp 2-3 
''[[Heroes of Light]]'' - p64 
''[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]]'' - pp1-4, pp9-13, pp304-310
|-valign="top"
|}

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Article)

2022-01-29T16:42:52Z

Blade Runner Rock:

DR. RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN

Medium humanoid (human), Lawful Good

Armor Class: 17 (half plate of flowing sanctity)

Hit Points: 77 (14d8 +14)

Speed: 30 ft.

Strength: 9 (-1)

Dexterity: 13 (+1)

Constitution: 13 (+1)

Intelligence: 17 (+3)

Wisdom: 18 (+4)

Charisma: 16 (+3)

Saving Throws: Con +5, Wis +8, Cha +7

Skills: Arcana +7, Deception +7, Insight +12,
Investigation +7, Medicine +8, Perception +12,
Religion +6, Sleight of Hand +4

Condition Immunities: charmed

Senses: darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 22

Languages: Abyssal, Celestial, Common, Draconic, Dwarvish, Elvish, Gundarak, Infernal, Sylvan

Challenge: 9 (5,000 XP)

SPECIAL EQUIPMENT:

In addition to his +1 sword cane and light crossbow, Van Richten wears a hat of disguise, goggles of night, and a ring of mind shielding, and he carries a spell scroll of raise dead.

Half Plate of Flowing Sanctity +1 mithril half plate. Once a day, a flask of water placed in the belt of armor becomes holy water.

ACTIONS:

Spellcasting: Van Richter is a 9th level Cleric of Helm, 1st level Wizard. His spellcasting ability is Wisdom (save DC 15, +7 to hit with spell attacks). Van Richten has the following Cleric and Wizard spells prepared:

Cantrips (at will): light, mage hand, mending, minor illusion, prestidigitation, sacred flame, thaumaturgy, toll the dead

1st level (4 slots): alarm, bless, cure wounds, detect evil and good, feather fall, find familiar, healing word, identify, protection from evil and good, shield, sleep

2nd level (3 slots): augury, beacon of hope, lesser restoration, protection from poison, silence, spiritual weapon warding bond, zone of truth

3rd level (3 slots): glyph of warding, magic circle, mass healing word, revivify, speak with dead, spirit guardians

4th level (3 slots): death ward, freedom of movement

5th level (3 slots): dawn, greater restoration, mass cure wounds, raise dead

Skulker: Van Richten can hide when he is lightly obscured from the creature from which he is hiding. When he’s hidden from a creature and misses it with a ranged weapon attack, making the attack doesn’t reveal his position. Dim light doesn’t impose disadvantage on his Wisdom (Perception) checks relying on sight.

Undead Slayer: When Van Richten hits an undead with a weapon attack, the undead takes an extra 10 (3d6) damage of weapon’s type.

Cunning Action: Van Richten can use a bonus action to take the Dash, Disengage or Hide action.

Sneak Attack: When Van Richten surprises a target, has advantage on an attack roll, or an enemy is within 5 ft. of the target, Van Richten deals and extra 7 damage.

Assassin Proficiencies: Van Richten is proficient with Disguise and Poisoner’s Kits.

Assassinate: When Van Richten hits a surprised enemy, it’s automatically a critical hit. When he attacks an enemy that hasn’t yet had a turn, he gains advantage on the attack.

Channel Divinity: Turn Undead: Undead within 30 ft. of Van Richten must make a Wisdom saving throw. If the creature fails its saving throw, they are turned for 1 minute or until they take damage. A turned creature must spend its turns trying to move as far away from him as it can, and it can’t willingly move to a space within 30 ft. of him. It also can’t take reactions. For its action, it can use only the Dash action or try to escape from an effect that prevents it from moving. If there’s nowhere to move, the creature can use the Dodge action. Undead with CR 1 or less are automatically destroyed on a failed save.

Preserve Life: As an action, Van Richten can distribute 45 hit points. This feature can restore a creature to no more than half of its hit point maximum and has no effect on an undead or construct.

Multiattack: Van Richten makes two attacks with his sword cane or light crossbow.

Sword Cane: Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 6 (1d6 +2) bludgeon damage (wooden cane) or piercing damage (silvered sword).

Light Crossbow: Ranged Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, range 80/320 ft., one target. Hit: 7 (1d8 +2) piercing damage.

Healer: As an action, Van Richten can spend one use of a Healer’s Kit to tend to a creature and restore 1d6 +4 hit points to it, plus additional hit points equal to the creature’s maximum number of Hit Dice. The creature can’t regain hit points from this feat again until it finishes a short or long rest.

REACTIONS:

Final Ward: Van Richten has a permanent glyph of warding tattooed on his neck that activates when he’s bitten there and chooses to say “Erasmus, I’m coming home” in Celestial. All targets in a 20 ft. radius must make a Dexterity saving throw or take 5d8 +5 radiant damage on a failed save or half as much (rounded up) on a successful one. Van Richten automatically fails the save and is disintegrated along with all of the items on his person.

RICTAVIO:

Several months ago a colorfully dressed half-elf bard came to Barovia in a carnival wagon, with a pet monkey on his shoulder. He took over an abandoned tower on Lake Baratok before rolling into town of Vallaki several months later. Claiming to be a carnival ringmaster in search of new actors, he began regaling locals with tales of distant lands.

MONSTER HUNTER:

The half-elf ringmaster is, in fact, the legendary human monster hunter named Rudolph Van Richten. Van Richten’s tale is a sad one. A scholar and doctor from a land called Darkon, he married his childhood sweetheart, Ingrid and together they had a son, Erasmus. When he was fourteen, Erasmus was stolen away by Vistani and sold to a vampire named Baron Metus to be used as a companion. By the time Van Richten found his son, it was too late: the Baron had already transformed Erasmus into a vampire spawn. Erasmus begged his father to end his suffering, which Van Richten did by pounding a wooden stake through his son’s chest. Baron Metus avenged that death by killing Van Richten’s wife, and Van Richten has lived with the horror of his family’s destruction ever since. After destroying Baron Metus in turn, Van Richten sought revenge against the Vistani and took up a life of hunting evil monsters.

THE WAITING GAME:

Van Richten isn’t a young man anymore. He knows his road is coming to an end, but his work isn’t done. He has come to Barovia to kill Strahd Von Zarovich, the greatest vampire of them all. Van Richten has studied Strahd for years and knows he can’t hope to best the vampire in a straight-up confrontation: he must wait for the right moment to strike. He has good evidence to suggest that Strahd periodically hibernates in his coffin, sometimes for years, when all is quite in the realm. While he bides his time, Van Richten hides in plain sight with the aid of a hat of disguise, his thoughts protected by a ring of mind shielding. He is trying to learn more about the Keepers of the Feather—a society of wereravens that oppose Strahd—while trying not to expose the secret society to their mutual enemy. He thinks the wereravens might prove helpful when the time comes. Van Richten also wants to take out as many of Strahd’s spies as he can, starting with the Vistani.

MAN WITH A PLAN:

Van Richten doesn’t know that his former protégé, a good-aligned Vistani named Ezmerelda d’Avenir, has come to Barovia looking for him. He taught her many of his monster-hunting techniques, but she doesn’t know all of his tricks and disguises. So far, their paths haven’t crossed. In the event that Van Richten becomes aware of Ezmerelda’s presence, he does his utmost to protect her without putting his own plans in jeopardy. If he can manipulate a party of adventurers into keeping an eye on her, he will do so.

VAN RICHTEN WORKS ALONE:

A curse placed on him long ago by a Vistani seer brings doom to those he befriends (see ‘Role Playing Notes’ for details). Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure. Consequently, if he thinks he’s in danger of being unmasked, he retreats to the Tower of Khazan (chapter 11) or some other quiet corner of Strahd’s domain to plan further.

TRAITS:

Ideal. “Evil cannot go unchallenged.”

Bond. “To protect those I love, I must keep them distant and hidden from my enemies.”

Flaw. “I am cursed. Thus, I will never have peace.”

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the greatest and most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

A CURSED MAN:

Van Richten suffers a curse bestowed on him by a Vistani:

Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws.

Its effect on him can best be summarized with this statement: "Van Richten Dies Last." This curse is both a boon and a bane to him. The curse is a large part of why he has lived so long--how he has accumulated so much experience and expertise. He is cursed to always see his friends and allies die--which means he has to live long enough to see it happen.

For a long time, he was unaware of the exact nature of the curse on him, but he is apparently aware of it now.

• Van Richten feels guilty. For decades he fought alongside others with monsters, completely unaware that he was a doombringer among them. Now that he knows, he is burdened by all the deaths he feels that his presence caused.

• Van Richten isolates himself. He doesn't let people get close to him for fear that his curse will take them out.

• If Van Richten is traveling with the party, he has excellent odds of surviving--if someone is going to die in the party, it'll be someone other than him.

• Van Richten's curse should have a tangible impact if he’s traveling with the party: he is a doombringer of the highest order. His mere presence among the party should invite tragedy and disaster.

The Tragedy of Ezmerelda and Van Richten. In the backstory that created Ezmerelda d’Avenir (Appendix D: Monsters and NPCs pages 230-231), there's a tragedy in there: Van Richten's curse could have been lifted years ago.

By Ravenloft Lore, the strongest of curses laid down by a Vistani can only be lifted by the Vistani who placed it, or a blood relative of that Vistani. Van Richten's curse was a Death Curse laid on him by Ezmerelda's mother. Only Ezmerelda has the ability to revoke the curse. But here's the problem...
Ezmerelda is Vistani...by nature; they are secretive about their abilities. Beyond that, Van Richten doesn't trust Vistani and likely commanded Ezmerelda to not use her Vistani abilities in his presence. As a result, Van Richten doesn't know how Vistani curses work--he doesn't know that they can be revoked by a blood relative of the one who laid it. He's a Cleric, he has undoubtedly tried remove curse on himself and it failed. As far as he knows, the curse is permanent.
Van Richten is also secretive and, as mentioned, doesn't trust the Vistani. He kept Ezmerelda at arm's length as best he could both because he couldn't trust her, but also to try to protect her from the curse...and even if he was aware of the curse when they traveled together, he never told her about it.

If either one of them had been less secretive, more open, his curse would have been revoked a long time ago.

If the players want to help Van Richten break the curse, here's the backstory:

The story of Ezmerelda and Van Richten's history was written in the Van Richten's Journal (Appendix F: Handouts pages 254-255). It involves him destroying Ezmerelda's caravan while she was very, very young. She survived the undead assault and later got picked up by another caravan of Vistani (it was actually the Zarovan tribe--Madam Eva's caravan). She originally wanted revenge on Van Richten, but time with Eva (and the presence of the most powerful Vistani of them all) showed her the tragedy of what had happened from an outside perspective. Ezmerelda realized that the whole thing was a horrible tragedy and wrongs had been committed on both sides. She, thus, set out to try to find Van Richten and try to make things right...though Eva never told her about the curse her mother had laid on Van Richten.

Van Richten and Ezmerelda must travel to the place the curse was first laid...a small clearing in the forests of Barovia where the ruins of Ezmerelda's caravan still lie. Both must verbally acknowledge the wrong that had been done and verbally forgive one another for it...then the remains of Ezmerelda's caravan must be burned.

THE DISGUISE:

Van Richten got the idea for “Rictavio” from his exposure to Ezmerelda and her occasional methods for blending in when going somewhere that didn't like Vistani. In short: "Sometimes the best disguise is being the most obvious thing in the room." As mentioned above, Ezmerelda has never encountered the Rictavio disguise and Van Richten isn't familiar with any of the disguises Ezmerelda is currently using.

It is a rather perfect disguise. Van Richten is known as a grim and serious individual, a dour old man who roves the world slaying monsters. “Rictavio” is a flamboyant fop who tells ludicrous stories, commits crimes against music, and is constantly trying to recruit people to his Circus of Wonders. He should be portrayed as extremely over the top and completely harmless. It should be very jarring to your players if he drops the act and reveals who he truly is.
Furthermore, Rictavio knows that even if someone suspects he's hiding something, they are extremely unlikely to guess the truth. If a player rolls well on Insight against him and figures out he's full of crap, that only tells them that he's lying about something...not what he is lying about. And his response is to just carry on and ignore accusations. Sure, the PCs may figure out that he's full of it (his stories are obvious fabrications) but he just carries right along, sticking to his guns even though the players know it’s a load of BS.

The players should have a hard time to get a serious read on Rictavio's personality. He strikes them as so straight forward--a carnie who is spinning tall tales for amusement. So they shouldn’t suspect that he's any more than what he appears to be.

A HARD MAN TO PIN DOWN:

Van Richten is a man with a plan for killing Strahd Von Zarovich, and it's a plan that plays well to his aged capabilities: "wait til Strahd takes a long nap, then stake him in his sleep." Of anyone in the valley, Van Richten knows how deadly Strahd is. He has fought elder vampires before and Strahd is the greatest of them all. He may very well believe that trying to fight him head on is pure folly, but he’s the one most capable of doing so.

It's important to note: Most of the "Destined Allies" the party can draw from Madame Eva’s Tarokka card reading have notes about how the PCs can get that individual to join them. Van Richten has no such notes. Instead, it says this...

Van Richten works alone. [...] Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure.

Van Richten is aware of Madame Eva but (unlike many others in the valley) he won't immediately cave to her prophecies, drop everything he has been working on, and throw his lot in with the PCs. Here are a few important things to keep in mind if the party is trying to recruit him...

• Van Richten is quite certain that if he drops his disguise, Strahd will find him and set out to kill him. (This is one of Strahd's Primary Goals as listed in Chapter 1)

• Van Richten's disguise is magically augmented. As long as the party can't get his hat off, they cannot prove that he’s not a carnie ringmaster

• Van Richten's disguise is only useful against Strahd as long as no one knows who he really is. The ring of mind shielding only works on him...it doesn't work on the PCs. He knows that if anyone else finds out, Strahd can charm them, read their mind or otherwise extract that information from them.

• Van Richten is fully aware of his curse. He will avoid physically joining up with the party for fear that he will get them all killed.

• Van Richten does not talk about his curse. He knows well the bravery of adventurers and that telling them about his curse tends to result in responses like "Oh, you don't need to worry about us, we're strong!" followed shortly by ":dying noises:." Rebuffing their advances without mentioning the curse is much more effective at getting them to stay away from him so his curse doesn't kill them.

• Even if Van Richten consents to offer them aid, it should be indirect as much as possible. He has his plan, he's set in his ways, and he’s not going to go gallivanting off with a bunch of young adventurers. And, he should stay in character as much as possible...blowing his cover will only bring Strahd down on him AND the PCs.

Ideally, even if the party can convince him to help...his help should primarily take the form of a surprisingly knowledgeable carnival ringmaster who is "certainly not going to go out and fight monsters with you. I'm a ringmaster, not an adventurer!"

He may lend the party his carnival wagon to travel around in (once he finds somewhere else to stash his saber-toothed tiger that has been trained to hunt Vistani, or he may lend them the tiger), give them helpful advice--possibly using ravens to stay in touch over long-distance if the PCs make friends with the Keepers of the Feather, and provide the sort of support that a Carnie could offer. But, it should take rather extreme circumstances for him to actually be honest with the PCs...and they may have to do something about his curse before he'll actually travel with them.

GETTING HIM TO JOIN UP:

Van Richten wants to stay under cover...so how does the party get him to change his mind?

Easy: Ruin his plan.

If Van Richten's cover is blown, his plan is a wash. The whole plan depends on his identity staying a secret until Strahd goes into hibernation. If Strahd identifies Van Richten before then, he will try to kill him and Van Richten is pretty sure he can't take Strahd in a straight-up fight. Thus...if Van Richten’s cover is blown, he is stuck with two bad choices: Either he tries to keep going it alone, possibly getting killed by Strahd, and fails his “final mission,” or he accepts the risk to the PCs and joins them to try to take Strahd down directly. A few example ways to blow his cover...

• Knock his hat off. A hat of disguise only works as long as it stays on your head, so if something happens that knocks his hat off; “Rictavio” is replaced by Van Richten.

• Let the Tyger Tyger event happen (chapter 5). When Rictavio flees to the Tower of Khazan, he's inside an antimagic field and cannot disguise himself.

• Even if Van Richten is distorting his voice, if the PCs have already befriended Ezmerelda, she may still recognize it...even if what she recognizes is the cadence his voice adopts when he's explaining something.

ABILITY LOADOUT:

Van Richten is a Cleric...and his listed prepared spells speaks more of a support caster than a monster hunter who has gone solo. But, because he's a Cleric, he can swap out his prepared spells at will to any other spells on the Cleric list. Here are a few notes on spells for him to use...

• Dawn creates sunlight. If he can lock a vampire down within the area of effect, they will be dust in short order.

• Dispel Evil and Good breaks a vampire's charm. However...things can't really leave Barovia, so the dismissal part of that spell won't be terribly effective here.

• Geas is useful when he needs to find something. For example, capture a werewolf then place a geas on it to lead them to the den.

• Lesser and Greater Restoration are enormously useful, as is remove curse.

• Guiding Bolt is a great weapon against Vampires. Shuts down their regeneration, and gives the next attack advantage.

• Hallow: If Van Richten can get his hands on the material components for this, he can create holy ground to help protect the PCs. Create a bubble of hallowed ground around the antimagic field that covers the Tower of Khazan....talk about a fortress. Sure, you'll have a bubble of non-hallowed ground where the antimagic field zone is...but the territory around the tower itself will be holy ground.

• Given his skill at predicting his foes...dropping sanctuary on a creature they are about to attack can completely trash their attempts.

• Spirit Guardians is another spell that is just....awesome.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Article)

2022-01-29T16:39:51Z

Blade Runner Rock:

DR. RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN

Medium humanoid (human), Lawful Good

Armor Class: 17 (half plate of flowing sanctity)

Hit Points: 77 (14d8 +14)

Speed: 30 ft.

Strength: 9 (-1)

Dexterity: 13 (+1)

Constitution: 13 (+1)

Intelligence: 17 (+3)

Wisdom: 18 (+4)

Charisma: 16 (+3)

Saving Throws: Con +5, Wis +8, Cha +7

Skills: Arcana +7, Deception +7, Insight +12,
Investigation +7, Medicine +8, Perception +12,
Religion +6, Sleight of Hand +4

Condition Immunities: charmed

Senses: darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 22

Languages: Abyssal, Celestial, Common, Draconic, Dwarvish, Elvish, Gundarak, Infernal, Sylvan

Challenge: 9 (5,000 XP)

SPECIAL EQUIPMENT:

In addition to his +1 sword cane and light crossbow, Van Richten wears a hat of disguise, goggles of night, and a ring of mind shielding, and he carries a spell scroll of raise dead.

Half Plate of Flowing Sanctity +1 mithril half plate. Once a day, a flask of water placed in the belt of armor becomes holy water.

ACTIONS:

Spellcasting: Van Richter is a 9th level Cleric of Helm, 1st level Wizard. His spellcasting ability is Wisdom (save DC 15, +7 to hit with spell attacks). Van Richten has the following Cleric and Wizard spells prepared:

Cantrips (at will): light, mage hand, mending, minor illusion, prestidigitation, sacred flame, thaumaturgy, toll the dead

1st level (4 slots): alarm, bless, cure wounds, detect evil and good, feather fall, find familiar, healing word, identify, protection from evil and good, shield, sleep

2nd level (3 slots): augury, beacon of hope, lesser restoration, protection from poison, silence, spiritual weapon warding bond, zone of truth

3rd level (3 slots): glyph of warding, magic circle, mass healing word, revivify, speak with dead, spirit guardians

4th level (3 slots): death ward, freedom of movement

5th level (3 slots): dawn, greater restoration, mass cure wounds, raise dead

Skulker: Van Richten can hide when he is lightly obscured from the creature from which he is hiding. When he’s hidden from a creature and misses it with a ranged weapon attack, making the attack doesn’t reveal his position. Dim light doesn’t impose disadvantage on his Wisdom (Perception) checks relying on sight.

Undead Slayer: When Van Richten hits an undead with a weapon attack, the undead takes an extra 10 (3d6) damage of weapon’s type.

Cunning Action: Van Richten can use a bonus action to take the Dash, Disengage or Hide action.

Sneak Attack: When Van Richten surprises a target, has advantage on an attack roll, or an enemy is within 5 ft. of the target, Van Richten deals and extra 7 damage.

Assassin Proficiencies: Van Richten is proficient with Disguise and Poisoner’s Kits.

Assassinate: When Van Richten hits a surprised enemy, it’s automatically a critical hit. When he attacks an enemy that hasn’t yet had a turn, he gains advantage on the attack.

Channel Divinity: Turn Undead: Undead within 30 ft. of Van Richten must make a Wisdom saving throw. If the creature fails its saving throw, they are turned for 1 minute or until they take damage. A turned creature must spend its turns trying to move as far away from him as it can, and it can’t willingly move to a space within 30 ft. of him. It also can’t take reactions. For its action, it can use only the Dash action or try to escape from an effect that prevents it from moving. If there’s nowhere to move, the creature can use the Dodge action. Undead with CR 1 or less are automatically destroyed on a failed save.

Preserve Life: As an action, Van Richten can distribute 45 hit points. This feature can restore a creature to no more than half of its hit point maximum and has no effect on an undead or construct.

Multiattack: Van Richten makes two attacks with his sword cane or light crossbow.

Sword Cane: Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 6 (1d6 +2) bludgeon damage (wooden cane) or piercing damage (silvered sword).

Light Crossbow: Ranged Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, range 80/320 ft., one target. Hit: 7 (1d8 +2) piercing damage.

Healer: As an action, Van Richten can spend one use of a Healer’s Kit to tend to a creature and restore 1d6 +4 hit points to it, plus additional hit points equal to the creature’s maximum number of Hit Dice. The creature can’t regain hit points from this feat again until it finishes a short or long rest.

REACTIONS:

Final Ward: Van Richten has a permanent glyph of warding tattooed on his neck that activates when he’s bitten there and chooses to say “Erasmus, I’m coming home” in Celestial. All targets in a 20 ft. radius must make a Dexterity saving throw or take 5d8 +5 radiant damage on a failed save or half as much (rounded up) on a successful one. Van Richten automatically fails the save and is disintegrated along with all of the items on his person.

RICTAVIO:

Several months ago a colorfully dressed half-elf bard came to Barovia in a carnival wagon, with a pet monkey on his shoulder. He took over an abandoned tower on Lake Baratok before rolling into town of Vallaki several months later. Claiming to be a carnival ringmaster in search of new actors, he began regaling locals with tales of distant lands.

MONSTER HUNTER:

The half-elf ringmaster is, in fact, the legendary human monster hunter named Rudolph Van Richten. Van Richten’s tale is a sad one. A scholar and doctor from a land called Darkon, he married his childhood sweetheart, Ingrid and together they had a son, Erasmus. When he was fourteen, Erasmus was stolen away by Vistani and sold to a vampire named Baron Metus to be used as a companion. By the time Van Richten found his son, it was too late: the Baron had already transformed Erasmus into a vampire spawn. Erasmus begged his father to end his suffering, which Van Richten did by pounding a wooden stake through his son’s chest. Baron Metus avenged that death by killing Van Richten’s wife, and Van Richten has lived with the horror of his family’s destruction ever since. After destroying Baron Metus in turn, Van Richten sought revenge against the Vistani and took up a life of hunting evil monsters.

THE WAITING GAME:

Van Richten isn’t a young man anymore. He knows his road is coming to an end, but his work isn’t done. He has come to Barovia to kill Strahd Von Zarovich, the greatest vampire of them all. Van Richten has studied Strahd for years and knows he can’t hope to best the vampire in a straight-up confrontation: he must wait for the right moment to strike. He has good evidence to suggest that Strahd periodically hibernates in his coffin, sometimes for years, when all is quite in the realm. While he bides his time, Van Richten hides in plain sight with the aid of a hat of disguise, his thoughts protected by a ring of mind shielding. He is trying to learn more about the Keepers of the Feather—a society of wereravens that oppose Strahd—while trying not to expose the secret society to their mutual enemy. He thinks the wereravens might prove helpful when the time comes. Van Richten also wants to take out as many of Strahd’s spies as he can, starting with the Vistani.

MAN WITH A PLAN:

Van Richten doesn’t know that his former protégé, a good-aligned Vistani named Ezmerelda d’Avenir, has come to Barovia looking for him. He taught her many of his monster-hunting techniques, but she doesn’t know all of his tricks and disguises. So far, their paths haven’t crossed. In the event that Van Richten becomes aware of Ezmerelda’s presence, he does his utmost to protect her without putting his own plans in jeopardy. If he can manipulate a party of adventurers into keeping an eye on her, he will do so.

VAN RICHTEN WORKS ALONE:

A curse placed on him long ago by a Vistani seer brings doom to those he befriends (see ‘Role Playing Notes’ for details). Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure. Consequently, if he thinks he’s in danger of being unmasked, he retreats to the Tower of Khazan (chapter 11) or some other quiet corner of Strahd’s domain to plan further.

TRAITS:

Ideal. “Evil cannot go unchallenged.”

Bond. “To protect those I love, I must keep them distant and hidden from my enemies.”

Flaw. “I am cursed. Thus, I will never have peace.”

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

A CURSED MAN:

Van Richten suffers a curse bestowed on him by a Vistani:

Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws.

Its effect on him can best be summarized with this statement: "Van Richten Dies Last." This curse is both a boon and a bane to him. The curse is a large part of why he has lived so long--how he has accumulated so much experience and expertise. He is cursed to always see his friends and allies die--which means he has to live long enough to see it happen.

For a long time, he was unaware of the exact nature of the curse on him, but he is apparently aware of it now.

• Van Richten feels guilty. For decades he fought alongside others with monsters, completely unaware that he was a doombringer among them. Now that he knows, he is burdened by all the deaths he feels that his presence caused.

• Van Richten isolates himself. He doesn't let people get close to him for fear that his curse will take them out.

• If Van Richten is traveling with the party, he has excellent odds of surviving--if someone is going to die in the party, it'll be someone other than him.

• Van Richten's curse should have a tangible impact if he’s traveling with the party: he is a doombringer of the highest order. His mere presence among the party should invite tragedy and disaster.

The Tragedy of Ezmerelda and Van Richten. In the backstory that created Ezmerelda d’Avenir (Appendix D: Monsters and NPCs pages 230-231), there's a tragedy in there: Van Richten's curse could have been lifted years ago.

By Ravenloft Lore, the strongest of curses laid down by a Vistani can only be lifted by the Vistani who placed it, or a blood relative of that Vistani. Van Richten's curse was a Death Curse laid on him by Ezmerelda's mother. Only Ezmerelda has the ability to revoke the curse. But here's the problem...
Ezmerelda is Vistani...by nature; they are secretive about their abilities. Beyond that, Van Richten doesn't trust Vistani and likely commanded Ezmerelda to not use her Vistani abilities in his presence. As a result, Van Richten doesn't know how Vistani curses work--he doesn't know that they can be revoked by a blood relative of the one who laid it. He's a Cleric, he has undoubtedly tried remove curse on himself and it failed. As far as he knows, the curse is permanent.
Van Richten is also secretive and, as mentioned, doesn't trust the Vistani. He kept Ezmerelda at arm's length as best he could both because he couldn't trust her, but also to try to protect her from the curse...and even if he was aware of the curse when they traveled together, he never told her about it.

If either one of them had been less secretive, more open, his curse would have been revoked a long time ago.

If the players want to help Van Richten break the curse, here's the backstory:

The story of Ezmerelda and Van Richten's history was written in the Van Richten's Journal (Appendix F: Handouts pages 254-255). It involves him destroying Ezmerelda's caravan while she was very, very young. She survived the undead assault and later got picked up by another caravan of Vistani (it was actually the Zarovan tribe--Madam Eva's caravan). She originally wanted revenge on Van Richten, but time with Eva (and the presence of the most powerful Vistani of them all) showed her the tragedy of what had happened from an outside perspective. Ezmerelda realized that the whole thing was a horrible tragedy and wrongs had been committed on both sides. She, thus, set out to try to find Van Richten and try to make things right...though Eva never told her about the curse her mother had laid on Van Richten.

Van Richten and Ezmerelda must travel to the place the curse was first laid...a small clearing in the forests of Barovia where the ruins of Ezmerelda's caravan still lie. Both must verbally acknowledge the wrong that had been done and verbally forgive one another for it...then the remains of Ezmerelda's caravan must be burned.

THE DISGUISE:

Van Richten got the idea for “Rictavio” from his exposure to Ezmerelda and her occasional methods for blending in when going somewhere that didn't like Vistani. In short: "Sometimes the best disguise is being the most obvious thing in the room." As mentioned above, Ezmerelda has never encountered the Rictavio disguise and Van Richten isn't familiar with any of the disguises Ezmerelda is currently using.

It is a rather perfect disguise. Van Richten is known as a grim and serious individual, a dour old man who roves the world slaying monsters. “Rictavio” is a flamboyant fop who tells ludicrous stories, commits crimes against music, and is constantly trying to recruit people to his Circus of Wonders. He should be portrayed as extremely over the top and completely harmless. It should be very jarring to your players if he drops the act and reveals who he truly is.
Furthermore, Rictavio knows that even if someone suspects he's hiding something, they are extremely unlikely to guess the truth. If a player rolls well on Insight against him and figures out he's full of crap, that only tells them that he's lying about something...not what he is lying about. And his response is to just carry on and ignore accusations. Sure, the PCs may figure out that he's full of it (his stories are obvious fabrications) but he just carries right along, sticking to his guns even though the players know it’s a load of BS.

The players should have a hard time to get a serious read on Rictavio's personality. He strikes them as so straight forward--a carnie who is spinning tall tales for amusement. So they shouldn’t suspect that he's any more than what he appears to be.

A HARD MAN TO PIN DOWN:

Van Richten is a man with a plan for killing Strahd Von Zarovich, and it's a plan that plays well to his aged capabilities: "wait til Strahd takes a long nap, then stake him in his sleep." Of anyone in the valley, Van Richten knows how deadly Strahd is. He has fought elder vampires before and Strahd is the greatest of them all. He may very well believe that trying to fight him head on is pure folly, but he’s the one most capable of doing so.

It's important to note: Most of the "Destined Allies" the party can draw from Madame Eva’s Tarokka card reading have notes about how the PCs can get that individual to join them. Van Richten has no such notes. Instead, it says this...

Van Richten works alone. [...] Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure.

Van Richten is aware of Madame Eva but (unlike many others in the valley) he won't immediately cave to her prophecies, drop everything he has been working on, and throw his lot in with the PCs. Here are a few important things to keep in mind if the party is trying to recruit him...

• Van Richten is quite certain that if he drops his disguise, Strahd will find him and set out to kill him. (This is one of Strahd's Primary Goals as listed in Chapter 1)

• Van Richten's disguise is magically augmented. As long as the party can't get his hat off, they cannot prove that he’s not a carnie ringmaster

• Van Richten's disguise is only useful against Strahd as long as no one knows who he really is. The ring of mind shielding only works on him...it doesn't work on the PCs. He knows that if anyone else finds out, Strahd can charm them, read their mind or otherwise extract that information from them.

• Van Richten is fully aware of his curse. He will avoid physically joining up with the party for fear that he will get them all killed.

• Van Richten does not talk about his curse. He knows well the bravery of adventurers and that telling them about his curse tends to result in responses like "Oh, you don't need to worry about us, we're strong!" followed shortly by ":dying noises:." Rebuffing their advances without mentioning the curse is much more effective at getting them to stay away from him so his curse doesn't kill them.

• Even if Van Richten consents to offer them aid, it should be indirect as much as possible. He has his plan, he's set in his ways, and he’s not going to go gallivanting off with a bunch of young adventurers. And, he should stay in character as much as possible...blowing his cover will only bring Strahd down on him AND the PCs.

Ideally, even if the party can convince him to help...his help should primarily take the form of a surprisingly knowledgeable carnival ringmaster who is "certainly not going to go out and fight monsters with you. I'm a ringmaster, not an adventurer!"

He may lend the party his carnival wagon to travel around in (once he finds somewhere else to stash his saber-toothed tiger that has been trained to hunt Vistani, or he may lend them the tiger), give them helpful advice--possibly using ravens to stay in touch over long-distance if the PCs make friends with the Keepers of the Feather, and provide the sort of support that a Carnie could offer. But, it should take rather extreme circumstances for him to actually be honest with the PCs...and they may have to do something about his curse before he'll actually travel with them.

GETTING HIM TO JOIN UP:

Van Richten wants to stay under cover...so how does the party get him to change his mind?

Easy: Ruin his plan.

If Van Richten's cover is blown, his plan is a wash. The whole plan depends on his identity staying a secret until Strahd goes into hibernation. If Strahd identifies Van Richten before then, he will try to kill him and Van Richten is pretty sure he can't take Strahd in a straight-up fight. Thus...if Van Richten’s cover is blown, he is stuck with two bad choices: Either he tries to keep going it alone, possibly getting killed by Strahd, and fails his “final mission,” or he accepts the risk to the PCs and joins them to try to take Strahd down directly. A few example ways to blow his cover...

• Knock his hat off. A hat of disguise only works as long as it stays on your head, so if something happens that knocks his hat off; “Rictavio” is replaced by Van Richten.

• Let the Tyger Tyger event happen (chapter 5). When Rictavio flees to the Tower of Khazan, he's inside an antimagic field and cannot disguise himself.

• Even if Van Richten is distorting his voice, if the PCs have already befriended Ezmerelda, she may still recognize it...even if what she recognizes is the cadence his voice adopts when he's explaining something.

ABILITY LOADOUT:

Van Richten is a Cleric...and his listed prepared spells speaks more of a support caster than a monster hunter who has gone solo. But, because he's a Cleric, he can swap out his prepared spells at will to any other spells on the Cleric list. Here are a few notes on spells for him to use...

• Dawn creates sunlight. If he can lock a vampire down within the area of effect, they will be dust in short order.

• Dispel Evil and Good breaks a vampire's charm. However...things can't really leave Barovia, so the dismissal part of that spell won't be terribly effective here.

• Geas is useful when he needs to find something. For example, capture a werewolf then place a geas on it to lead them to the den.

• Lesser and Greater Restoration are enormously useful, as is remove curse.

• Guiding Bolt is a great weapon against Vampires. Shuts down their regeneration, and gives the next attack advantage.

• Hallow: If Van Richten can get his hands on the material components for this, he can create holy ground to help protect the PCs. Create a bubble of hallowed ground around the antimagic field that covers the Tower of Khazan....talk about a fortress. Sure, you'll have a bubble of non-hallowed ground where the antimagic field zone is...but the territory around the tower itself will be holy ground.

• Given his skill at predicting his foes...dropping sanctuary on a creature they are about to attack can completely trash their attempts.

• Spirit Guardians is another spell that is just....awesome.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Article)

2022-01-29T16:38:29Z

Blade Runner Rock:

DR. RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN

Medium humanoid (human), Lawful Good

Armor Class: 17 (half plate of flowing sanctity)

Hit Points: 77 (14d8 +14)

Speed: 30 ft.

Strength: 9 (-1)

Dexterity: 13 (+1)

Constitution: 13 (+1)

Intelligence: 17 (+3)

Wisdom: 18 (+4)

Charisma: 16 (+3)

Saving Throws: Con +5, Wis +8, Cha +7

Skills: Arcana +7, Deception +7, Insight +12,
Investigation +7, Medicine +8, Perception +12,
Religion +6, Sleight of Hand +4

Condition Immunities: charmed

Senses: darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 22

Languages: Abyssal, Celestial, Common, Draconic, Dwarvish, Elvish, Gundarak, Infernal, Sylvan

Challenge: 9 (5,000 XP)

SPECIAL EQUIPMENT:

In addition to his +1 sword cane and light crossbow, Van Richten wears a hat of disguise, goggles of night, and a ring of mind shielding, and he carries a spell scroll of raise dead.

Half Plate of Flowing Sanctity +1 mithril half plate. Once a day, a flask of water placed in the belt of armor becomes holy water.

ACTIONS:

Spellcasting: Van Richter is a 9th level Cleric of Helm, 1st level Wizard. His spellcasting ability is Wisdom (save DC 15, +7 to hit with spell attacks). Van Richten has the following Cleric and Wizard spells prepared:

Cantrips (at will): light, mage hand, mending, minor illusion, prestidigitation, sacred flame, thaumaturgy, toll the dead

1st level (4 slots): alarm, bless, cure wounds, detect evil and good, feather fall, find familiar, healing word, identify, protection from evil and good, shield, sleep

2nd level (3 slots): augury, beacon of hope, lesser restoration, protection from poison, silence, spiritual weapon warding bond, zone of truth

3rd level (3 slots): glyph of warding, magic circle, mass healing word, revivify, speak with dead, spirit guardians

4th level (3 slots): death ward, freedom of movement

5th level (3 slots): dawn, greater restoration, mass cure wounds, raise dead

Skulker: Van Richten can hide when he is lightly obscured from the creature from which he is hiding. When he’s hidden from a creature and misses it with a ranged weapon attack, making the attack doesn’t reveal his position. Dim light doesn’t impose disadvantage on his Wisdom (Perception) checks relying on sight.

Undead Slayer: When Van Richten hits an undead with a weapon attack, the undead takes an extra 10 (3d6) damage of weapon’s type.

Cunning Action: Van Richten can use a bonus action to take the Dash, Disengage or Hide action.

Sneak Attack: When Van Richten surprises a target, has advantage on an attack roll, or an enemy is within 5 ft. of the target, Van Richten deals and extra 7 damage.

Assassin Proficiencies: Van Richten is proficient with Disguise and Poisoner’s Kits.

Assassinate: When Van Richten hits a surprised enemy, it’s automatically a critical hit. When he attacks an enemy that hasn’t yet had a turn, he gains advantage on the attack.

Channel Divinity: Turn Undead: Undead within 30 ft. of Van Richten must make a Wisdom saving throw. If the creature fails its saving throw, they are turned for 1 minute or until they take damage. A turned creature must spend its turns trying to move as far away from him as it can, and it can’t willingly move to a space within 30 ft. of him. It also can’t take reactions. For its action, it can use only the Dash action or try to escape from an effect that prevents it from moving. If there’s nowhere to move, the creature can use the Dodge action. Undead with CR 1 or less are automatically destroyed on a failed save.

Preserve Life: As an action, Van Richten can distribute 45 hit points. This feature can restore a creature to no more than half of its hit point maximum and has no effect on an undead or construct.

Multiattack: Van Richten makes two attacks with his sword cane or light crossbow.

Sword Cane: Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 6 (1d6 +2) bludgeon damage (wooden cane) or piercing damage (silvered sword).

Light Crossbow: Ranged Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, range 80/320 ft., one target. Hit: 7 (1d8 +2) piercing damage.

Healer: As an action, Van Richten can spend one use of a Healer’s Kit to tend to a creature and restore 1d6 +4 hit points to it, plus additional hit points equal to the creature’s maximum number of Hit Dice. The creature can’t regain hit points from this feat again until it finishes a short or long rest.

REACTIONS:

Final Ward: Van Richten has a permanent glyph of warding tattooed on his neck that activates when he’s bitten there and chooses to say “Erasmus, I’m coming home” in Celestial. All targets in a 20 ft. radius must make a Dexterity saving throw or take 5d8 +5 radiant damage on a failed save or half as much (rounded up) on a successful one. Van Richten automatically fails the save and is disintegrated along with all of the items on his person.

RICTAVIO:

Several months ago a colorfully dressed half-elf bard came to Barovia in a carnival wagon, with a pet monkey on his shoulder. He took over an abandoned tower on Lake Baratok before rolling into town of Vallaki several months later. Claiming to be a carnival ringmaster in search of new actors, he began regaling locals with tales of distant lands.

MONSTER HUNTER:

The half-elf ringmaster is, in fact, the legendary human monster hunter named Rudolph Van Richten. Van Richten’s tale is a sad one. A scholar and doctor from a land called Darkon, he married his childhood sweetheart, Ingrid and together they had a son, Erasmus. When he was fourteen, Erasmus was stolen away by Vistani and sold to a vampire named Baron Metus to be used as a companion. By the time Van Richten found his son, it was too late: the Baron had already transformed Erasmus into a vampire spawn. Erasmus begged his father to end his suffering, which Van Richten did by pounding a wooden stake through his son’s chest. Baron Metus avenged that death by killing Van Richten’s wife, and Van Richten has lived with the horror of his family’s destruction ever since. After destroying Baron Metus in turn, Van Richten sought revenge against the Vistani and took up a life of hunting evil monsters.

THE WAITING GAME:

Van Richten isn’t a young man anymore. He knows his road is coming to an end, but his work isn’t done. He has come to Barovia to kill Strahd Von Zarovich, the greatest vampire of them all. Van Richten has studied Strahd for years and knows he can’t hope to best the vampire in a straight-up confrontation: he must wait for the right moment to strike. He has good evidence to suggest that Strahd periodically hibernates in his coffin, sometimes for years, when all is quite in the realm. While he bides his time, Van Richten hides in plain sight with the aid of a hat of disguise, his thoughts protected by a ring of mind shielding. He is trying to learn more about the Keepers of the Feather—a society of wereravens that oppose Strahd—while trying not to expose the secret society to their mutual enemy. He thinks the wereravens might prove helpful when the time comes. Van Richten also wants to take out as many of Strahd’s spies as he can, starting with the Vistani.

MAN WITH A PLAN:

Van Richten doesn’t know that his former protégé, a good-aligned Vistani named Ezmerelda d’Avenir, has come to Barovia looking for him. He taught her many of his monster-hunting techniques, but she doesn’t know all of his tricks and disguises. So far, their paths haven’t crossed. In the event that Van Richten becomes aware of Ezmerelda’s presence, he does his utmost to protect her without putting his own plans in jeopardy. If he can manipulate a party of adventurers into keeping an eye on her, he will do so.

VAN RICHTEN WORKS ALONE:

A curse placed on him long ago by a Vistani seer brings doom to those he befriends (see ‘Role Playing Notes’ for details). Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure. Consequently, if he thinks he’s in danger of being unmasked, he retreats to the Tower of Khazan (chapter 11) or some other quiet corner of Strahd’s domain to plan further.

TRAITS:

Ideal. “Evil cannot go unchallenged.”
Bond. “To protect those I love, I must keep them distant and hidden from my enemies.”
Flaw. “I am cursed. Thus, I will never have peace.”

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

A CURSED MAN:

Van Richten suffers a curse bestowed on him by a Vistani:

Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws.

Its effect on him can best be summarized with this statement: "Van Richten Dies Last." This curse is both a boon and a bane to him. The curse is a large part of why he has lived so long--how he has accumulated so much experience and expertise. He is cursed to always see his friends and allies die--which means he has to live long enough to see it happen.

For a long time, he was unaware of the exact nature of the curse on him, but he is apparently aware of it now.

• Van Richten feels guilty. For decades he fought alongside others with monsters, completely unaware that he was a doombringer among them. Now that he knows, he is burdened by all the deaths he feels that his presence caused.

• Van Richten isolates himself. He doesn't let people get close to him for fear that his curse will take them out.

• If Van Richten is traveling with the party, he has excellent odds of surviving--if someone is going to die in the party, it'll be someone other than him.

• Van Richten's curse should have a tangible impact if he’s traveling with the party: he is a doombringer of the highest order. His mere presence among the party should invite tragedy and disaster.

The Tragedy of Ezmerelda and Van Richten. In the backstory that created Ezmerelda d’Avenir (Appendix D: Monsters and NPCs pages 230-231), there's a tragedy in there: Van Richten's curse could have been lifted years ago.

By Ravenloft Lore, the strongest of curses laid down by a Vistani can only be lifted by the Vistani who placed it, or a blood relative of that Vistani. Van Richten's curse was a Death Curse laid on him by Ezmerelda's mother. Only Ezmerelda has the ability to revoke the curse. But here's the problem...
Ezmerelda is Vistani...by nature; they are secretive about their abilities. Beyond that, Van Richten doesn't trust Vistani and likely commanded Ezmerelda to not use her Vistani abilities in his presence. As a result, Van Richten doesn't know how Vistani curses work--he doesn't know that they can be revoked by a blood relative of the one who laid it. He's a Cleric, he has undoubtedly tried remove curse on himself and it failed. As far as he knows, the curse is permanent.
Van Richten is also secretive and, as mentioned, doesn't trust the Vistani. He kept Ezmerelda at arm's length as best he could both because he couldn't trust her, but also to try to protect her from the curse...and even if he was aware of the curse when they traveled together, he never told her about it.

If either one of them had been less secretive, more open, his curse would have been revoked a long time ago.

If the players want to help Van Richten break the curse, here's the backstory:

The story of Ezmerelda and Van Richten's history was written in the Van Richten's Journal (Appendix F: Handouts pages 254-255). It involves him destroying Ezmerelda's caravan while she was very, very young. She survived the undead assault and later got picked up by another caravan of Vistani (it was actually the Zarovan tribe--Madam Eva's caravan). She originally wanted revenge on Van Richten, but time with Eva (and the presence of the most powerful Vistani of them all) showed her the tragedy of what had happened from an outside perspective. Ezmerelda realized that the whole thing was a horrible tragedy and wrongs had been committed on both sides. She, thus, set out to try to find Van Richten and try to make things right...though Eva never told her about the curse her mother had laid on Van Richten.

Van Richten and Ezmerelda must travel to the place the curse was first laid...a small clearing in the forests of Barovia where the ruins of Ezmerelda's caravan still lie. Both must verbally acknowledge the wrong that had been done and verbally forgive one another for it...then the remains of Ezmerelda's caravan must be burned.

THE DISGUISE:

Van Richten got the idea for “Rictavio” from his exposure to Ezmerelda and her occasional methods for blending in when going somewhere that didn't like Vistani. In short: "Sometimes the best disguise is being the most obvious thing in the room." As mentioned above, Ezmerelda has never encountered the Rictavio disguise and Van Richten isn't familiar with any of the disguises Ezmerelda is currently using.

It is a rather perfect disguise. Van Richten is known as a grim and serious individual, a dour old man who roves the world slaying monsters. “Rictavio” is a flamboyant fop who tells ludicrous stories, commits crimes against music, and is constantly trying to recruit people to his Circus of Wonders. He should be portrayed as extremely over the top and completely harmless. It should be very jarring to your players if he drops the act and reveals who he truly is.
Furthermore, Rictavio knows that even if someone suspects he's hiding something, they are extremely unlikely to guess the truth. If a player rolls well on Insight against him and figures out he's full of crap, that only tells them that he's lying about something...not what he is lying about. And his response is to just carry on and ignore accusations. Sure, the PCs may figure out that he's full of it (his stories are obvious fabrications) but he just carries right along, sticking to his guns even though the players know it’s a load of BS.

The players should have a hard time to get a serious read on Rictavio's personality. He strikes them as so straight forward--a carnie who is spinning tall tales for amusement. So they shouldn’t suspect that he's any more than what he appears to be.

A HARD MAN TO PIN DOWN:

Van Richten is a man with a plan for killing Strahd Von Zarovich, and it's a plan that plays well to his aged capabilities: "wait til Strahd takes a long nap, then stake him in his sleep." Of anyone in the valley, Van Richten knows how deadly Strahd is. He has fought elder vampires before and Strahd is the greatest of them all. He may very well believe that trying to fight him head on is pure folly, but he’s the one most capable of doing so.

It's important to note: Most of the "Destined Allies" the party can draw from Madame Eva’s Tarokka card reading have notes about how the PCs can get that individual to join them. Van Richten has no such notes. Instead, it says this...

Van Richten works alone. [...] Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure.

Van Richten is aware of Madame Eva but (unlike many others in the valley) he won't immediately cave to her prophecies, drop everything he has been working on, and throw his lot in with the PCs. Here are a few important things to keep in mind if the party is trying to recruit him...

• Van Richten is quite certain that if he drops his disguise, Strahd will find him and set out to kill him. (This is one of Strahd's Primary Goals as listed in Chapter 1)

• Van Richten's disguise is magically augmented. As long as the party can't get his hat off, they cannot prove that he’s not a carnie ringmaster

• Van Richten's disguise is only useful against Strahd as long as no one knows who he really is. The ring of mind shielding only works on him...it doesn't work on the PCs. He knows that if anyone else finds out, Strahd can charm them, read their mind or otherwise extract that information from them.

• Van Richten is fully aware of his curse. He will avoid physically joining up with the party for fear that he will get them all killed.

• Van Richten does not talk about his curse. He knows well the bravery of adventurers and that telling them about his curse tends to result in responses like "Oh, you don't need to worry about us, we're strong!" followed shortly by ":dying noises:." Rebuffing their advances without mentioning the curse is much more effective at getting them to stay away from him so his curse doesn't kill them.

• Even if Van Richten consents to offer them aid, it should be indirect as much as possible. He has his plan, he's set in his ways, and he’s not going to go gallivanting off with a bunch of young adventurers. And, he should stay in character as much as possible...blowing his cover will only bring Strahd down on him AND the PCs.

Ideally, even if the party can convince him to help...his help should primarily take the form of a surprisingly knowledgeable carnival ringmaster who is "certainly not going to go out and fight monsters with you. I'm a ringmaster, not an adventurer!"

He may lend the party his carnival wagon to travel around in (once he finds somewhere else to stash his saber-toothed tiger that has been trained to hunt Vistani, or he may lend them the tiger), give them helpful advice--possibly using ravens to stay in touch over long-distance if the PCs make friends with the Keepers of the Feather, and provide the sort of support that a Carnie could offer. But, it should take rather extreme circumstances for him to actually be honest with the PCs...and they may have to do something about his curse before he'll actually travel with them.

GETTING HIM TO JOIN UP:

Van Richten wants to stay under cover...so how does the party get him to change his mind?

Easy: Ruin his plan.

If Van Richten's cover is blown, his plan is a wash. The whole plan depends on his identity staying a secret until Strahd goes into hibernation. If Strahd identifies Van Richten before then, he will try to kill him and Van Richten is pretty sure he can't take Strahd in a straight-up fight. Thus...if Van Richten’s cover is blown, he is stuck with two bad choices: Either he tries to keep going it alone, possibly getting killed by Strahd, and fails his “final mission,” or he accepts the risk to the PCs and joins them to try to take Strahd down directly. A few example ways to blow his cover...

• Knock his hat off. A hat of disguise only works as long as it stays on your head, so if something happens that knocks his hat off; “Rictavio” is replaced by Van Richten.

• Let the Tyger Tyger event happen (chapter 5). When Rictavio flees to the Tower of Khazan, he's inside an antimagic field and cannot disguise himself.

• Even if Van Richten is distorting his voice, if the PCs have already befriended Ezmerelda, she may still recognize it...even if what she recognizes is the cadence his voice adopts when he's explaining something.

ABILITY LOADOUT:

Van Richten is a Cleric...and his listed prepared spells speaks more of a support caster than a monster hunter who has gone solo. But, because he's a Cleric, he can swap out his prepared spells at will to any other spells on the Cleric list. Here are a few notes on spells for him to use...

• Dawn creates sunlight. If he can lock a vampire down within the area of effect, they will be dust in short order.

• Dispel Evil and Good breaks a vampire's charm. However...things can't really leave Barovia, so the dismissal part of that spell won't be terribly effective here.

• Geas is useful when he needs to find something. For example, capture a werewolf then place a geas on it to lead them to the den.

• Lesser and Greater Restoration are enormously useful, as is remove curse.

• Guiding Bolt is a great weapon against Vampires. Shuts down their regeneration, and gives the next attack advantage.

• Hallow: If Van Richten can get his hands on the material components for this, he can create holy ground to help protect the PCs. Create a bubble of hallowed ground around the antimagic field that covers the Tower of Khazan....talk about a fortress. Sure, you'll have a bubble of non-hallowed ground where the antimagic field zone is...but the territory around the tower itself will be holy ground.

• Given his skill at predicting his foes...dropping sanctuary on a creature they are about to attack can completely trash their attempts.

• Spirit Guardians is another spell that is just....awesome.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (NPC)

2022-01-29T16:37:34Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* In Curse of Strahd */

[[File:Original VR.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
[[File:Rudolph van richten.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten and [[Strahd]] by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
{{canon}}
'''Dr. Rudolph Van Richten''' is the greatest monster hunter that has ever lived and the most well-known hero of the Lands of the Mists.

==History==
He was born in [[Rivalis]] in [[Darkon]] in [[671 BC]]. He took [[medicine]] at the [[University of Il Aluk]], completing his four or five year program of study in [[693 BC]]. This humble man was spurred into a life of monster hunting when his son [[Erasmus van Richten]] was kidnapped by the [[Radanavich clan]] and sold to [[Baron Metus]]. Metus turned Erasmus into a [[vampire groom]] and Van Richten was forced to slay his son. In revenge, Metus killed Rudolph's wife, [[Ingrid van Richten]]. Van Richten eventually slew Metus, and then, with the help of [[Azalin]], the entire [[Radanavich tribe]].

Until his disappearance in [[750 BC]], he resided in [[Mordentshire]], where he ran an [[Van Richten's Herbalist Shop|herbalist shop]], as well as wrote several of his famous [[Van Richten's Guides]], and mentored [[The Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]], who regarded him as an uncle and took up his work.

==In [[Curse of Strahd]]==
Dr. van Richten makes a notable appearance in the [[5th Edition]] [[module]], [[Curse of Strahd]], though not in his [[famous]] persona as the monster hunter and [[writer]] of the [[Van Richten's Guides]] he is notable for in previous Ravenloft products. Instead, he adopts the guise of [[Rictavio]], a traveling [[half-elf]] [[bard]], [[storyteller]], and [[ringmaster]] gathering stories and watching out for talent. In reality he is gathering formation and waiting for an optimal time to strike at [[Strahd]], preferably when the vampire lord is in [[hibernation]]. Unlike other versions of van Richten, the Curse of Strahd van Richten is a [[loner]] because he knows the full extent of his [[curse]].<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> For more details, see [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Curse of Strahd)]]

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

A CURSED MAN:

Van Richten suffers a curse bestowed on him by a Vistani:

Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws.

Its effect on him can best be summarized with this statement: "Van Richten Dies Last." This curse is both a boon and a bane to him. The curse is a large part of why he has lived so long--how he has accumulated so much experience and expertise. He is cursed to always see his friends and allies die--which means he has to live long enough to see it happen.

For a long time, he was unaware of the exact nature of the curse on him, but he is apparently aware of it now.

• Van Richten feels guilty. For decades he fought alongside others with monsters, completely unaware that he was a doombringer among them. Now that he knows, he is burdened by all the deaths he feels that his presence caused.

• Van Richten isolates himself. He doesn't let people get close to him for fear that his curse will take them out.

• If Van Richten is traveling with the party, he has excellent odds of surviving--if someone is going to die in the party, it'll be someone other than him.

• Van Richten's curse should have a tangible impact if he’s traveling with the party: he is a doombringer of the highest order. His mere presence among the party should invite tragedy and disaster.

The Tragedy of Ezmerelda and Van Richten. In the backstory that created Ezmerelda d’Avenir (Appendix D: Monsters and NPCs pages 230-231), there's a tragedy in there: Van Richten's curse could have been lifted years ago.

By Ravenloft Lore, the strongest of curses laid down by a Vistani can only be lifted by the Vistani who placed it, or a blood relative of that Vistani. Van Richten's curse was a Death Curse laid on him by Ezmerelda's mother. Only Ezmerelda has the ability to revoke the curse. But here's the problem...
Ezmerelda is Vistani...by nature; they are secretive about their abilities. Beyond that, Van Richten doesn't trust Vistani and likely commanded Ezmerelda to not use her Vistani abilities in his presence. As a result, Van Richten doesn't know how Vistani curses work--he doesn't know that they can be revoked by a blood relative of the one who laid it. He's a Cleric, he has undoubtedly tried remove curse on himself and it failed. As far as he knows, the curse is permanent.
Van Richten is also secretive and, as mentioned, doesn't trust the Vistani. He kept Ezmerelda at arm's length as best he could both because he couldn't trust her, but also to try to protect her from the curse...and even if he was aware of the curse when they traveled together, he never told her about it.

If either one of them had been less secretive, more open, his curse would have been revoked a long time ago.

If the players want to help Van Richten break the curse, here's the backstory:

The story of Ezmerelda and Van Richten's history was written in the Van Richten's Journal (Appendix F: Handouts pages 254-255). It involves him destroying Ezmerelda's caravan while she was very, very young. She survived the undead assault and later got picked up by another caravan of Vistani (it was actually the Zarovan tribe--Madam Eva's caravan). She originally wanted revenge on Van Richten, but time with Eva (and the presence of the most powerful Vistani of them all) showed her the tragedy of what had happened from an outside perspective. Ezmerelda realized that the whole thing was a horrible tragedy and wrongs had been committed on both sides. She, thus, set out to try to find Van Richten and try to make things right...though Eva never told her about the curse her mother had laid on Van Richten.

Van Richten and Ezmerelda must travel to the place the curse was first laid...a small clearing in the forests of Barovia where the ruins of Ezmerelda's caravan still lie. Both must verbally acknowledge the wrong that had been done and verbally forgive one another for it...then the remains of Ezmerelda's caravan must be burned.

THE DISGUISE:

Van Richten got the idea for “Rictavio” from his exposure to Ezmerelda and her occasional methods for blending in when going somewhere that didn't like Vistani. In short: "Sometimes the best disguise is being the most obvious thing in the room." As mentioned above, Ezmerelda has never encountered the Rictavio disguise and Van Richten isn't familiar with any of the disguises Ezmerelda is currently using.

It is a rather perfect disguise. Van Richten is known as a grim and serious individual, a dour old man who roves the world slaying monsters. “Rictavio” is a flamboyant fop who tells ludicrous stories, commits crimes against music, and is constantly trying to recruit people to his Circus of Wonders. He should be portrayed as extremely over the top and completely harmless. It should be very jarring to your players if he drops the act and reveals who he truly is.
Furthermore, Rictavio knows that even if someone suspects he's hiding something, they are extremely unlikely to guess the truth. If a player rolls well on Insight against him and figures out he's full of crap, that only tells them that he's lying about something...not what he is lying about. And his response is to just carry on and ignore accusations. Sure, the PCs may figure out that he's full of it (his stories are obvious fabrications) but he just carries right along, sticking to his guns even though the players know it’s a load of BS.

The players should have a hard time to get a serious read on Rictavio's personality. He strikes them as so straight forward--a carnie who is spinning tall tales for amusement. So they shouldn’t suspect that he's any more than what he appears to be.

A HARD MAN TO PIN DOWN:

Van Richten is a man with a plan for killing Strahd Von Zarovich, and it's a plan that plays well to his aged capabilities: "wait til Strahd takes a long nap, then stake him in his sleep." Of anyone in the valley, Van Richten knows how deadly Strahd is. He has fought elder vampires before and Strahd is the greatest of them all. He may very well believe that trying to fight him head on is pure folly, but he’s the one most capable of doing so.

It's important to note: Most of the "Destined Allies" the party can draw from Madame Eva’s Tarokka card reading have notes about how the PCs can get that individual to join them. Van Richten has no such notes. Instead, it says this...

Van Richten works alone. [...] Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure.

Van Richten is aware of Madame Eva but (unlike many others in the valley) he won't immediately cave to her prophecies, drop everything he has been working on, and throw his lot in with the PCs. Here are a few important things to keep in mind if the party is trying to recruit him...

• Van Richten is quite certain that if he drops his disguise, Strahd will find him and set out to kill him. (This is one of Strahd's Primary Goals as listed in Chapter 1)

• Van Richten's disguise is magically augmented. As long as the party can't get his hat off, they cannot prove that he’s not a carnie ringmaster

• Van Richten's disguise is only useful against Strahd as long as no one knows who he really is. The ring of mind shielding only works on him...it doesn't work on the PCs. He knows that if anyone else finds out, Strahd can charm them, read their mind or otherwise extract that information from them.

• Van Richten is fully aware of his curse. He will avoid physically joining up with the party for fear that he will get them all killed.

• Van Richten does not talk about his curse. He knows well the bravery of adventurers and that telling them about his curse tends to result in responses like "Oh, you don't need to worry about us, we're strong!" followed shortly by ":dying noises:." Rebuffing their advances without mentioning the curse is much more effective at getting them to stay away from him so his curse doesn't kill them.

• Even if Van Richten consents to offer them aid, it should be indirect as much as possible. He has his plan, he's set in his ways, and he’s not going to go gallivanting off with a bunch of young adventurers. And, he should stay in character as much as possible...blowing his cover will only bring Strahd down on him AND the PCs.

Ideally, even if the party can convince him to help...his help should primarily take the form of a surprisingly knowledgeable carnival ringmaster who is "certainly not going to go out and fight monsters with you. I'm a ringmaster, not an adventurer!"

He may lend the party his carnival wagon to travel around in (once he finds somewhere else to stash his saber-toothed tiger that has been trained to hunt Vistani, or he may lend them the tiger), give them helpful advice--possibly using ravens to stay in touch over long-distance if the PCs make friends with the Keepers of the Feather, and provide the sort of support that a Carnie could offer. But, it should take rather extreme circumstances for him to actually be honest with the PCs...and they may have to do something about his curse before he'll actually travel with them.

GETTING HIM TO JOIN UP:

Van Richten wants to stay under cover...so how does the party get him to change his mind?

Easy: Ruin his plan.

If Van Richten's cover is blown, his plan is a wash. The whole plan depends on his identity staying a secret until Strahd goes into hibernation. If Strahd identifies Van Richten before then, he will try to kill him and Van Richten is pretty sure he can't take Strahd in a straight-up fight. Thus...if Van Richten’s cover is blown, he is stuck with two bad choices: Either he tries to keep going it alone, possibly getting killed by Strahd, and fails his “final mission,” or he accepts the risk to the PCs and joins them to try to take Strahd down directly. A few example ways to blow his cover...

• Knock his hat off. A hat of disguise only works as long as it stays on your head, so if something happens that knocks his hat off; “Rictavio” is replaced by Van Richten.

• Let the Tyger Tyger event happen (chapter 5). When Rictavio flees to the Tower of Khazan, he's inside an antimagic field and cannot disguise himself.

• Even if Van Richten is distorting his voice, if the PCs have already befriended Ezmerelda, she may still recognize it...even if what she recognizes is the cadence his voice adopts when he's explaining something.

ABILITY LOADOUT:

Van Richten is a Cleric...and his listed prepared spells speaks more of a support caster than a monster hunter who has gone solo. But, because he's a Cleric, he can swap out his prepared spells at will to any other spells on the Cleric list. Here are a few notes on spells for him to use...

• Dawn creates sunlight. If he can lock a vampire down within the area of effect, they will be dust in short order.

• Dispel Evil and Good breaks a vampire's charm. However...things can't really leave Barovia, so the dismissal part of that spell won't be terribly effective here.

• Geas is useful when he needs to find something. For example, capture a werewolf then place a geas on it to lead them to the den.

• Lesser and Greater Restoration are enormously useful, as is remove curse.

• Guiding Bolt is a great weapon against Vampires. Shuts down their regeneration, and gives the next attack advantage.

• Hallow: If Van Richten can get his hands on the material components for this, he can create holy ground to help protect the PCs. Create a bubble of hallowed ground around the antimagic field that covers the Tower of Khazan....talk about a fortress. Sure, you'll have a bubble of non-hallowed ground where the antimagic field zone is...but the territory around the tower itself will be holy ground.

• Given his skill at predicting his foes...dropping sanctuary on a creature they are about to attack can completely trash their attempts.

• Spirit Guardians is another spell that is just....awesome.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Authored:==
* ''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Demons]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Witches (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Witches]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]''

Credited for marketing purposes with:
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Mists (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Mists]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]]''

==[[Associate of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]==

==Chronology==

[[671 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten born<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, son of Otto and Mrs. Van Richten
 
{{Spec|[[678 BC]] - Rudolph’s sister [[Maria Van Richten]] born.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 18 "Speculation based on BH. We only know that she is younger than Rudolph."</ref>
 

[[679 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten sent to boarding school in [[Nartok]]. A childhood friend is [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]].<ref name="VRMHCII p.25-26">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 25-26</ref>

[[680 BC]] - [[Casimir (of Richten Haus)|Casimir]] (not to be confused with [[Casimir Lukas|Harkon Lukas’ son]]) starts working at Richten Haus as the gate keeper.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 6">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 6</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[683 BC]] - The servants of [[Richten Haus]] are all killed while the family is away one day. (summer)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.18: "Speculation based on [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] pg. 15, 24: I’m going on the hunch that VR grows younger until he reaches the age he was at when this event occurred"</ref>
 

[[685 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten meets [[Robert Tatenna]], a fellow student at boarding school. (fall)<ref name="CT p.14">[[Chilling Tales]] p.14</ref>

[[688 BC]] - The [[The Crimson Death Epidemic | Crimson Death]] spreads across Darkon (winter); it claims Van Richten’s great aunt Helga, despite his efforts; Rudolph is even more driven into his medical studies.<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[689 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten attends the [[University of Il Aluk]]. While there, he meets a fellow student, [[Dr. Harmon Ruscheider]]. (fall)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]] pg. 15"</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[691 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten marries his childhood sweetheart, [[Ingrid van Richten|Ingrid]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "[[Realm of Terror]]; [[VRGtV]]: Give VR a good respectable year between their marriage and birth of Erasmus in 692"</ref>
 

[[692 BC]] - Rudolph and Ingrid Van Richten's son [[Erasmus van Richten|Erasmus]] is born.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]] p. 4; [[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 8, "fourteen summers" before [[706 BC]]</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[693 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten finishes his studies; opens his practice back home in [[Rivalis]].}},<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VR’s age, RoT; VRGtV; and ToDm pg. 86, which indicates it takes 4-5 years to get a medical education at the University of Il Aluk"</ref> 
 
{{Spec|693 BC - Dr. Van Richten travels to [[Lamordia]], hears of the [[Loud Man of Lamordia]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VRGtG pg. 9: “When I was young.”</ref> 

[[696 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Antonin Madren]] and becomes his mentor.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 21: "VRGttC pg. 6: Van Richten takes Madren on as a medical student, which implies Van Richten has time to offer such an education (which lasts up to 8 years), i.e., while he was still a simple doctor (693-706)."</ref>

[[706 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten suffers the wrath of the [[Radanavich clan]]; the Vistani steal his son Erasmus; they sell Erasmus to [[Baron Metus]]<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, a vampire from [[Richemulot]]; with the help of an amused [[Azalin]], Van Richten wipes out all but one member of the Radanavich caravan<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]</ref>; [[Madame Radanavich]] [[curse | curses]] Van Richten<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, although he doesn’t realize it until the end of his career.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

[[706 BC]] Van Richten puts his Erasmus, now a vampire, out of his misery, but in spite [[Baron Metus]] tears [[Ingrid van Richten]] to pieces; Dr. Van Richten destroys Baron Metus, starting his career of hunting evil. Unable to live with the memories in [[Richten Haus]], Van Richten moves to [[Corvia]].<ref name="VRA p. 5">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 5</ref>

[[707 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten researches vampires, and meets [[Aimon Davidovitch]], a fellow scholar of the arcane.<ref> from [[JWM Timeline]] p.22: "[[VRGtF]] pg. 4: VR knew him for “some 30-odd years”]</ref>

[[710 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten encounters his first werebeast near [[Varithne]], a small village in northern [[Darkon]]. Dr. Van Richten starts hunting werebeasts as well<ref name="VRMHC p. 109-110">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 109-110</ref>

[[711 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Gedlan Ironheart]], a fearless [[dwarven]] [[innkeeper]] in [[Corvia]]. Gedlan becomes a frequent hunting companion.<ref name="Bleah House p. 11">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p.11</ref>

[[712 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets the mage [[Shauten]]; they bond when they are attacked by one of Azalin's patrols. Shauten opens Van Richten's eyes to the existence of the [[Lich]].<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref>

[[713 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten is visited by the dying Dr. Ruscheider, who tells Rudolph all he can about several months spent as a lich's captive; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting liches.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p.111-112</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[714 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten receives a visit from his childhood friend, [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]], who is now a ghostly slave to Azalin; Dr. Van Richten learns the terrible truth about [[Azalin Rex]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on [[VRGtG]] pg. 22, [[VRMHCII]] pg. 24</ref>
 

{{Spec|714 BC - Dr. Van Richten moves to [[Mordentshire]], sensing it is politically unsafe for him to remain in [[Darkon]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on VRGttL pg. 22</ref>
 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[716 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 3 n1">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade after her death, but [[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[718 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and [[Shauten]] battle a creature they believe to be a priestly [[lich]]; it is actually Van Richten's first [[ancient dead]]}}.<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] "Speculation based on VRGAD pg. 5: “Some years ago,” and other markers. It happened after VR started hunting liches, but before he started hunting ghosts. (The latter conclusion taken from numerous references to Claudia in this Guide"</ref>
 
[[724 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten battles the [[Bog Monster of Hroth]], and meets [[Jameld of Hroth|Jameld]]. This is also Van Richten's first visit to both [[Kartakass]] and [[Sithicus]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p.153</ref> 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[726 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decade n1">[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades after her death but[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade</ref> 

{{Spec|726 BC - Dr. Van Richten visits [[Sanguinia]] with [[George Weathermay]] and [[Arametrius]]; they meet [[Claudia DeShanes]]; Claudia becomes Rudolph’s assistant, and it seems he had certain unspoken feelings for her.}}<ref>Speculation from JWM Timeline p.28: "Since Arametrius is probably [[Athasian]], Van Richten may have recently visited [[Kalidnay]] and encountered [[Ahmose Tanit]]. [VRGtG pg. 73. This is the earliest possible date for this event (due to George’s inclusion, and we know from this source and BH that VR starts hunting ghosts one year after this event. That leaves only 9 years between VR starting to hunt and writing his Guide on the subject. I chose to go with this date to keep as wide a margin of opportunity as possible.]"</ref>
 

[[727 BC]] - [[Merilee Markuza]], the Child [[Vampire]], kills Claudia. Van Richten pursues the creature relentlessly, but loses her in [[Lamordia]].<ref name="Darklords p. 63">[[Darklords]] p. 63</ref>

727 BC - While hunting the Child Vampire, Van Richten witnesses the [[Thundering Carriage]]; Van Richten decides he must put an end to these ghostly horrors, too.<ref name="Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts p. 6">[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 6</ref>

[[728 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten defeats the [[Phantom Army]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 91</ref>

[[729 BC]] - The fiend [[Elsepeth]] enters Ravenloft via [[transposition]] in a small village outside [[Stangengrad]], near the [[Grashen Falls]] (sept)<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.28: "[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] pg. 14: the diary is dated “twelve years ago.”</ref>

[[730 BC]] - {{Spec|[[Gedlan Ironheart]] killed while battling evil spirits.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: "VRGtG pg. 23: Gedlan is referred to as “Geddar” in this book. The date is an estimate based on the 727-736 available time span."</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] leaves [[Borca]], having lurked there for years.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] p. 66</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] writes to Van Richten about the death of Madren’s sister.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[734 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] shows up on Van Richten's doorstep, and gives the good doctor his notes; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting the [[Created]].}}<ref>JWM Timeline p. 30: "VRGttC pg. 6: Estimate. “Years” after Madren wrote about his sister’s death"</ref> 

[[735 BC] - Dr. Van Richten is forced to kill his old friend [[Shauten]] in self-defense, when Shauten tries to sacrifice Rudolph in a bid for [[lichdom]]<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref><ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>. {{Spec|This "near-miss" may have inspired Van Richten to start recording his collected knowledge for heroes to come.}}<ref>JWM Timeline: "Speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6"</ref>

735 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''.<ref name="RLCS p.18">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.18</ref><ref name="RLPHB p.20">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.20</ref>

[[736 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''.

[[737 BC]] - The [[Vistana]] [[Cyrilla]]'s niece [[Vassa]] is [[kidnapped]] near [[Corvia]].<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 20: The golem appeared “the following year” after Vaasa’s soul is taken."</ref>

737 BC - [[Vassa]] returns as a [[clay golem]]; Cyrilla writes to Dr. Van Richten.<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 19 "just last year"</ref>

737 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''.

[[738 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''.

[[738 BC]] [[Emil Bollenbach]] engineers the [[kidnapping]] of Dr. Rudolph van Richten to the end of seizing his [[brain]] for [[transplantation]] into a super-golem. fortunately, several of Van Richten's friends intercede to thwart Dr. Bollenbach.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 33: "[[Children of the Night: The Created]] pg. 50; CT pg. 32 places this adventure 8 years after Emil’s disappearance (i.e., 746), but the dating used in CotN:C fits VR’s chronology better.</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] goes to [[Nartok]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 67-68">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.67-68</ref>

[[739 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and the adventuring band known as [[the Hand (Adventurer Band)|the Hand]] hunt and destroy [[the Gibbering Golem]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 265-276">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.265-276</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]] publishes ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''. This act earns him considerable ire from [[Agatha Clairmont]], whom sees it as an instruction manual to building [[dread golem]]s just much as it is hunting them.<ref name="Van Richten's Arsenal p. 149">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p. 149</ref>

[[740 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]'' (early spring).

740 BC - Dr. Van Richten inherits the [[library (Aimon Davidovitch)]] of [[Aimon Davidovitch]]. Dr. Van Richten starts studying tomes. (Sept)<ref>JWM Timeline p. 35 "Extrapolated from VRGtF pg. 4"</ref>

[[741 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]], [[Davvyd]], [[Samuel]] and [[Dr. Ottelie Farringer]] battle the fiend [[Drigor]]. Only Dr. van Richten survives. (Feb.)<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 79-85">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p. 79-85</ref>

741 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]]''.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Book)]] p.4</ref>

741 BC - [[Van Richten]] stumbles into the clutches of [[the nameless Amnizu]] and [[the nameless Barbazu]] infesting [[Chateaufaux]]. He is captured. However, he manages to join with some [[adventurer]]s to route the [[devil]]s from the town.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.72-73; Note that the encounter with these [[fiend]]s doesn't appear in the original uncompiled Van Richten's Guide to Fiends. Therefore, the encounter with the [[Fiends of Chateaufaux]] took place after took place after the first VRGtF was published.</ref><ref>[[Gazetteer III]] p.30-31, "just over 15 years ago"</ref>

741 BC<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> - Dr. Van Richten is [[depressed]]; he consults with the [[diviner]], [[Inarin Alster]]; Rudolph realizes he had been laboring under a [[curse]] all these years; Dr. Van Richten spends a year with [[Arturi Radanavich]] studying the Vistani.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]] p.5-7; 87-89</ref>

[[742 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten writes his ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]'' and retires.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> (Oct.)

[[750 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten dies in [[Richten Haus|Bleak House]] in the fight against [[Madame Radanavich]]<ref>[[Domains of Dread]] p. 17, as told in [[Bleak House]], particularly [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 58-63</ref> Meanwhile, all that is known to most, including the [[Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]] is that he [[disappeared]].<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

{{ref}}

[[category:Character]] [[category:NPC]]
[[category:2nd Edition Character]]
[[category:3rd Edition Character]]
[[category:4th Edition Character]]
[[category:5th Edition Character]]
[[category:Abused]]
[[category:Betrayed]]
[[Category:Cursed]]
[[category:Cursed by the Vistani]]
[[Category:Darkonian]]
[[Category:Demonologist]]
[[category:Energy Drained]]
[[Category:Filicide]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Rivalis]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Nartok]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Forest of Shadows]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Darkon]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordentshire]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordent]]
[[Category:Former Patients of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Dominia]]
[[Category:Former Medical Student]]
[[Category:Former Student of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[category:Gaslighted]]
[[category:Giogoto]]
[[Category:Ghost]]
[[Category:Graduate of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Graduate]]
[[Category:Herbalist]]
[[Category:Human]]
[[category:healer]]
[[category:Hero]]
[[Category:Hunter Of Monsters]]
[[Category:Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[category:Intellectual]]
[[Category:Kidnapped]]
[[category:Killer]]
[[category:Lorist]]
[[Category:Male]]
[[category:Mass Murderer]]
[[category:Medical Doctor]]
[[category:Medical Professional]]
[[category:Mentor]]
[[category:Murderer]]
[[Category:Necrologist]]
[[category:Old]]
[[Category:Planar Mechanic]]
[[category:Polymath]]
[[category:Posthumous Character]]
[[category:Potential Darklord]]
[[Category:Proprietor]]
[[category:Professional Killer]]
[[category:Punished]]
[[category:Ravenloft Lorist]]
[[Category:Ravenloft Loremaster]]
[[category:Redeemed]]
[[category:Reformed]]
[[category:Repentant]]
[[category:Researcher]]
[[category:Retired]]
[[Category:Rogue]]
[[category:Sage]]
[[category:Seduced]]
[[Category:Stasis]]
[[category:Tempted]]
[[category:Transgressed]]
[[category:Transgressor]]
[[Category:Van Richten Family]]
[[category:Victim of Medical Malpractice]]
[[Category:Victim of the van Richten Curse]]
[[category:Victimized]]
[[Category:Widowed]]
[[Category:writer]]
[[category:Births in 671 BC]]
[[category:Deaths in 750 BC]]
<references/>

==Data from the Ravenloft Catalogue==



{|
|-valign="top"
|[[Image:rldb_npc.jpg]]
|[[Image:rldb_primary.gif]]
|
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' 
''[[Bleak House]]''
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_art.gif]]
|
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - p4 
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - cover, p4 
''[[Bleak House:Homecoming]]'' - p4,p16 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - p7,8 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p92 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - p114 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 5,11 
''[[The Created]]'' - p13 
''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]'' - p5
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_stats.gif]]
|
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - pp4-5 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p91 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 3
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_desc.gif]]
|
''[[Ravenloft Third Edition]]'' - pp14,17-18,27,176 
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - throughout 
''[[Bleak House]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to The Created]]'' - throughout 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]'' - throughout 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - pp91-93 
''[[Tales of Ravenloft: The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]'' - pp1-17 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - pp 2-3 
''[[Heroes of Light]]'' - p64 
''[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]]'' - pp1-4, pp9-13, pp304-310
|-valign="top"
|}

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (NPC)

2022-01-29T16:33:41Z

Blade Runner Rock:

[[File:Original VR.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
[[File:Rudolph van richten.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten and [[Strahd]] by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
{{canon}}
'''Dr. Rudolph Van Richten''' is the greatest monster hunter that has ever lived and the most well-known hero of the Lands of the Mists.

==History==
He was born in [[Rivalis]] in [[Darkon]] in [[671 BC]]. He took [[medicine]] at the [[University of Il Aluk]], completing his four or five year program of study in [[693 BC]]. This humble man was spurred into a life of monster hunting when his son [[Erasmus van Richten]] was kidnapped by the [[Radanavich clan]] and sold to [[Baron Metus]]. Metus turned Erasmus into a [[vampire groom]] and Van Richten was forced to slay his son. In revenge, Metus killed Rudolph's wife, [[Ingrid van Richten]]. Van Richten eventually slew Metus, and then, with the help of [[Azalin]], the entire [[Radanavich tribe]].

Until his disappearance in [[750 BC]], he resided in [[Mordentshire]], where he ran an [[Van Richten's Herbalist Shop|herbalist shop]], as well as wrote several of his famous [[Van Richten's Guides]], and mentored [[The Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]], who regarded him as an uncle and took up his work.

==In [[Curse of Strahd]]==
Dr. van Richten makes a notable appearance in the [[5th Edition]] [[module]], [[Curse of Strahd]], though not in his [[famous]] persona as the monster hunter and [[writer]] of the [[Van Richten's Guides]] he is notable for in previous Ravenloft products. Instead, he adopts the guise of [[Rictavio]], a traveling [[half-elf]] [[bard]], [[storyteller]], and [[ringmaster]] gathering stories and watching out for talent. In reality he is gathering formation and waiting for an optimal time to strike at [[Strahd]], preferably when the vampire lord is in [[hibernation]]. Unlike other versions of van Richten, the Curse of Strahd van Richten is a [[loner]] because he knows the full extent of his [[curse]].<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> For more details, see [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Curse of Strahd)]]

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

A CURSED MAN:

Van Richten suffers a curse bestowed on him by a Vistani:

Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws.

Its effect on him can best be summarized with this statement: "Van Richten Dies Last." This curse is both a boon and a bane to him. The curse is a large part of why he has lived so long--how he has accumulated so much experience and expertise. He is cursed to always see his friends and allies die--which means he has to live long enough to see it happen.

For a long time, he was unaware of the exact nature of the curse on him, but he is apparently aware of it now.

• Van Richten feels guilty. For decades he fought alongside others with monsters, completely unaware that he was a doombringer among them. Now that he knows, he is burdened by all the deaths he feels that his presence caused.

• Van Richten isolates himself. He doesn't let people get close to him for fear that his curse will take them out.

• If Van Richten is traveling with the party, he has excellent odds of surviving--if someone is going to die in the party, it'll be someone other than him.

• Van Richten's curse should have a tangible impact if he’s traveling with the party: he is a doombringer of the highest order. His mere presence among the party should invite tragedy and disaster.

The Tragedy of Ezmerelda and Van Richten. In the backstory that created Ezmerelda d’Avenir (Appendix D: Monsters and NPCs pages 230-231), there's a tragedy in there: Van Richten's curse could have been lifted years ago.

By Ravenloft Lore, the strongest of curses laid down by a Vistani can only be lifted by the Vistani who placed it, or a blood relative of that Vistani. Van Richten's curse was a Death Curse laid on him by Ezmerelda's mother. Only Ezmerelda has the ability to revoke the curse. But here's the problem...
Ezmerelda is Vistani...by nature; they are secretive about their abilities. Beyond that, Van Richten doesn't trust Vistani and likely commanded Ezmerelda to not use her Vistani abilities in his presence. As a result, Van Richten doesn't know how Vistani curses work--he doesn't know that they can be revoked by a blood relative of the one who laid it. He's a Cleric, he has undoubtedly tried remove curse on himself and it failed. As far as he knows, the curse is permanent.
Van Richten is also secretive and, as mentioned, doesn't trust the Vistani. He kept Ezmerelda at arm's length as best he could both because he couldn't trust her, but also to try to protect her from the curse...and even if he was aware of the curse when they traveled together, he never told her about it.

If either one of them had been less secretive, more open, his curse would have been revoked a long time ago.

If the players want to help Van Richten break the curse, here's the backstory:

The story of Ezmerelda and Van Richten's history was written in the Van Richten's Journal (Appendix F: Handouts pages 254-255). It involves him destroying Ezmerelda's caravan while she was very, very young. She survived the undead assault and later got picked up by another caravan of Vistani (it was actually the Zarovan tribe--Madam Eva's caravan). She originally wanted revenge on Van Richten, but time with Eva (and the presence of the most powerful Vistani of them all) showed her the tragedy of what had happened from an outside perspective. Ezmerelda realized that the whole thing was a horrible tragedy and wrongs had been committed on both sides. She, thus, set out to try to find Van Richten and try to make things right...though Eva never told her about the curse her mother had laid on Van Richten.

Van Richten and Ezmerelda must travel to the place the curse was first laid...a small clearing in the forests of Barovia where the ruins of Ezmerelda's caravan still lie. Both must verbally acknowledge the wrong that had been done and verbally forgive one another for it...then the remains of Ezmerelda's caravan must be burned.

THE DISGUISE:

Van Richten got the idea for “Rictavio” from his exposure to Ezmerelda and her occasional methods for blending in when going somewhere that didn't like Vistani. In short: "Sometimes the best disguise is being the most obvious thing in the room." As mentioned above, Ezmerelda has never encountered the Rictavio disguise and Van Richten isn't familiar with any of the disguises Ezmerelda is currently using.

It is a rather perfect disguise. Van Richten is known as a grim and serious individual, a dour old man who roves the world slaying monsters. “Rictavio” is a flamboyant fop who tells ludicrous stories, commits crimes against music, and is constantly trying to recruit people to his Circus of Wonders. He should be portrayed as extremely over the top and completely harmless. It should be very jarring to your players if he drops the act and reveals who he truly is.
Furthermore, Rictavio knows that even if someone suspects he's hiding something, they are extremely unlikely to guess the truth. If a player rolls well on Insight against him and figures out he's full of crap, that only tells them that he's lying about something...not what he is lying about. And his response is to just carry on and ignore accusations. Sure, the PCs may figure out that he's full of it (his stories are obvious fabrications) but he just carries right along, sticking to his guns even though the players know it’s a load of BS.

The players should have a hard time to get a serious read on Rictavio's personality. He strikes them as so straight forward--a carnie who is spinning tall tales for amusement. So they shouldn’t suspect that he's any more than what he appears to be.

A HARD MAN TO PIN DOWN:

Van Richten is a man with a plan for killing Strahd Von Zarovich, and it's a plan that plays well to his aged capabilities: "wait til Strahd takes a long nap, then stake him in his sleep." Of anyone in the valley, Van Richten knows how deadly Strahd is. He has fought elder vampires before and Strahd is the greatest of them all. He may very well believe that trying to fight him head on is pure folly, but he’s the one most capable of doing so.

It's important to note: Most of the "Destined Allies" the party can draw from Madame Eva’s Tarokka card reading have notes about how the PCs can get that individual to join them. Van Richten has no such notes. Instead, it says this...

Van Richten works alone. [...] Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure.

Van Richten is aware of Madame Eva but (unlike many others in the valley) he won't immediately cave to her prophecies, drop everything he has been working on, and throw his lot in with the PCs. Here are a few important things to keep in mind if the party is trying to recruit him...

• Van Richten is quite certain that if he drops his disguise, Strahd will find him and set out to kill him. (This is one of Strahd's Primary Goals as listed in Chapter 1)

• Van Richten's disguise is magically augmented. As long as the party can't get his hat off, they cannot prove that he’s not a carnie ringmaster

• Van Richten's disguise is only useful against Strahd as long as no one knows who he really is. The ring of mind shielding only works on him...it doesn't work on the PCs. He knows that if anyone else finds out, Strahd can charm them, read their mind or otherwise extract that information from them.

• Van Richten is fully aware of his curse. He will avoid physically joining up with the party for fear that he will get them all killed.

• Van Richten does not talk about his curse. He knows well the bravery of adventurers and that telling them about his curse tends to result in responses like "Oh, you don't need to worry about us, we're strong!" followed shortly by ":dying noises:." Rebuffing their advances without mentioning the curse is much more effective at getting them to stay away from him so his curse doesn't kill them.

• Even if Van Richten consents to offer them aid, it should be indirect as much as possible. He has his plan, he's set in his ways, and he’s not going to go gallivanting off with a bunch of young adventurers. And, he should stay in character as much as possible...blowing his cover will only bring Strahd down on him AND the PCs.

Ideally, even if the party can convince him to help...his help should primarily take the form of a surprisingly knowledgeable carnival ringmaster who is "certainly not going to go out and fight monsters with you. I'm a ringmaster, not an adventurer!"

He may lend the party his carnival wagon to travel around in (once he finds somewhere else to stash his saber-toothed tiger that has been trained to hunt Vistani, or he may lend them the tiger), give them helpful advice--possibly using ravens to stay in touch over long-distance if the PCs make friends with the Keepers of the Feather, and provide the sort of support that a Carnie could offer. But, it should take rather extreme circumstances for him to actually be honest with the PCs...and they may have to do something about his curse before he'll actually travel with them.

GETTING HIM TO GOIN UP:

Van Richten wants to stay under cover...so how does the party get him to change his mind?

Easy: Ruin his plan.

If Van Richten's cover is blown, his plan is a wash. The whole plan depends on his identity staying a secret until Strahd goes into hibernation. If Strahd identifies Van Richten before then, he will try to kill him and Van Richten is pretty sure he can't take Strahd in a straight-up fight. Thus...if Van Richten’s cover is blown, he is stuck with two bad choices: Either he tries to keep going it alone, possibly getting killed by Strahd, and fails his “final mission,” or he accepts the risk to the PCs and joins them to try to take Strahd down directly. A few example ways to blow his cover...

• Knock his hat off. A hat of disguise only works as long as it stays on your head, so if something happens that knocks his hat off; “Rictavio” is replaced by Van Richten.

• Let the Tyger Tyger event happen (chapter 5). When Rictavio flees to the Tower of Khazan, he's inside an antimagic field and cannot disguise himself.

• Even if Van Richten is distorting his voice, if the PCs have already befriended Ezmerelda, she may still recognize it...even if what she recognizes is the cadence his voice adopts when he's explaining something.

ABILITY LOADOUT:

Van Richten is a Cleric...and his listed prepared spells speaks more of a support caster than a monster hunter who has gone solo. But, because he's a Cleric, he can swap out his prepared spells at will to any other spells on the Cleric list. Here are a few notes on spells for him to use...

• Dawn creates sunlight. If he can lock a vampire down within the area of effect, they will be dust in short order.

• Dispel Evil and Good breaks a vampire's charm. However...things can't really leave Barovia, so the dismissal part of that spell won't be terribly effective here.

• Geas is useful when he needs to find something. For example, capture a werewolf then place a geas on it to lead them to the den.

• Lesser and Greater Restoration are enormously useful, as is remove curse.

• Guiding Bolt is a great weapon against Vampires. Shuts down their regeneration, and gives the next attack advantage.

• Hallow: If Van Richten can get his hands on the material components for this, he can create holy ground to help protect the PCs. Create a bubble of hallowed ground around the antimagic field that covers the Tower of Khazan....talk about a fortress. Sure, you'll have a bubble of non-hallowed ground where the antimagic field zone is...but the territory around the tower itself will be holy ground.

• Given his skill at predicting his foes...dropping sanctuary on a creature they are about to attack can completely trash their attempts.

• Spirit Guardians is another spell that is just....awesome.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Authored:==
* ''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Demons]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Witches (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Witches]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]''

Credited for marketing purposes with:
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Mists (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Mists]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]]''

==[[Associate of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]==

==Chronology==

[[671 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten born<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, son of Otto and Mrs. Van Richten
 
{{Spec|[[678 BC]] - Rudolph’s sister [[Maria Van Richten]] born.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 18 "Speculation based on BH. We only know that she is younger than Rudolph."</ref>
 

[[679 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten sent to boarding school in [[Nartok]]. A childhood friend is [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]].<ref name="VRMHCII p.25-26">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 25-26</ref>

[[680 BC]] - [[Casimir (of Richten Haus)|Casimir]] (not to be confused with [[Casimir Lukas|Harkon Lukas’ son]]) starts working at Richten Haus as the gate keeper.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 6">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 6</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[683 BC]] - The servants of [[Richten Haus]] are all killed while the family is away one day. (summer)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.18: "Speculation based on [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] pg. 15, 24: I’m going on the hunch that VR grows younger until he reaches the age he was at when this event occurred"</ref>
 

[[685 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten meets [[Robert Tatenna]], a fellow student at boarding school. (fall)<ref name="CT p.14">[[Chilling Tales]] p.14</ref>

[[688 BC]] - The [[The Crimson Death Epidemic | Crimson Death]] spreads across Darkon (winter); it claims Van Richten’s great aunt Helga, despite his efforts; Rudolph is even more driven into his medical studies.<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[689 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten attends the [[University of Il Aluk]]. While there, he meets a fellow student, [[Dr. Harmon Ruscheider]]. (fall)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]] pg. 15"</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[691 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten marries his childhood sweetheart, [[Ingrid van Richten|Ingrid]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "[[Realm of Terror]]; [[VRGtV]]: Give VR a good respectable year between their marriage and birth of Erasmus in 692"</ref>
 

[[692 BC]] - Rudolph and Ingrid Van Richten's son [[Erasmus van Richten|Erasmus]] is born.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]] p. 4; [[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 8, "fourteen summers" before [[706 BC]]</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[693 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten finishes his studies; opens his practice back home in [[Rivalis]].}},<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VR’s age, RoT; VRGtV; and ToDm pg. 86, which indicates it takes 4-5 years to get a medical education at the University of Il Aluk"</ref> 
 
{{Spec|693 BC - Dr. Van Richten travels to [[Lamordia]], hears of the [[Loud Man of Lamordia]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VRGtG pg. 9: “When I was young.”</ref> 

[[696 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Antonin Madren]] and becomes his mentor.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 21: "VRGttC pg. 6: Van Richten takes Madren on as a medical student, which implies Van Richten has time to offer such an education (which lasts up to 8 years), i.e., while he was still a simple doctor (693-706)."</ref>

[[706 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten suffers the wrath of the [[Radanavich clan]]; the Vistani steal his son Erasmus; they sell Erasmus to [[Baron Metus]]<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, a vampire from [[Richemulot]]; with the help of an amused [[Azalin]], Van Richten wipes out all but one member of the Radanavich caravan<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]</ref>; [[Madame Radanavich]] [[curse | curses]] Van Richten<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, although he doesn’t realize it until the end of his career.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

[[706 BC]] Van Richten puts his Erasmus, now a vampire, out of his misery, but in spite [[Baron Metus]] tears [[Ingrid van Richten]] to pieces; Dr. Van Richten destroys Baron Metus, starting his career of hunting evil. Unable to live with the memories in [[Richten Haus]], Van Richten moves to [[Corvia]].<ref name="VRA p. 5">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 5</ref>

[[707 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten researches vampires, and meets [[Aimon Davidovitch]], a fellow scholar of the arcane.<ref> from [[JWM Timeline]] p.22: "[[VRGtF]] pg. 4: VR knew him for “some 30-odd years”]</ref>

[[710 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten encounters his first werebeast near [[Varithne]], a small village in northern [[Darkon]]. Dr. Van Richten starts hunting werebeasts as well<ref name="VRMHC p. 109-110">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 109-110</ref>

[[711 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Gedlan Ironheart]], a fearless [[dwarven]] [[innkeeper]] in [[Corvia]]. Gedlan becomes a frequent hunting companion.<ref name="Bleah House p. 11">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p.11</ref>

[[712 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets the mage [[Shauten]]; they bond when they are attacked by one of Azalin's patrols. Shauten opens Van Richten's eyes to the existence of the [[Lich]].<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref>

[[713 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten is visited by the dying Dr. Ruscheider, who tells Rudolph all he can about several months spent as a lich's captive; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting liches.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p.111-112</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[714 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten receives a visit from his childhood friend, [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]], who is now a ghostly slave to Azalin; Dr. Van Richten learns the terrible truth about [[Azalin Rex]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on [[VRGtG]] pg. 22, [[VRMHCII]] pg. 24</ref>
 

{{Spec|714 BC - Dr. Van Richten moves to [[Mordentshire]], sensing it is politically unsafe for him to remain in [[Darkon]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on VRGttL pg. 22</ref>
 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[716 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 3 n1">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade after her death, but [[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[718 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and [[Shauten]] battle a creature they believe to be a priestly [[lich]]; it is actually Van Richten's first [[ancient dead]]}}.<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] "Speculation based on VRGAD pg. 5: “Some years ago,” and other markers. It happened after VR started hunting liches, but before he started hunting ghosts. (The latter conclusion taken from numerous references to Claudia in this Guide"</ref>
 
[[724 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten battles the [[Bog Monster of Hroth]], and meets [[Jameld of Hroth|Jameld]]. This is also Van Richten's first visit to both [[Kartakass]] and [[Sithicus]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p.153</ref> 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[726 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decade n1">[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades after her death but[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade</ref> 

{{Spec|726 BC - Dr. Van Richten visits [[Sanguinia]] with [[George Weathermay]] and [[Arametrius]]; they meet [[Claudia DeShanes]]; Claudia becomes Rudolph’s assistant, and it seems he had certain unspoken feelings for her.}}<ref>Speculation from JWM Timeline p.28: "Since Arametrius is probably [[Athasian]], Van Richten may have recently visited [[Kalidnay]] and encountered [[Ahmose Tanit]]. [VRGtG pg. 73. This is the earliest possible date for this event (due to George’s inclusion, and we know from this source and BH that VR starts hunting ghosts one year after this event. That leaves only 9 years between VR starting to hunt and writing his Guide on the subject. I chose to go with this date to keep as wide a margin of opportunity as possible.]"</ref>
 

[[727 BC]] - [[Merilee Markuza]], the Child [[Vampire]], kills Claudia. Van Richten pursues the creature relentlessly, but loses her in [[Lamordia]].<ref name="Darklords p. 63">[[Darklords]] p. 63</ref>

727 BC - While hunting the Child Vampire, Van Richten witnesses the [[Thundering Carriage]]; Van Richten decides he must put an end to these ghostly horrors, too.<ref name="Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts p. 6">[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 6</ref>

[[728 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten defeats the [[Phantom Army]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 91</ref>

[[729 BC]] - The fiend [[Elsepeth]] enters Ravenloft via [[transposition]] in a small village outside [[Stangengrad]], near the [[Grashen Falls]] (sept)<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.28: "[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] pg. 14: the diary is dated “twelve years ago.”</ref>

[[730 BC]] - {{Spec|[[Gedlan Ironheart]] killed while battling evil spirits.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: "VRGtG pg. 23: Gedlan is referred to as “Geddar” in this book. The date is an estimate based on the 727-736 available time span."</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] leaves [[Borca]], having lurked there for years.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] p. 66</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] writes to Van Richten about the death of Madren’s sister.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[734 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] shows up on Van Richten's doorstep, and gives the good doctor his notes; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting the [[Created]].}}<ref>JWM Timeline p. 30: "VRGttC pg. 6: Estimate. “Years” after Madren wrote about his sister’s death"</ref> 

[[735 BC] - Dr. Van Richten is forced to kill his old friend [[Shauten]] in self-defense, when Shauten tries to sacrifice Rudolph in a bid for [[lichdom]]<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref><ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>. {{Spec|This "near-miss" may have inspired Van Richten to start recording his collected knowledge for heroes to come.}}<ref>JWM Timeline: "Speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6"</ref>

735 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''.<ref name="RLCS p.18">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.18</ref><ref name="RLPHB p.20">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.20</ref>

[[736 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''.

[[737 BC]] - The [[Vistana]] [[Cyrilla]]'s niece [[Vassa]] is [[kidnapped]] near [[Corvia]].<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 20: The golem appeared “the following year” after Vaasa’s soul is taken."</ref>

737 BC - [[Vassa]] returns as a [[clay golem]]; Cyrilla writes to Dr. Van Richten.<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 19 "just last year"</ref>

737 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''.

[[738 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''.

[[738 BC]] [[Emil Bollenbach]] engineers the [[kidnapping]] of Dr. Rudolph van Richten to the end of seizing his [[brain]] for [[transplantation]] into a super-golem. fortunately, several of Van Richten's friends intercede to thwart Dr. Bollenbach.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 33: "[[Children of the Night: The Created]] pg. 50; CT pg. 32 places this adventure 8 years after Emil’s disappearance (i.e., 746), but the dating used in CotN:C fits VR’s chronology better.</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] goes to [[Nartok]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 67-68">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.67-68</ref>

[[739 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and the adventuring band known as [[the Hand (Adventurer Band)|the Hand]] hunt and destroy [[the Gibbering Golem]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 265-276">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.265-276</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]] publishes ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''. This act earns him considerable ire from [[Agatha Clairmont]], whom sees it as an instruction manual to building [[dread golem]]s just much as it is hunting them.<ref name="Van Richten's Arsenal p. 149">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p. 149</ref>

[[740 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]'' (early spring).

740 BC - Dr. Van Richten inherits the [[library (Aimon Davidovitch)]] of [[Aimon Davidovitch]]. Dr. Van Richten starts studying tomes. (Sept)<ref>JWM Timeline p. 35 "Extrapolated from VRGtF pg. 4"</ref>

[[741 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]], [[Davvyd]], [[Samuel]] and [[Dr. Ottelie Farringer]] battle the fiend [[Drigor]]. Only Dr. van Richten survives. (Feb.)<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 79-85">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p. 79-85</ref>

741 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]]''.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Book)]] p.4</ref>

741 BC - [[Van Richten]] stumbles into the clutches of [[the nameless Amnizu]] and [[the nameless Barbazu]] infesting [[Chateaufaux]]. He is captured. However, he manages to join with some [[adventurer]]s to route the [[devil]]s from the town.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.72-73; Note that the encounter with these [[fiend]]s doesn't appear in the original uncompiled Van Richten's Guide to Fiends. Therefore, the encounter with the [[Fiends of Chateaufaux]] took place after took place after the first VRGtF was published.</ref><ref>[[Gazetteer III]] p.30-31, "just over 15 years ago"</ref>

741 BC<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> - Dr. Van Richten is [[depressed]]; he consults with the [[diviner]], [[Inarin Alster]]; Rudolph realizes he had been laboring under a [[curse]] all these years; Dr. Van Richten spends a year with [[Arturi Radanavich]] studying the Vistani.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]] p.5-7; 87-89</ref>

[[742 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten writes his ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]'' and retires.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> (Oct.)

[[750 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten dies in [[Richten Haus|Bleak House]] in the fight against [[Madame Radanavich]]<ref>[[Domains of Dread]] p. 17, as told in [[Bleak House]], particularly [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 58-63</ref> Meanwhile, all that is known to most, including the [[Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]] is that he [[disappeared]].<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

{{ref}}

[[category:Character]] [[category:NPC]]
[[category:2nd Edition Character]]
[[category:3rd Edition Character]]
[[category:4th Edition Character]]
[[category:5th Edition Character]]
[[category:Abused]]
[[category:Betrayed]]
[[Category:Cursed]]
[[category:Cursed by the Vistani]]
[[Category:Darkonian]]
[[Category:Demonologist]]
[[category:Energy Drained]]
[[Category:Filicide]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Rivalis]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Nartok]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Forest of Shadows]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Darkon]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordentshire]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordent]]
[[Category:Former Patients of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Dominia]]
[[Category:Former Medical Student]]
[[Category:Former Student of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[category:Gaslighted]]
[[category:Giogoto]]
[[Category:Ghost]]
[[Category:Graduate of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Graduate]]
[[Category:Herbalist]]
[[Category:Human]]
[[category:healer]]
[[category:Hero]]
[[Category:Hunter Of Monsters]]
[[Category:Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[category:Intellectual]]
[[Category:Kidnapped]]
[[category:Killer]]
[[category:Lorist]]
[[Category:Male]]
[[category:Mass Murderer]]
[[category:Medical Doctor]]
[[category:Medical Professional]]
[[category:Mentor]]
[[category:Murderer]]
[[Category:Necrologist]]
[[category:Old]]
[[Category:Planar Mechanic]]
[[category:Polymath]]
[[category:Posthumous Character]]
[[category:Potential Darklord]]
[[Category:Proprietor]]
[[category:Professional Killer]]
[[category:Punished]]
[[category:Ravenloft Lorist]]
[[Category:Ravenloft Loremaster]]
[[category:Redeemed]]
[[category:Reformed]]
[[category:Repentant]]
[[category:Researcher]]
[[category:Retired]]
[[Category:Rogue]]
[[category:Sage]]
[[category:Seduced]]
[[Category:Stasis]]
[[category:Tempted]]
[[category:Transgressed]]
[[category:Transgressor]]
[[Category:Van Richten Family]]
[[category:Victim of Medical Malpractice]]
[[Category:Victim of the van Richten Curse]]
[[category:Victimized]]
[[Category:Widowed]]
[[Category:writer]]
[[category:Births in 671 BC]]
[[category:Deaths in 750 BC]]
<references/>

==Data from the Ravenloft Catalogue==



{|
|-valign="top"
|[[Image:rldb_npc.jpg]]
|[[Image:rldb_primary.gif]]
|
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' 
''[[Bleak House]]''
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_art.gif]]
|
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - p4 
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - cover, p4 
''[[Bleak House:Homecoming]]'' - p4,p16 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - p7,8 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p92 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - p114 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 5,11 
''[[The Created]]'' - p13 
''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]'' - p5
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_stats.gif]]
|
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - pp4-5 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p91 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 3
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_desc.gif]]
|
''[[Ravenloft Third Edition]]'' - pp14,17-18,27,176 
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - throughout 
''[[Bleak House]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to The Created]]'' - throughout 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]'' - throughout 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - pp91-93 
''[[Tales of Ravenloft: The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]'' - pp1-17 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - pp 2-3 
''[[Heroes of Light]]'' - p64 
''[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]]'' - pp1-4, pp9-13, pp304-310
|-valign="top"
|}

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (NPC)

2022-01-29T16:32:38Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* In Curse of Strahd */

[[File:Original VR.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
[[File:Rudolph van richten.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten and [[Strahd]] by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
{{canon}}
'''Dr. Rudolph van Richten''' is the greatest monster hunter that has ever lived and the most well-known hero of the Lands of the Mists.

==History==
He was born in [[Rivalis]] in [[Darkon]] in [[671 BC]]. He took [[medicine]] at the [[University of Il Aluk]], completing his four or five year program of study in [[693 BC]]. This humble man was spurred into a life of monster hunting when his son [[Erasmus van Richten]] was kidnapped by the [[Radanavich clan]] and sold to [[Baron Metus]]. Metus turned Erasmus into a [[vampire groom]] and Van Richten was forced to slay his son. In revenge, Metus killed Rudolph's wife, [[Ingrid van Richten]]. Van Richten eventually slew Metus, and then, with the help of [[Azalin]], the entire [[Radanavich tribe]].

Until his disappearance in [[750 BC]], he resided in [[Mordentshire]], where he ran an [[Van Richten's Herbalist Shop|herbalist shop]], as well as wrote several of his famous [[Van Richten's Guides]], and mentored [[The Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]], who regarded him as an uncle and took up his work.

==In [[Curse of Strahd]]==
Dr. van Richten makes a notable appearance in the [[5th Edition]] [[module]], [[Curse of Strahd]], though not in his [[famous]] persona as the monster hunter and [[writer]] of the [[Van Richten's Guides]] he is notable for in previous Ravenloft products. Instead, he adopts the guise of [[Rictavio]], a traveling [[half-elf]] [[bard]], [[storyteller]], and [[ringmaster]] gathering stories and watching out for talent. In reality he is gathering formation and waiting for an optimal time to strike at [[Strahd]], preferably when the vampire lord is in [[hibernation]]. Unlike other versions of van Richten, the Curse of Strahd van Richten is a [[loner]] because he knows the full extent of his [[curse]].<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> For more details, see [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Curse of Strahd)]]

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

A CURSED MAN:

Van Richten suffers a curse bestowed on him by a Vistani:

Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws.

Its effect on him can best be summarized with this statement: "Van Richten Dies Last." This curse is both a boon and a bane to him. The curse is a large part of why he has lived so long--how he has accumulated so much experience and expertise. He is cursed to always see his friends and allies die--which means he has to live long enough to see it happen.

For a long time, he was unaware of the exact nature of the curse on him, but he is apparently aware of it now.

• Van Richten feels guilty. For decades he fought alongside others with monsters, completely unaware that he was a doombringer among them. Now that he knows, he is burdened by all the deaths he feels that his presence caused.

• Van Richten isolates himself. He doesn't let people get close to him for fear that his curse will take them out.

• If Van Richten is traveling with the party, he has excellent odds of surviving--if someone is going to die in the party, it'll be someone other than him.

• Van Richten's curse should have a tangible impact if he’s traveling with the party: he is a doombringer of the highest order. His mere presence among the party should invite tragedy and disaster.

The Tragedy of Ezmerelda and Van Richten. In the backstory that created Ezmerelda d’Avenir (Appendix D: Monsters and NPCs pages 230-231), there's a tragedy in there: Van Richten's curse could have been lifted years ago.

By Ravenloft Lore, the strongest of curses laid down by a Vistani can only be lifted by the Vistani who placed it, or a blood relative of that Vistani. Van Richten's curse was a Death Curse laid on him by Ezmerelda's mother. Only Ezmerelda has the ability to revoke the curse. But here's the problem...
Ezmerelda is Vistani...by nature; they are secretive about their abilities. Beyond that, Van Richten doesn't trust Vistani and likely commanded Ezmerelda to not use her Vistani abilities in his presence. As a result, Van Richten doesn't know how Vistani curses work--he doesn't know that they can be revoked by a blood relative of the one who laid it. He's a Cleric, he has undoubtedly tried remove curse on himself and it failed. As far as he knows, the curse is permanent.
Van Richten is also secretive and, as mentioned, doesn't trust the Vistani. He kept Ezmerelda at arm's length as best he could both because he couldn't trust her, but also to try to protect her from the curse...and even if he was aware of the curse when they traveled together, he never told her about it.

If either one of them had been less secretive, more open, his curse would have been revoked a long time ago.

If the players want to help Van Richten break the curse, here's the backstory:

The story of Ezmerelda and Van Richten's history was written in the Van Richten's Journal (Appendix F: Handouts pages 254-255). It involves him destroying Ezmerelda's caravan while she was very, very young. She survived the undead assault and later got picked up by another caravan of Vistani (it was actually the Zarovan tribe--Madam Eva's caravan). She originally wanted revenge on Van Richten, but time with Eva (and the presence of the most powerful Vistani of them all) showed her the tragedy of what had happened from an outside perspective. Ezmerelda realized that the whole thing was a horrible tragedy and wrongs had been committed on both sides. She, thus, set out to try to find Van Richten and try to make things right...though Eva never told her about the curse her mother had laid on Van Richten.

Van Richten and Ezmerelda must travel to the place the curse was first laid...a small clearing in the forests of Barovia where the ruins of Ezmerelda's caravan still lie. Both must verbally acknowledge the wrong that had been done and verbally forgive one another for it...then the remains of Ezmerelda's caravan must be burned.

THE DISGUISE:

Van Richten got the idea for “Rictavio” from his exposure to Ezmerelda and her occasional methods for blending in when going somewhere that didn't like Vistani. In short: "Sometimes the best disguise is being the most obvious thing in the room." As mentioned above, Ezmerelda has never encountered the Rictavio disguise and Van Richten isn't familiar with any of the disguises Ezmerelda is currently using.

It is a rather perfect disguise. Van Richten is known as a grim and serious individual, a dour old man who roves the world slaying monsters. “Rictavio” is a flamboyant fop who tells ludicrous stories, commits crimes against music, and is constantly trying to recruit people to his Circus of Wonders. He should be portrayed as extremely over the top and completely harmless. It should be very jarring to your players if he drops the act and reveals who he truly is.
Furthermore, Rictavio knows that even if someone suspects he's hiding something, they are extremely unlikely to guess the truth. If a player rolls well on Insight against him and figures out he's full of crap, that only tells them that he's lying about something...not what he is lying about. And his response is to just carry on and ignore accusations. Sure, the PCs may figure out that he's full of it (his stories are obvious fabrications) but he just carries right along, sticking to his guns even though the players know it’s a load of BS.

The players should have a hard time to get a serious read on Rictavio's personality. He strikes them as so straight forward--a carnie who is spinning tall tales for amusement. So they shouldn’t suspect that he's any more than what he appears to be.

A HARD MAN TO PIN DOWN:

Van Richten is a man with a plan for killing Strahd Von Zarovich, and it's a plan that plays well to his aged capabilities: "wait til Strahd takes a long nap, then stake him in his sleep." Of anyone in the valley, Van Richten knows how deadly Strahd is. He has fought elder vampires before and Strahd is the greatest of them all. He may very well believe that trying to fight him head on is pure folly, but he’s the one most capable of doing so.

It's important to note: Most of the "Destined Allies" the party can draw from Madame Eva’s Tarokka card reading have notes about how the PCs can get that individual to join them. Van Richten has no such notes. Instead, it says this...

Van Richten works alone. [...] Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure.

Van Richten is aware of Madame Eva but (unlike many others in the valley) he won't immediately cave to her prophecies, drop everything he has been working on, and throw his lot in with the PCs. Here are a few important things to keep in mind if the party is trying to recruit him...

• Van Richten is quite certain that if he drops his disguise, Strahd will find him and set out to kill him. (This is one of Strahd's Primary Goals as listed in Chapter 1)

• Van Richten's disguise is magically augmented. As long as the party can't get his hat off, they cannot prove that he’s not a carnie ringmaster

• Van Richten's disguise is only useful against Strahd as long as no one knows who he really is. The ring of mind shielding only works on him...it doesn't work on the PCs. He knows that if anyone else finds out, Strahd can charm them, read their mind or otherwise extract that information from them.

• Van Richten is fully aware of his curse. He will avoid physically joining up with the party for fear that he will get them all killed.

• Van Richten does not talk about his curse. He knows well the bravery of adventurers and that telling them about his curse tends to result in responses like "Oh, you don't need to worry about us, we're strong!" followed shortly by ":dying noises:." Rebuffing their advances without mentioning the curse is much more effective at getting them to stay away from him so his curse doesn't kill them.

• Even if Van Richten consents to offer them aid, it should be indirect as much as possible. He has his plan, he's set in his ways, and he’s not going to go gallivanting off with a bunch of young adventurers. And, he should stay in character as much as possible...blowing his cover will only bring Strahd down on him AND the PCs.

Ideally, even if the party can convince him to help...his help should primarily take the form of a surprisingly knowledgeable carnival ringmaster who is "certainly not going to go out and fight monsters with you. I'm a ringmaster, not an adventurer!"

He may lend the party his carnival wagon to travel around in (once he finds somewhere else to stash his saber-toothed tiger that has been trained to hunt Vistani, or he may lend them the tiger), give them helpful advice--possibly using ravens to stay in touch over long-distance if the PCs make friends with the Keepers of the Feather, and provide the sort of support that a Carnie could offer. But, it should take rather extreme circumstances for him to actually be honest with the PCs...and they may have to do something about his curse before he'll actually travel with them.

GETTING HIM TO GOIN UP:

Van Richten wants to stay under cover...so how does the party get him to change his mind?

Easy: Ruin his plan.

If Van Richten's cover is blown, his plan is a wash. The whole plan depends on his identity staying a secret until Strahd goes into hibernation. If Strahd identifies Van Richten before then, he will try to kill him and Van Richten is pretty sure he can't take Strahd in a straight-up fight. Thus...if Van Richten’s cover is blown, he is stuck with two bad choices: Either he tries to keep going it alone, possibly getting killed by Strahd, and fails his “final mission,” or he accepts the risk to the PCs and joins them to try to take Strahd down directly. A few example ways to blow his cover...

• Knock his hat off. A hat of disguise only works as long as it stays on your head, so if something happens that knocks his hat off; “Rictavio” is replaced by Van Richten.

• Let the Tyger Tyger event happen (chapter 5). When Rictavio flees to the Tower of Khazan, he's inside an antimagic field and cannot disguise himself.

• Even if Van Richten is distorting his voice, if the PCs have already befriended Ezmerelda, she may still recognize it...even if what she recognizes is the cadence his voice adopts when he's explaining something.

ABILITY LOADOUT:

Van Richten is a Cleric...and his listed prepared spells speaks more of a support caster than a monster hunter who has gone solo. But, because he's a Cleric, he can swap out his prepared spells at will to any other spells on the Cleric list. Here are a few notes on spells for him to use...

• Dawn creates sunlight. If he can lock a vampire down within the area of effect, they will be dust in short order.

• Dispel Evil and Good breaks a vampire's charm. However...things can't really leave Barovia, so the dismissal part of that spell won't be terribly effective here.

• Geas is useful when he needs to find something. For example, capture a werewolf then place a geas on it to lead them to the den.

• Lesser and Greater Restoration are enormously useful, as is remove curse.

• Guiding Bolt is a great weapon against Vampires. Shuts down their regeneration, and gives the next attack advantage.

• Hallow: If Van Richten can get his hands on the material components for this, he can create holy ground to help protect the PCs. Create a bubble of hallowed ground around the antimagic field that covers the Tower of Khazan....talk about a fortress. Sure, you'll have a bubble of non-hallowed ground where the antimagic field zone is...but the territory around the tower itself will be holy ground.

• Given his skill at predicting his foes...dropping sanctuary on a creature they are about to attack can completely trash their attempts.

• Spirit Guardians is another spell that is just....awesome.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Authored:==
* ''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Demons]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Witches (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Witches]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]''

Credited for marketing purposes with:
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Mists (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Mists]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]]''

==[[Associate of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]==

==Chronology==

[[671 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten born<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, son of Otto and Mrs. Van Richten
 
{{Spec|[[678 BC]] - Rudolph’s sister [[Maria Van Richten]] born.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 18 "Speculation based on BH. We only know that she is younger than Rudolph."</ref>
 

[[679 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten sent to boarding school in [[Nartok]]. A childhood friend is [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]].<ref name="VRMHCII p.25-26">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 25-26</ref>

[[680 BC]] - [[Casimir (of Richten Haus)|Casimir]] (not to be confused with [[Casimir Lukas|Harkon Lukas’ son]]) starts working at Richten Haus as the gate keeper.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 6">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 6</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[683 BC]] - The servants of [[Richten Haus]] are all killed while the family is away one day. (summer)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.18: "Speculation based on [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] pg. 15, 24: I’m going on the hunch that VR grows younger until he reaches the age he was at when this event occurred"</ref>
 

[[685 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten meets [[Robert Tatenna]], a fellow student at boarding school. (fall)<ref name="CT p.14">[[Chilling Tales]] p.14</ref>

[[688 BC]] - The [[The Crimson Death Epidemic | Crimson Death]] spreads across Darkon (winter); it claims Van Richten’s great aunt Helga, despite his efforts; Rudolph is even more driven into his medical studies.<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[689 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten attends the [[University of Il Aluk]]. While there, he meets a fellow student, [[Dr. Harmon Ruscheider]]. (fall)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]] pg. 15"</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[691 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten marries his childhood sweetheart, [[Ingrid van Richten|Ingrid]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "[[Realm of Terror]]; [[VRGtV]]: Give VR a good respectable year between their marriage and birth of Erasmus in 692"</ref>
 

[[692 BC]] - Rudolph and Ingrid Van Richten's son [[Erasmus van Richten|Erasmus]] is born.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]] p. 4; [[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 8, "fourteen summers" before [[706 BC]]</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[693 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten finishes his studies; opens his practice back home in [[Rivalis]].}},<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VR’s age, RoT; VRGtV; and ToDm pg. 86, which indicates it takes 4-5 years to get a medical education at the University of Il Aluk"</ref> 
 
{{Spec|693 BC - Dr. Van Richten travels to [[Lamordia]], hears of the [[Loud Man of Lamordia]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VRGtG pg. 9: “When I was young.”</ref> 

[[696 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Antonin Madren]] and becomes his mentor.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 21: "VRGttC pg. 6: Van Richten takes Madren on as a medical student, which implies Van Richten has time to offer such an education (which lasts up to 8 years), i.e., while he was still a simple doctor (693-706)."</ref>

[[706 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten suffers the wrath of the [[Radanavich clan]]; the Vistani steal his son Erasmus; they sell Erasmus to [[Baron Metus]]<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, a vampire from [[Richemulot]]; with the help of an amused [[Azalin]], Van Richten wipes out all but one member of the Radanavich caravan<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]</ref>; [[Madame Radanavich]] [[curse | curses]] Van Richten<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, although he doesn’t realize it until the end of his career.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

[[706 BC]] Van Richten puts his Erasmus, now a vampire, out of his misery, but in spite [[Baron Metus]] tears [[Ingrid van Richten]] to pieces; Dr. Van Richten destroys Baron Metus, starting his career of hunting evil. Unable to live with the memories in [[Richten Haus]], Van Richten moves to [[Corvia]].<ref name="VRA p. 5">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 5</ref>

[[707 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten researches vampires, and meets [[Aimon Davidovitch]], a fellow scholar of the arcane.<ref> from [[JWM Timeline]] p.22: "[[VRGtF]] pg. 4: VR knew him for “some 30-odd years”]</ref>

[[710 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten encounters his first werebeast near [[Varithne]], a small village in northern [[Darkon]]. Dr. Van Richten starts hunting werebeasts as well<ref name="VRMHC p. 109-110">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 109-110</ref>

[[711 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Gedlan Ironheart]], a fearless [[dwarven]] [[innkeeper]] in [[Corvia]]. Gedlan becomes a frequent hunting companion.<ref name="Bleah House p. 11">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p.11</ref>

[[712 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets the mage [[Shauten]]; they bond when they are attacked by one of Azalin's patrols. Shauten opens Van Richten's eyes to the existence of the [[Lich]].<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref>

[[713 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten is visited by the dying Dr. Ruscheider, who tells Rudolph all he can about several months spent as a lich's captive; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting liches.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p.111-112</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[714 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten receives a visit from his childhood friend, [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]], who is now a ghostly slave to Azalin; Dr. Van Richten learns the terrible truth about [[Azalin Rex]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on [[VRGtG]] pg. 22, [[VRMHCII]] pg. 24</ref>
 

{{Spec|714 BC - Dr. Van Richten moves to [[Mordentshire]], sensing it is politically unsafe for him to remain in [[Darkon]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on VRGttL pg. 22</ref>
 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[716 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 3 n1">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade after her death, but [[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[718 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and [[Shauten]] battle a creature they believe to be a priestly [[lich]]; it is actually Van Richten's first [[ancient dead]]}}.<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] "Speculation based on VRGAD pg. 5: “Some years ago,” and other markers. It happened after VR started hunting liches, but before he started hunting ghosts. (The latter conclusion taken from numerous references to Claudia in this Guide"</ref>
 
[[724 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten battles the [[Bog Monster of Hroth]], and meets [[Jameld of Hroth|Jameld]]. This is also Van Richten's first visit to both [[Kartakass]] and [[Sithicus]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p.153</ref> 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[726 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decade n1">[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades after her death but[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade</ref> 

{{Spec|726 BC - Dr. Van Richten visits [[Sanguinia]] with [[George Weathermay]] and [[Arametrius]]; they meet [[Claudia DeShanes]]; Claudia becomes Rudolph’s assistant, and it seems he had certain unspoken feelings for her.}}<ref>Speculation from JWM Timeline p.28: "Since Arametrius is probably [[Athasian]], Van Richten may have recently visited [[Kalidnay]] and encountered [[Ahmose Tanit]]. [VRGtG pg. 73. This is the earliest possible date for this event (due to George’s inclusion, and we know from this source and BH that VR starts hunting ghosts one year after this event. That leaves only 9 years between VR starting to hunt and writing his Guide on the subject. I chose to go with this date to keep as wide a margin of opportunity as possible.]"</ref>
 

[[727 BC]] - [[Merilee Markuza]], the Child [[Vampire]], kills Claudia. Van Richten pursues the creature relentlessly, but loses her in [[Lamordia]].<ref name="Darklords p. 63">[[Darklords]] p. 63</ref>

727 BC - While hunting the Child Vampire, Van Richten witnesses the [[Thundering Carriage]]; Van Richten decides he must put an end to these ghostly horrors, too.<ref name="Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts p. 6">[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 6</ref>

[[728 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten defeats the [[Phantom Army]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 91</ref>

[[729 BC]] - The fiend [[Elsepeth]] enters Ravenloft via [[transposition]] in a small village outside [[Stangengrad]], near the [[Grashen Falls]] (sept)<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.28: "[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] pg. 14: the diary is dated “twelve years ago.”</ref>

[[730 BC]] - {{Spec|[[Gedlan Ironheart]] killed while battling evil spirits.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: "VRGtG pg. 23: Gedlan is referred to as “Geddar” in this book. The date is an estimate based on the 727-736 available time span."</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] leaves [[Borca]], having lurked there for years.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] p. 66</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] writes to Van Richten about the death of Madren’s sister.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[734 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] shows up on Van Richten's doorstep, and gives the good doctor his notes; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting the [[Created]].}}<ref>JWM Timeline p. 30: "VRGttC pg. 6: Estimate. “Years” after Madren wrote about his sister’s death"</ref> 

[[735 BC] - Dr. Van Richten is forced to kill his old friend [[Shauten]] in self-defense, when Shauten tries to sacrifice Rudolph in a bid for [[lichdom]]<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref><ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>. {{Spec|This "near-miss" may have inspired Van Richten to start recording his collected knowledge for heroes to come.}}<ref>JWM Timeline: "Speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6"</ref>

735 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''.<ref name="RLCS p.18">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.18</ref><ref name="RLPHB p.20">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.20</ref>

[[736 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''.

[[737 BC]] - The [[Vistana]] [[Cyrilla]]'s niece [[Vassa]] is [[kidnapped]] near [[Corvia]].<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 20: The golem appeared “the following year” after Vaasa’s soul is taken."</ref>

737 BC - [[Vassa]] returns as a [[clay golem]]; Cyrilla writes to Dr. Van Richten.<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 19 "just last year"</ref>

737 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''.

[[738 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''.

[[738 BC]] [[Emil Bollenbach]] engineers the [[kidnapping]] of Dr. Rudolph van Richten to the end of seizing his [[brain]] for [[transplantation]] into a super-golem. fortunately, several of Van Richten's friends intercede to thwart Dr. Bollenbach.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 33: "[[Children of the Night: The Created]] pg. 50; CT pg. 32 places this adventure 8 years after Emil’s disappearance (i.e., 746), but the dating used in CotN:C fits VR’s chronology better.</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] goes to [[Nartok]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 67-68">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.67-68</ref>

[[739 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and the adventuring band known as [[the Hand (Adventurer Band)|the Hand]] hunt and destroy [[the Gibbering Golem]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 265-276">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.265-276</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]] publishes ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''. This act earns him considerable ire from [[Agatha Clairmont]], whom sees it as an instruction manual to building [[dread golem]]s just much as it is hunting them.<ref name="Van Richten's Arsenal p. 149">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p. 149</ref>

[[740 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]'' (early spring).

740 BC - Dr. Van Richten inherits the [[library (Aimon Davidovitch)]] of [[Aimon Davidovitch]]. Dr. Van Richten starts studying tomes. (Sept)<ref>JWM Timeline p. 35 "Extrapolated from VRGtF pg. 4"</ref>

[[741 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]], [[Davvyd]], [[Samuel]] and [[Dr. Ottelie Farringer]] battle the fiend [[Drigor]]. Only Dr. van Richten survives. (Feb.)<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 79-85">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p. 79-85</ref>

741 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]]''.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Book)]] p.4</ref>

741 BC - [[Van Richten]] stumbles into the clutches of [[the nameless Amnizu]] and [[the nameless Barbazu]] infesting [[Chateaufaux]]. He is captured. However, he manages to join with some [[adventurer]]s to route the [[devil]]s from the town.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.72-73; Note that the encounter with these [[fiend]]s doesn't appear in the original uncompiled Van Richten's Guide to Fiends. Therefore, the encounter with the [[Fiends of Chateaufaux]] took place after took place after the first VRGtF was published.</ref><ref>[[Gazetteer III]] p.30-31, "just over 15 years ago"</ref>

741 BC<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> - Dr. Van Richten is [[depressed]]; he consults with the [[diviner]], [[Inarin Alster]]; Rudolph realizes he had been laboring under a [[curse]] all these years; Dr. Van Richten spends a year with [[Arturi Radanavich]] studying the Vistani.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]] p.5-7; 87-89</ref>

[[742 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten writes his ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]'' and retires.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> (Oct.)

[[750 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten dies in [[Richten Haus|Bleak House]] in the fight against [[Madame Radanavich]]<ref>[[Domains of Dread]] p. 17, as told in [[Bleak House]], particularly [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 58-63</ref> Meanwhile, all that is known to most, including the [[Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]] is that he [[disappeared]].<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

{{ref}}

[[category:Character]] [[category:NPC]]
[[category:2nd Edition Character]]
[[category:3rd Edition Character]]
[[category:4th Edition Character]]
[[category:5th Edition Character]]
[[category:Abused]]
[[category:Betrayed]]
[[Category:Cursed]]
[[category:Cursed by the Vistani]]
[[Category:Darkonian]]
[[Category:Demonologist]]
[[category:Energy Drained]]
[[Category:Filicide]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Rivalis]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Nartok]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Forest of Shadows]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Darkon]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordentshire]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordent]]
[[Category:Former Patients of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Dominia]]
[[Category:Former Medical Student]]
[[Category:Former Student of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[category:Gaslighted]]
[[category:Giogoto]]
[[Category:Ghost]]
[[Category:Graduate of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Graduate]]
[[Category:Herbalist]]
[[Category:Human]]
[[category:healer]]
[[category:Hero]]
[[Category:Hunter Of Monsters]]
[[Category:Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[category:Intellectual]]
[[Category:Kidnapped]]
[[category:Killer]]
[[category:Lorist]]
[[Category:Male]]
[[category:Mass Murderer]]
[[category:Medical Doctor]]
[[category:Medical Professional]]
[[category:Mentor]]
[[category:Murderer]]
[[Category:Necrologist]]
[[category:Old]]
[[Category:Planar Mechanic]]
[[category:Polymath]]
[[category:Posthumous Character]]
[[category:Potential Darklord]]
[[Category:Proprietor]]
[[category:Professional Killer]]
[[category:Punished]]
[[category:Ravenloft Lorist]]
[[Category:Ravenloft Loremaster]]
[[category:Redeemed]]
[[category:Reformed]]
[[category:Repentant]]
[[category:Researcher]]
[[category:Retired]]
[[Category:Rogue]]
[[category:Sage]]
[[category:Seduced]]
[[Category:Stasis]]
[[category:Tempted]]
[[category:Transgressed]]
[[category:Transgressor]]
[[Category:Van Richten Family]]
[[category:Victim of Medical Malpractice]]
[[Category:Victim of the van Richten Curse]]
[[category:Victimized]]
[[Category:Widowed]]
[[Category:writer]]
[[category:Births in 671 BC]]
[[category:Deaths in 750 BC]]
<references/>

==Data from the Ravenloft Catalogue==



{|
|-valign="top"
|[[Image:rldb_npc.jpg]]
|[[Image:rldb_primary.gif]]
|
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' 
''[[Bleak House]]''
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_art.gif]]
|
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - p4 
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - cover, p4 
''[[Bleak House:Homecoming]]'' - p4,p16 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - p7,8 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p92 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - p114 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 5,11 
''[[The Created]]'' - p13 
''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]'' - p5
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_stats.gif]]
|
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - pp4-5 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p91 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 3
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_desc.gif]]
|
''[[Ravenloft Third Edition]]'' - pp14,17-18,27,176 
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - throughout 
''[[Bleak House]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to The Created]]'' - throughout 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]'' - throughout 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - pp91-93 
''[[Tales of Ravenloft: The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]'' - pp1-17 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - pp 2-3 
''[[Heroes of Light]]'' - p64 
''[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]]'' - pp1-4, pp9-13, pp304-310
|-valign="top"
|}

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (NPC)

2022-01-29T16:30:18Z

Blade Runner Rock:

[[File:Original VR.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
[[File:Rudolph van richten.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten and [[Strahd]] by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
{{canon}}
'''Dr. Rudolph van Richten''' is the greatest monster hunter that has ever lived and the most well-known hero of the Lands of the Mists.

==History==
He was born in [[Rivalis]] in [[Darkon]] in [[671 BC]]. He took [[medicine]] at the [[University of Il Aluk]], completing his four or five year program of study in [[693 BC]]. This humble man was spurred into a life of monster hunting when his son [[Erasmus van Richten]] was kidnapped by the [[Radanavich clan]] and sold to [[Baron Metus]]. Metus turned Erasmus into a [[vampire groom]] and Van Richten was forced to slay his son. In revenge, Metus killed Rudolph's wife, [[Ingrid van Richten]]. Van Richten eventually slew Metus, and then, with the help of [[Azalin]], the entire [[Radanavich tribe]].

Until his disappearance in [[750 BC]], he resided in [[Mordentshire]], where he ran an [[Van Richten's Herbalist Shop|herbalist shop]], as well as wrote several of his famous [[Van Richten's Guides]], and mentored [[The Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]], who regarded him as an uncle and took up his work.

==In [[Curse of Strahd]]==
Dr. van Richten makes a notable appearance in the [[5th Edition]] [[module]], [[Curse of Strahd]], though not in his [[famous]] persona as the monster hunter and [[writer]] of the [[Van Richten's Guides]] he is notable for in previous Ravenloft products. Instead, he adopts the guise of [[Rictavio]], a traveling [[half-elf]] [[bard]], [[storyteller]], and [[ringmaster]] gathering stories and watching out for talent. In reality he is gathering formation and waiting for an optimal time to strike at [[Strahd]], preferably when the vampire lord is in [[hibernation]]. Unlike other versions of van Richten, the Curse of Strahd van Richten is a [[loner]] because he knows the full extent of his [[curse]].<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> For more details, see [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Curse of Strahd)]]

The Legend.

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A Physician.

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

The Weight of Experience.

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

The Slayer.

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

The Old Hero.

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

A Cursed Man.

Van Richten suffers a curse bestowed on him by a Vistani:

Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws.

Its effect on him can best be summarized with this statement: "Van Richten Dies Last." This curse is both a boon and a bane to him. The curse is a large part of why he has lived so long--how he has accumulated so much experience and expertise. He is cursed to always see his friends and allies die--which means he has to live long enough to see it happen.

For a long time, he was unaware of the exact nature of the curse on him, but he is apparently aware of it now.

• Van Richten feels guilty. For decades he fought alongside others with monsters, completely unaware that he was a doombringer among them. Now that he knows, he is burdened by all the deaths he feels that his presence caused.

• Van Richten isolates himself. He doesn't let people get close to him for fear that his curse will take them out.

• If Van Richten is traveling with the party, he has excellent odds of surviving--if someone is going to die in the party, it'll be someone other than him.

• Van Richten's curse should have a tangible impact if he’s traveling with the party: he is a doombringer of the highest order. His mere presence among the party should invite tragedy and disaster.

The Tragedy of Ezmerelda and Van Richten. In the backstory that created Ezmerelda d’Avenir (Appendix D: Monsters and NPCs pages 230-231), there's a tragedy in there: Van Richten's curse could have been lifted years ago.

By Ravenloft Lore, the strongest of curses laid down by a Vistani can only be lifted by the Vistani who placed it, or a blood relative of that Vistani. Van Richten's curse was a Death Curse laid on him by Ezmerelda's mother. Only Ezmerelda has the ability to revoke the curse. But here's the problem...
Ezmerelda is Vistani...by nature; they are secretive about their abilities. Beyond that, Van Richten doesn't trust Vistani and likely commanded Ezmerelda to not use her Vistani abilities in his presence. As a result, Van Richten doesn't know how Vistani curses work--he doesn't know that they can be revoked by a blood relative of the one who laid it. He's a Cleric, he has undoubtedly tried remove curse on himself and it failed. As far as he knows, the curse is permanent.
Van Richten is also secretive and, as mentioned, doesn't trust the Vistani. He kept Ezmerelda at arm's length as best he could both because he couldn't trust her, but also to try to protect her from the curse...and even if he was aware of the curse when they traveled together, he never told her about it.

If either one of them had been less secretive, more open, his curse would have been revoked a long time ago.

If the players want to help Van Richten break the curse, here's the backstory:

The story of Ezmerelda and Van Richten's history was written in the Van Richten's Journal (Appendix F: Handouts pages 254-255). It involves him destroying Ezmerelda's caravan while she was very, very young. She survived the undead assault and later got picked up by another caravan of Vistani (it was actually the Zarovan tribe--Madam Eva's caravan). She originally wanted revenge on Van Richten, but time with Eva (and the presence of the most powerful Vistani of them all) showed her the tragedy of what had happened from an outside perspective. Ezmerelda realized that the whole thing was a horrible tragedy and wrongs had been committed on both sides. She, thus, set out to try to find Van Richten and try to make things right...though Eva never told her about the curse her mother had laid on Van Richten.

Van Richten and Ezmerelda must travel to the place the curse was first laid...a small clearing in the forests of Barovia where the ruins of Ezmerelda's caravan still lie. Both must verbally acknowledge the wrong that had been done and verbally forgive one another for it...then the remains of Ezmerelda's caravan must be burned.

The Disguise.

Van Richten got the idea for “Rictavio” from his exposure to Ezmerelda and her occasional methods for blending in when going somewhere that didn't like Vistani. In short: "Sometimes the best disguise is being the most obvious thing in the room." As mentioned above, Ezmerelda has never encountered the Rictavio disguise and Van Richten isn't familiar with any of the disguises Ezmerelda is currently using.

It is a rather perfect disguise. Van Richten is known as a grim and serious individual, a dour old man who roves the world slaying monsters. “Rictavio” is a flamboyant fop who tells ludicrous stories, commits crimes against music, and is constantly trying to recruit people to his Circus of Wonders. He should be portrayed as extremely over the top and completely harmless. It should be very jarring to your players if he drops the act and reveals who he truly is.
Furthermore, Rictavio knows that even if someone suspects he's hiding something, they are extremely unlikely to guess the truth. If a player rolls well on Insight against him and figures out he's full of crap, that only tells them that he's lying about something...not what he is lying about. And his response is to just carry on and ignore accusations. Sure, the PCs may figure out that he's full of it (his stories are obvious fabrications) but he just carries right along, sticking to his guns even though the players know it’s a load of BS.

The players should have a hard time to get a serious read on Rictavio's personality. He strikes them as so straight forward--a carnie who is spinning tall tales for amusement. So they shouldn’t suspect that he's any more than what he appears to be.

A Hard Man to Pin Down.

Van Richten is a man with a plan for killing Strahd Von Zarovich, and it's a plan that plays well to his aged capabilities: "wait til Strahd takes a long nap, then stake him in his sleep." Of anyone in the valley, Van Richten knows how deadly Strahd is. He has fought elder vampires before and Strahd is the greatest of them all. He may very well believe that trying to fight him head on is pure folly, but he’s the one most capable of doing so.

It's important to note: Most of the "Destined Allies" the party can draw from Madame Eva’s Tarokka card reading have notes about how the PCs can get that individual to join them. Van Richten has no such notes. Instead, it says this...

Van Richten works alone. [...] Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure.

Van Richten is aware of Madame Eva but (unlike many others in the valley) he won't immediately cave to her prophecies, drop everything he has been working on, and throw his lot in with the PCs. Here are a few important things to keep in mind if the party is trying to recruit him...

• Van Richten is quite certain that if he drops his disguise, Strahd will find him and set out to kill him. (This is one of Strahd's Primary Goals as listed in Chapter 1)

• Van Richten's disguise is magically augmented. As long as the party can't get his hat off, they cannot prove that he’s not a carnie ringmaster

• Van Richten's disguise is only useful against Strahd as long as no one knows who he really is. The ring of mind shielding only works on him...it doesn't work on the PCs. He knows that if anyone else finds out, Strahd can charm them, read their mind or otherwise extract that information from them.

• Van Richten is fully aware of his curse. He will avoid physically joining up with the party for fear that he will get them all killed.

• Van Richten does not talk about his curse. He knows well the bravery of adventurers and that telling them about his curse tends to result in responses like "Oh, you don't need to worry about us, we're strong!" followed shortly by ":dying noises:." Rebuffing their advances without mentioning the curse is much more effective at getting them to stay away from him so his curse doesn't kill them.

• Even if Van Richten consents to offer them aid, it should be indirect as much as possible. He has his plan, he's set in his ways, and he’s not going to go gallivanting off with a bunch of young adventurers. And, he should stay in character as much as possible...blowing his cover will only bring Strahd down on him AND the PCs.

Ideally, even if the party can convince him to help...his help should primarily take the form of a surprisingly knowledgeable carnival ringmaster who is "certainly not going to go out and fight monsters with you. I'm a ringmaster, not an adventurer!"

He may lend the party his carnival wagon to travel around in (once he finds somewhere else to stash his saber-toothed tiger that has been trained to hunt Vistani, or he may lend them the tiger), give them helpful advice--possibly using ravens to stay in touch over long-distance if the PCs make friends with the Keepers of the Feather, and provide the sort of support that a Carnie could offer. But, it should take rather extreme circumstances for him to actually be honest with the PCs...and they may have to do something about his curse before he'll actually travel with them.

Getting him to Join Up.

Van Richten wants to stay under cover...so how does the party get him to change his mind?

Easy: Ruin his plan.

If Van Richten's cover is blown, his plan is a wash. The whole plan depends on his identity staying a secret until Strahd goes into hibernation. If Strahd identifies Van Richten before then, he will try to kill him and Van Richten is pretty sure he can't take Strahd in a straight-up fight. Thus...if Van Richten’s cover is blown, he is stuck with two bad choices: Either he tries to keep going it alone, possibly getting killed by Strahd, and fails his “final mission,” or he accepts the risk to the PCs and joins them to try to take Strahd down directly. A few example ways to blow his cover...

• Knock his hat off. A hat of disguise only works as long as it stays on your head, so if something happens that knocks his hat off; “Rictavio” is replaced by Van Richten.

• Let the Tyger Tyger event happen (chapter 5). When Rictavio flees to the Tower of Khazan, he's inside an antimagic field and cannot disguise himself.

• Even if Van Richten is distorting his voice, if the PCs have already befriended Ezmerelda, she may still recognize it...even if what she recognizes is the cadence his voice adopts when he's explaining something.

Ability Loadout.

Van Richten is a Cleric...and his listed prepared spells speaks more of a support caster than a monster hunter who has gone solo. But, because he's a Cleric, he can swap out his prepared spells at will to any other spells on the Cleric list. Here are a few notes on spells for him to use...

• Dawn creates sunlight. If he can lock a vampire down within the area of effect, they will be dust in short order.

• Dispel Evil and Good breaks a vampire's charm. However...things can't really leave Barovia, so the dismissal part of that spell won't be terribly effective here.

• Geas is useful when he needs to find something. For example, capture a werewolf then place a geas on it to lead them to the den.

• Lesser and Greater Restoration are enormously useful, as is remove curse.

• Guiding Bolt is a great weapon against Vampires. Shuts down their regeneration, and gives the next attack advantage.

• Hallow: If Van Richten can get his hands on the material components for this, he can create holy ground to help protect the PCs. Create a bubble of hallowed ground around the antimagic field that covers the Tower of Khazan....talk about a fortress. Sure, you'll have a bubble of non-hallowed ground where the antimagic field zone is...but the territory around the tower itself will be holy ground.

• Given his skill at predicting his foes...dropping sanctuary on a creature they are about to attack can completely trash their attempts.

• Spirit Guardians is another spell that is just....awesome.

Rudolph Van Richten quotes:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Authored:==
* ''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Demons]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Witches (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Witches]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]''

Credited for marketing purposes with:
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Mists (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Mists]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]]''

==[[Associate of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]==

==Chronology==

[[671 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten born<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, son of Otto and Mrs. Van Richten
 
{{Spec|[[678 BC]] - Rudolph’s sister [[Maria Van Richten]] born.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 18 "Speculation based on BH. We only know that she is younger than Rudolph."</ref>
 

[[679 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten sent to boarding school in [[Nartok]]. A childhood friend is [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]].<ref name="VRMHCII p.25-26">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 25-26</ref>

[[680 BC]] - [[Casimir (of Richten Haus)|Casimir]] (not to be confused with [[Casimir Lukas|Harkon Lukas’ son]]) starts working at Richten Haus as the gate keeper.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 6">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 6</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[683 BC]] - The servants of [[Richten Haus]] are all killed while the family is away one day. (summer)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.18: "Speculation based on [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] pg. 15, 24: I’m going on the hunch that VR grows younger until he reaches the age he was at when this event occurred"</ref>
 

[[685 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten meets [[Robert Tatenna]], a fellow student at boarding school. (fall)<ref name="CT p.14">[[Chilling Tales]] p.14</ref>

[[688 BC]] - The [[The Crimson Death Epidemic | Crimson Death]] spreads across Darkon (winter); it claims Van Richten’s great aunt Helga, despite his efforts; Rudolph is even more driven into his medical studies.<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[689 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten attends the [[University of Il Aluk]]. While there, he meets a fellow student, [[Dr. Harmon Ruscheider]]. (fall)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]] pg. 15"</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[691 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten marries his childhood sweetheart, [[Ingrid van Richten|Ingrid]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "[[Realm of Terror]]; [[VRGtV]]: Give VR a good respectable year between their marriage and birth of Erasmus in 692"</ref>
 

[[692 BC]] - Rudolph and Ingrid Van Richten's son [[Erasmus van Richten|Erasmus]] is born.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]] p. 4; [[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 8, "fourteen summers" before [[706 BC]]</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[693 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten finishes his studies; opens his practice back home in [[Rivalis]].}},<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VR’s age, RoT; VRGtV; and ToDm pg. 86, which indicates it takes 4-5 years to get a medical education at the University of Il Aluk"</ref> 
 
{{Spec|693 BC - Dr. Van Richten travels to [[Lamordia]], hears of the [[Loud Man of Lamordia]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VRGtG pg. 9: “When I was young.”</ref> 

[[696 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Antonin Madren]] and becomes his mentor.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 21: "VRGttC pg. 6: Van Richten takes Madren on as a medical student, which implies Van Richten has time to offer such an education (which lasts up to 8 years), i.e., while he was still a simple doctor (693-706)."</ref>

[[706 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten suffers the wrath of the [[Radanavich clan]]; the Vistani steal his son Erasmus; they sell Erasmus to [[Baron Metus]]<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, a vampire from [[Richemulot]]; with the help of an amused [[Azalin]], Van Richten wipes out all but one member of the Radanavich caravan<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]</ref>; [[Madame Radanavich]] [[curse | curses]] Van Richten<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, although he doesn’t realize it until the end of his career.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

[[706 BC]] Van Richten puts his Erasmus, now a vampire, out of his misery, but in spite [[Baron Metus]] tears [[Ingrid van Richten]] to pieces; Dr. Van Richten destroys Baron Metus, starting his career of hunting evil. Unable to live with the memories in [[Richten Haus]], Van Richten moves to [[Corvia]].<ref name="VRA p. 5">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 5</ref>

[[707 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten researches vampires, and meets [[Aimon Davidovitch]], a fellow scholar of the arcane.<ref> from [[JWM Timeline]] p.22: "[[VRGtF]] pg. 4: VR knew him for “some 30-odd years”]</ref>

[[710 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten encounters his first werebeast near [[Varithne]], a small village in northern [[Darkon]]. Dr. Van Richten starts hunting werebeasts as well<ref name="VRMHC p. 109-110">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 109-110</ref>

[[711 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Gedlan Ironheart]], a fearless [[dwarven]] [[innkeeper]] in [[Corvia]]. Gedlan becomes a frequent hunting companion.<ref name="Bleah House p. 11">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p.11</ref>

[[712 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets the mage [[Shauten]]; they bond when they are attacked by one of Azalin's patrols. Shauten opens Van Richten's eyes to the existence of the [[Lich]].<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref>

[[713 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten is visited by the dying Dr. Ruscheider, who tells Rudolph all he can about several months spent as a lich's captive; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting liches.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p.111-112</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[714 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten receives a visit from his childhood friend, [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]], who is now a ghostly slave to Azalin; Dr. Van Richten learns the terrible truth about [[Azalin Rex]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on [[VRGtG]] pg. 22, [[VRMHCII]] pg. 24</ref>
 

{{Spec|714 BC - Dr. Van Richten moves to [[Mordentshire]], sensing it is politically unsafe for him to remain in [[Darkon]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on VRGttL pg. 22</ref>
 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[716 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 3 n1">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade after her death, but [[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[718 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and [[Shauten]] battle a creature they believe to be a priestly [[lich]]; it is actually Van Richten's first [[ancient dead]]}}.<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] "Speculation based on VRGAD pg. 5: “Some years ago,” and other markers. It happened after VR started hunting liches, but before he started hunting ghosts. (The latter conclusion taken from numerous references to Claudia in this Guide"</ref>
 
[[724 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten battles the [[Bog Monster of Hroth]], and meets [[Jameld of Hroth|Jameld]]. This is also Van Richten's first visit to both [[Kartakass]] and [[Sithicus]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p.153</ref> 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[726 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decade n1">[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades after her death but[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade</ref> 

{{Spec|726 BC - Dr. Van Richten visits [[Sanguinia]] with [[George Weathermay]] and [[Arametrius]]; they meet [[Claudia DeShanes]]; Claudia becomes Rudolph’s assistant, and it seems he had certain unspoken feelings for her.}}<ref>Speculation from JWM Timeline p.28: "Since Arametrius is probably [[Athasian]], Van Richten may have recently visited [[Kalidnay]] and encountered [[Ahmose Tanit]]. [VRGtG pg. 73. This is the earliest possible date for this event (due to George’s inclusion, and we know from this source and BH that VR starts hunting ghosts one year after this event. That leaves only 9 years between VR starting to hunt and writing his Guide on the subject. I chose to go with this date to keep as wide a margin of opportunity as possible.]"</ref>
 

[[727 BC]] - [[Merilee Markuza]], the Child [[Vampire]], kills Claudia. Van Richten pursues the creature relentlessly, but loses her in [[Lamordia]].<ref name="Darklords p. 63">[[Darklords]] p. 63</ref>

727 BC - While hunting the Child Vampire, Van Richten witnesses the [[Thundering Carriage]]; Van Richten decides he must put an end to these ghostly horrors, too.<ref name="Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts p. 6">[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 6</ref>

[[728 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten defeats the [[Phantom Army]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 91</ref>

[[729 BC]] - The fiend [[Elsepeth]] enters Ravenloft via [[transposition]] in a small village outside [[Stangengrad]], near the [[Grashen Falls]] (sept)<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.28: "[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] pg. 14: the diary is dated “twelve years ago.”</ref>

[[730 BC]] - {{Spec|[[Gedlan Ironheart]] killed while battling evil spirits.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: "VRGtG pg. 23: Gedlan is referred to as “Geddar” in this book. The date is an estimate based on the 727-736 available time span."</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] leaves [[Borca]], having lurked there for years.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] p. 66</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] writes to Van Richten about the death of Madren’s sister.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[734 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] shows up on Van Richten's doorstep, and gives the good doctor his notes; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting the [[Created]].}}<ref>JWM Timeline p. 30: "VRGttC pg. 6: Estimate. “Years” after Madren wrote about his sister’s death"</ref> 

[[735 BC] - Dr. Van Richten is forced to kill his old friend [[Shauten]] in self-defense, when Shauten tries to sacrifice Rudolph in a bid for [[lichdom]]<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref><ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>. {{Spec|This "near-miss" may have inspired Van Richten to start recording his collected knowledge for heroes to come.}}<ref>JWM Timeline: "Speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6"</ref>

735 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''.<ref name="RLCS p.18">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.18</ref><ref name="RLPHB p.20">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.20</ref>

[[736 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''.

[[737 BC]] - The [[Vistana]] [[Cyrilla]]'s niece [[Vassa]] is [[kidnapped]] near [[Corvia]].<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 20: The golem appeared “the following year” after Vaasa’s soul is taken."</ref>

737 BC - [[Vassa]] returns as a [[clay golem]]; Cyrilla writes to Dr. Van Richten.<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 19 "just last year"</ref>

737 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''.

[[738 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''.

[[738 BC]] [[Emil Bollenbach]] engineers the [[kidnapping]] of Dr. Rudolph van Richten to the end of seizing his [[brain]] for [[transplantation]] into a super-golem. fortunately, several of Van Richten's friends intercede to thwart Dr. Bollenbach.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 33: "[[Children of the Night: The Created]] pg. 50; CT pg. 32 places this adventure 8 years after Emil’s disappearance (i.e., 746), but the dating used in CotN:C fits VR’s chronology better.</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] goes to [[Nartok]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 67-68">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.67-68</ref>

[[739 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and the adventuring band known as [[the Hand (Adventurer Band)|the Hand]] hunt and destroy [[the Gibbering Golem]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 265-276">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.265-276</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]] publishes ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''. This act earns him considerable ire from [[Agatha Clairmont]], whom sees it as an instruction manual to building [[dread golem]]s just much as it is hunting them.<ref name="Van Richten's Arsenal p. 149">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p. 149</ref>

[[740 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]'' (early spring).

740 BC - Dr. Van Richten inherits the [[library (Aimon Davidovitch)]] of [[Aimon Davidovitch]]. Dr. Van Richten starts studying tomes. (Sept)<ref>JWM Timeline p. 35 "Extrapolated from VRGtF pg. 4"</ref>

[[741 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]], [[Davvyd]], [[Samuel]] and [[Dr. Ottelie Farringer]] battle the fiend [[Drigor]]. Only Dr. van Richten survives. (Feb.)<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 79-85">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p. 79-85</ref>

741 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]]''.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Book)]] p.4</ref>

741 BC - [[Van Richten]] stumbles into the clutches of [[the nameless Amnizu]] and [[the nameless Barbazu]] infesting [[Chateaufaux]]. He is captured. However, he manages to join with some [[adventurer]]s to route the [[devil]]s from the town.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.72-73; Note that the encounter with these [[fiend]]s doesn't appear in the original uncompiled Van Richten's Guide to Fiends. Therefore, the encounter with the [[Fiends of Chateaufaux]] took place after took place after the first VRGtF was published.</ref><ref>[[Gazetteer III]] p.30-31, "just over 15 years ago"</ref>

741 BC<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> - Dr. Van Richten is [[depressed]]; he consults with the [[diviner]], [[Inarin Alster]]; Rudolph realizes he had been laboring under a [[curse]] all these years; Dr. Van Richten spends a year with [[Arturi Radanavich]] studying the Vistani.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]] p.5-7; 87-89</ref>

[[742 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten writes his ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]'' and retires.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> (Oct.)

[[750 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten dies in [[Richten Haus|Bleak House]] in the fight against [[Madame Radanavich]]<ref>[[Domains of Dread]] p. 17, as told in [[Bleak House]], particularly [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 58-63</ref> Meanwhile, all that is known to most, including the [[Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]] is that he [[disappeared]].<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

{{ref}}

[[category:Character]] [[category:NPC]]
[[category:2nd Edition Character]]
[[category:3rd Edition Character]]
[[category:4th Edition Character]]
[[category:5th Edition Character]]
[[category:Abused]]
[[category:Betrayed]]
[[Category:Cursed]]
[[category:Cursed by the Vistani]]
[[Category:Darkonian]]
[[Category:Demonologist]]
[[category:Energy Drained]]
[[Category:Filicide]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Rivalis]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Nartok]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Forest of Shadows]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Darkon]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordentshire]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordent]]
[[Category:Former Patients of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Dominia]]
[[Category:Former Medical Student]]
[[Category:Former Student of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[category:Gaslighted]]
[[category:Giogoto]]
[[Category:Ghost]]
[[Category:Graduate of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Graduate]]
[[Category:Herbalist]]
[[Category:Human]]
[[category:healer]]
[[category:Hero]]
[[Category:Hunter Of Monsters]]
[[Category:Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[category:Intellectual]]
[[Category:Kidnapped]]
[[category:Killer]]
[[category:Lorist]]
[[Category:Male]]
[[category:Mass Murderer]]
[[category:Medical Doctor]]
[[category:Medical Professional]]
[[category:Mentor]]
[[category:Murderer]]
[[Category:Necrologist]]
[[category:Old]]
[[Category:Planar Mechanic]]
[[category:Polymath]]
[[category:Posthumous Character]]
[[category:Potential Darklord]]
[[Category:Proprietor]]
[[category:Professional Killer]]
[[category:Punished]]
[[category:Ravenloft Lorist]]
[[Category:Ravenloft Loremaster]]
[[category:Redeemed]]
[[category:Reformed]]
[[category:Repentant]]
[[category:Researcher]]
[[category:Retired]]
[[Category:Rogue]]
[[category:Sage]]
[[category:Seduced]]
[[Category:Stasis]]
[[category:Tempted]]
[[category:Transgressed]]
[[category:Transgressor]]
[[Category:Van Richten Family]]
[[category:Victim of Medical Malpractice]]
[[Category:Victim of the van Richten Curse]]
[[category:Victimized]]
[[Category:Widowed]]
[[Category:writer]]
[[category:Births in 671 BC]]
[[category:Deaths in 750 BC]]
<references/>

==Data from the Ravenloft Catalogue==



{|
|-valign="top"
|[[Image:rldb_npc.jpg]]
|[[Image:rldb_primary.gif]]
|
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' 
''[[Bleak House]]''
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_art.gif]]
|
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - p4 
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - cover, p4 
''[[Bleak House:Homecoming]]'' - p4,p16 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - p7,8 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p92 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - p114 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 5,11 
''[[The Created]]'' - p13 
''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]'' - p5
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_stats.gif]]
|
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - pp4-5 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p91 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 3
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_desc.gif]]
|
''[[Ravenloft Third Edition]]'' - pp14,17-18,27,176 
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - throughout 
''[[Bleak House]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to The Created]]'' - throughout 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]'' - throughout 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - pp91-93 
''[[Tales of Ravenloft: The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]'' - pp1-17 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - pp 2-3 
''[[Heroes of Light]]'' - p64 
''[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]]'' - pp1-4, pp9-13, pp304-310
|-valign="top"
|}

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Article)

2022-01-29T16:27:58Z

Blade Runner Rock: Created page with "DR. RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN Medium humanoid (human), Lawful Good Armor Class: 17 (half plate of flowing sanctity) Hit Points: 77 (14d8 +14) Speed: 30 ft. Strength: 9 (-1)..."

DR. RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN

Medium humanoid (human), Lawful Good

Armor Class: 17 (half plate of flowing sanctity)

Hit Points: 77 (14d8 +14)

Speed: 30 ft.

Strength: 9 (-1)

Dexterity: 13 (+1)

Constitution: 13 (+1)

Intelligence: 17 (+3)

Wisdom: 18 (+4)

Charisma: 16 (+3)

Saving Throws: Con +5, Wis +8, Cha +7

Skills: Arcana +7, Deception +7, Insight +12,
Investigation +7, Medicine +8, Perception +12,
Religion +6, Sleight of Hand +4

Condition Immunities: charmed

Senses: darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 22

Languages: Abyssal, Celestial, Common, Draconic, Dwarvish, Elvish, Gundarak, Infernal, Sylvan

Challenge: 9 (5,000 XP)

SPECIAL EQUIPMENT:

In addition to his +1 sword cane and light crossbow, Van Richten wears a hat of disguise, goggles of night, and a ring of mind shielding, and he carries a spell scroll of raise dead.

Half Plate of Flowing Sanctity +1 mithril half plate. Once a day, a flask of water placed in the belt of armor becomes holy water.

ACTIONS:

Spellcasting: Van Richter is a 9th level Cleric of Helm, 1st level Wizard. His spellcasting ability is Wisdom (save DC 15, +7 to hit with spell attacks). Van Richten has the following Cleric and Wizard spells prepared:

Cantrips (at will): light, mage hand, mending, minor illusion, prestidigitation, sacred flame, thaumaturgy, toll the dead

1st level (4 slots): alarm, bless, cure wounds, detect evil and good, feather fall, find familiar, healing word, identify, protection from evil and good, shield, sleep

2nd level (3 slots): augury, beacon of hope, lesser restoration, protection from poison, silence, spiritual weapon warding bond, zone of truth

3rd level (3 slots): glyph of warding, magic circle, mass healing word, revivify, speak with dead, spirit guardians

4th level (3 slots): death ward, freedom of movement

5th level (3 slots): dawn, greater restoration, mass cure wounds, raise dead

Skulker: Van Richten can hide when he is lightly obscured from the creature from which he is hiding. When he’s hidden from a creature and misses it with a ranged weapon attack, making the attack doesn’t reveal his position. Dim light doesn’t impose disadvantage on his Wisdom (Perception) checks relying on sight.

Undead Slayer: When Van Richten hits an undead with a weapon attack, the undead takes an extra 10 (3d6) damage of weapon’s type.

Cunning Action: Van Richten can use a bonus action to take the Dash, Disengage or Hide action.

Sneak Attack: When Van Richten surprises a target, has advantage on an attack roll, or an enemy is within 5 ft. of the target, Van Richten deals and extra 7 damage.

Assassin Proficiencies: Van Richten is proficient with Disguise and Poisoner’s Kits.

Assassinate: When Van Richten hits a surprised enemy, it’s automatically a critical hit. When he attacks an enemy that hasn’t yet had a turn, he gains advantage on the attack.

Channel Divinity: Turn Undead: Undead within 30 ft. of Van Richten must make a Wisdom saving throw. If the creature fails its saving throw, they are turned for 1 minute or until they take damage. A turned creature must spend its turns trying to move as far away from him as it can, and it can’t willingly move to a space within 30 ft. of him. It also can’t take reactions. For its action, it can use only the Dash action or try to escape from an effect that prevents it from moving. If there’s nowhere to move, the creature can use the Dodge action. Undead with CR 1 or less are automatically destroyed on a failed save.

Preserve Life: As an action, Van Richten can distribute 45 hit points. This feature can restore a creature to no more than half of its hit point maximum and has no effect on an undead or construct.

Multiattack: Van Richten makes two attacks with his sword cane or light crossbow.

Sword Cane: Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 6 (1d6 +2) bludgeon damage (wooden cane) or piercing damage (silvered sword).

Light Crossbow: Ranged Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, range 80/320 ft., one target. Hit: 7 (1d8 +2) piercing damage.

Healer: As an action, Van Richten can spend one use of a Healer’s Kit to tend to a creature and restore 1d6 +4 hit points to it, plus additional hit points equal to the creature’s maximum number of Hit Dice. The creature can’t regain hit points from this feat again until it finishes a short or long rest.

REACTIONS:

Final Ward: Van Richten has a permanent glyph of warding tattooed on his neck that activates when he’s bitten there and chooses to say “Erasmus, I’m coming home” in Celestial. All targets in a 20 ft. radius must make a Dexterity saving throw or take 5d8 +5 radiant damage on a failed save or half as much (rounded up) on a successful one. Van Richten automatically fails the save and is disintegrated along with all of the items on his person.

RICTAVIO:

Several months ago a colorfully dressed half-elf bard came to Barovia in a carnival wagon, with a pet monkey on his shoulder. He took over an abandoned tower on Lake Baratok before rolling into town of Vallaki several months later. Claiming to be a carnival ringmaster in search of new actors, he began regaling locals with tales of distant lands.

MONSTER HUNTER:

The half-elf ringmaster is, in fact, the legendary human monster hunter named Rudolph Van Richten. Van Richten’s tale is a sad one. A scholar and doctor from a land called Darkon, he married his childhood sweetheart, Ingrid and together they had a son, Erasmus. When he was fourteen, Erasmus was stolen away by Vistani and sold to a vampire named Baron Metus to be used as a companion. By the time Van Richten found his son, it was too late: the Baron had already transformed Erasmus into a vampire spawn. Erasmus begged his father to end his suffering, which Van Richten did by pounding a wooden stake through his son’s chest. Baron Metus avenged that death by killing Van Richten’s wife, and Van Richten has lived with the horror of his family’s destruction ever since. After destroying Baron Metus in turn, Van Richten sought revenge against the Vistani and took up a life of hunting evil monsters.

THE WAITING GAME:

Van Richten isn’t a young man anymore. He knows his road is coming to an end, but his work isn’t done. He has come to Barovia to kill Strahd Von Zarovich, the greatest vampire of them all. Van Richten has studied Strahd for years and knows he can’t hope to best the vampire in a straight-up confrontation: he must wait for the right moment to strike. He has good evidence to suggest that Strahd periodically hibernates in his coffin, sometimes for years, when all is quite in the realm. While he bides his time, Van Richten hides in plain sight with the aid of a hat of disguise, his thoughts protected by a ring of mind shielding. He is trying to learn more about the Keepers of the Feather—a society of wereravens that oppose Strahd—while trying not to expose the secret society to their mutual enemy. He thinks the wereravens might prove helpful when the time comes. Van Richten also wants to take out as many of Strahd’s spies as he can, starting with the Vistani.

MAN WITH A PLAN:

Van Richten doesn’t know that his former protégé, a good-aligned Vistani named Ezmerelda d’Avenir, has come to Barovia looking for him. He taught her many of his monster-hunting techniques, but she doesn’t know all of his tricks and disguises. So far, their paths haven’t crossed. In the event that Van Richten becomes aware of Ezmerelda’s presence, he does his utmost to protect her without putting his own plans in jeopardy. If he can manipulate a party of adventurers into keeping an eye on her, he will do so.

VAN RICHTEN WORKS ALONE:

A curse placed on him long ago by a Vistani seer brings doom to those he befriends (see ‘Role Playing Notes’ for details). Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure. Consequently, if he thinks he’s in danger of being unmasked, he retreats to the Tower of Khazan (chapter 11) or some other quiet corner of Strahd’s domain to plan further.

TRAITS:

Ideal. “Evil cannot go unchallenged.”
Bond. “To protect those I love, I must keep them distant and hidden from my enemies.”
Flaw. “I am cursed. Thus, I will never have peace.”

ROLE PLAYING NOTES:

THE LEGEND:

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A PHYSICIAN:

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

THE WEIGHT OF EXPERIENCE:

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

THE SLAYER:

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

THE OLD HERO:

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

A CURSED MAN:

Van Richten suffers a curse bestowed on him by a Vistani:

Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws.

Its effect on him can best be summarized with this statement: "Van Richten Dies Last." This curse is both a boon and a bane to him. The curse is a large part of why he has lived so long--how he has accumulated so much experience and expertise. He is cursed to always see his friends and allies die--which means he has to live long enough to see it happen.

For a long time, he was unaware of the exact nature of the curse on him, but he is apparently aware of it now.

• Van Richten feels guilty. For decades he fought alongside others with monsters, completely unaware that he was a doombringer among them. Now that he knows, he is burdened by all the deaths he feels that his presence caused.

• Van Richten isolates himself. He doesn't let people get close to him for fear that his curse will take them out.

• If Van Richten is traveling with the party, he has excellent odds of surviving--if someone is going to die in the party, it'll be someone other than him.

• Van Richten's curse should have a tangible impact if he’s traveling with the party: he is a doombringer of the highest order. His mere presence among the party should invite tragedy and disaster.

The Tragedy of Ezmerelda and Van Richten. In the backstory that created Ezmerelda d’Avenir (Appendix D: Monsters and NPCs pages 230-231), there's a tragedy in there: Van Richten's curse could have been lifted years ago.

By Ravenloft Lore, the strongest of curses laid down by a Vistani can only be lifted by the Vistani who placed it, or a blood relative of that Vistani. Van Richten's curse was a Death Curse laid on him by Ezmerelda's mother. Only Ezmerelda has the ability to revoke the curse. But here's the problem...
Ezmerelda is Vistani...by nature; they are secretive about their abilities. Beyond that, Van Richten doesn't trust Vistani and likely commanded Ezmerelda to not use her Vistani abilities in his presence. As a result, Van Richten doesn't know how Vistani curses work--he doesn't know that they can be revoked by a blood relative of the one who laid it. He's a Cleric, he has undoubtedly tried remove curse on himself and it failed. As far as he knows, the curse is permanent.
Van Richten is also secretive and, as mentioned, doesn't trust the Vistani. He kept Ezmerelda at arm's length as best he could both because he couldn't trust her, but also to try to protect her from the curse...and even if he was aware of the curse when they traveled together, he never told her about it.

If either one of them had been less secretive, more open, his curse would have been revoked a long time ago.

If the players want to help Van Richten break the curse, here's the backstory:

The story of Ezmerelda and Van Richten's history was written in the Van Richten's Journal (Appendix F: Handouts pages 254-255). It involves him destroying Ezmerelda's caravan while she was very, very young. She survived the undead assault and later got picked up by another caravan of Vistani (it was actually the Zarovan tribe--Madam Eva's caravan). She originally wanted revenge on Van Richten, but time with Eva (and the presence of the most powerful Vistani of them all) showed her the tragedy of what had happened from an outside perspective. Ezmerelda realized that the whole thing was a horrible tragedy and wrongs had been committed on both sides. She, thus, set out to try to find Van Richten and try to make things right...though Eva never told her about the curse her mother had laid on Van Richten.

Van Richten and Ezmerelda must travel to the place the curse was first laid...a small clearing in the forests of Barovia where the ruins of Ezmerelda's caravan still lie. Both must verbally acknowledge the wrong that had been done and verbally forgive one another for it...then the remains of Ezmerelda's caravan must be burned.

THE DISGUISE:

Van Richten got the idea for “Rictavio” from his exposure to Ezmerelda and her occasional methods for blending in when going somewhere that didn't like Vistani. In short: "Sometimes the best disguise is being the most obvious thing in the room." As mentioned above, Ezmerelda has never encountered the Rictavio disguise and Van Richten isn't familiar with any of the disguises Ezmerelda is currently using.

It is a rather perfect disguise. Van Richten is known as a grim and serious individual, a dour old man who roves the world slaying monsters. “Rictavio” is a flamboyant fop who tells ludicrous stories, commits crimes against music, and is constantly trying to recruit people to his Circus of Wonders. He should be portrayed as extremely over the top and completely harmless. It should be very jarring to your players if he drops the act and reveals who he truly is.
Furthermore, Rictavio knows that even if someone suspects he's hiding something, they are extremely unlikely to guess the truth. If a player rolls well on Insight against him and figures out he's full of crap, that only tells them that he's lying about something...not what he is lying about. And his response is to just carry on and ignore accusations. Sure, the PCs may figure out that he's full of it (his stories are obvious fabrications) but he just carries right along, sticking to his guns even though the players know it’s a load of BS.

The players should have a hard time to get a serious read on Rictavio's personality. He strikes them as so straight forward--a carnie who is spinning tall tales for amusement. So they shouldn’t suspect that he's any more than what he appears to be.

A HARD MAN TO PIN DOWN:

Van Richten is a man with a plan for killing Strahd Von Zarovich, and it's a plan that plays well to his aged capabilities: "wait til Strahd takes a long nap, then stake him in his sleep." Of anyone in the valley, Van Richten knows how deadly Strahd is. He has fought elder vampires before and Strahd is the greatest of them all. He may very well believe that trying to fight him head on is pure folly, but he’s the one most capable of doing so.

It's important to note: Most of the "Destined Allies" the party can draw from Madame Eva’s Tarokka card reading have notes about how the PCs can get that individual to join them. Van Richten has no such notes. Instead, it says this...

Van Richten works alone. [...] Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure.

Van Richten is aware of Madame Eva but (unlike many others in the valley) he won't immediately cave to her prophecies, drop everything he has been working on, and throw his lot in with the PCs. Here are a few important things to keep in mind if the party is trying to recruit him...

• Van Richten is quite certain that if he drops his disguise, Strahd will find him and set out to kill him. (This is one of Strahd's Primary Goals as listed in Chapter 1)

• Van Richten's disguise is magically augmented. As long as the party can't get his hat off, they cannot prove that he’s not a carnie ringmaster

• Van Richten's disguise is only useful against Strahd as long as no one knows who he really is. The ring of mind shielding only works on him...it doesn't work on the PCs. He knows that if anyone else finds out, Strahd can charm them, read their mind or otherwise extract that information from them.

• Van Richten is fully aware of his curse. He will avoid physically joining up with the party for fear that he will get them all killed.

• Van Richten does not talk about his curse. He knows well the bravery of adventurers and that telling them about his curse tends to result in responses like "Oh, you don't need to worry about us, we're strong!" followed shortly by ":dying noises:." Rebuffing their advances without mentioning the curse is much more effective at getting them to stay away from him so his curse doesn't kill them.

• Even if Van Richten consents to offer them aid, it should be indirect as much as possible. He has his plan, he's set in his ways, and he’s not going to go gallivanting off with a bunch of young adventurers. And, he should stay in character as much as possible...blowing his cover will only bring Strahd down on him AND the PCs.

Ideally, even if the party can convince him to help...his help should primarily take the form of a surprisingly knowledgeable carnival ringmaster who is "certainly not going to go out and fight monsters with you. I'm a ringmaster, not an adventurer!"

He may lend the party his carnival wagon to travel around in (once he finds somewhere else to stash his saber-toothed tiger that has been trained to hunt Vistani, or he may lend them the tiger), give them helpful advice--possibly using ravens to stay in touch over long-distance if the PCs make friends with the Keepers of the Feather, and provide the sort of support that a Carnie could offer. But, it should take rather extreme circumstances for him to actually be honest with the PCs...and they may have to do something about his curse before he'll actually travel with them.

GETTING HIM TO GOIN UP:

Van Richten wants to stay under cover...so how does the party get him to change his mind?

Easy: Ruin his plan.

If Van Richten's cover is blown, his plan is a wash. The whole plan depends on his identity staying a secret until Strahd goes into hibernation. If Strahd identifies Van Richten before then, he will try to kill him and Van Richten is pretty sure he can't take Strahd in a straight-up fight. Thus...if Van Richten’s cover is blown, he is stuck with two bad choices: Either he tries to keep going it alone, possibly getting killed by Strahd, and fails his “final mission,” or he accepts the risk to the PCs and joins them to try to take Strahd down directly. A few example ways to blow his cover...

• Knock his hat off. A hat of disguise only works as long as it stays on your head, so if something happens that knocks his hat off; “Rictavio” is replaced by Van Richten.

• Let the Tyger Tyger event happen (chapter 5). When Rictavio flees to the Tower of Khazan, he's inside an antimagic field and cannot disguise himself.

• Even if Van Richten is distorting his voice, if the PCs have already befriended Ezmerelda, she may still recognize it...even if what she recognizes is the cadence his voice adopts when he's explaining something.

ABILITY LOADOUT:

Van Richten is a Cleric...and his listed prepared spells speaks more of a support caster than a monster hunter who has gone solo. But, because he's a Cleric, he can swap out his prepared spells at will to any other spells on the Cleric list. Here are a few notes on spells for him to use...

• Dawn creates sunlight. If he can lock a vampire down within the area of effect, they will be dust in short order.

• Dispel Evil and Good breaks a vampire's charm. However...things can't really leave Barovia, so the dismissal part of that spell won't be terribly effective here.

• Geas is useful when he needs to find something. For example, capture a werewolf then place a geas on it to lead them to the den.

• Lesser and Greater Restoration are enormously useful, as is remove curse.

• Guiding Bolt is a great weapon against Vampires. Shuts down their regeneration, and gives the next attack advantage.

• Hallow: If Van Richten can get his hands on the material components for this, he can create holy ground to help protect the PCs. Create a bubble of hallowed ground around the antimagic field that covers the Tower of Khazan....talk about a fortress. Sure, you'll have a bubble of non-hallowed ground where the antimagic field zone is...but the territory around the tower itself will be holy ground.

• Given his skill at predicting his foes...dropping sanctuary on a creature they are about to attack can completely trash their attempts.

• Spirit Guardians is another spell that is just....awesome.

RUDOLPH VAN RICHTEN QUOTES:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (NPC)

2022-01-29T15:55:50Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* In Curse of Strahd */

[[File:Original VR.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
[[File:Rudolph van richten.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten and [[Strahd]] by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
{{canon}}
'''Dr. Rudolph van Richten''' is the greatest and most well-known hero of the Lands of the Mists.

==History==
He was born in [[Rivalis]] in [[Darkon]] in [[671 BC]]. He took [[medicine]] at the [[University of Il Aluk]], completing his four or five year program of study in [[693 BC]]. This humble man was spurred into a life of monster hunting when his son [[Erasmus van Richten]] was kidnapped by the [[Radanavich clan]] and sold to [[Baron Metus]]. Metus turned Erasmus into a [[vampire groom]] and Van Richten was forced to slay his son. In revenge, Metus killed Rudolph's wife, [[Ingrid van Richten]]. Van Richten eventually slew Metus, and then, with the help of [[Azalin]], the entire [[Radanavich tribe]].

Until his disappearance in [[750 BC]], he resided in [[Mordentshire]], where he ran an [[Van Richten's Herbalist Shop|herbalist shop]], as well as wrote several of his famous [[Van Richten's Guides]], and mentored [[The Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]], who regarded him as an uncle and took up his work.

==In [[Curse of Strahd]]==
Dr. van Richten makes a notable appearance in the [[5th Edition]] [[module]], [[Curse of Strahd]], though not in his [[famous]] persona as the monster hunter and [[writer]] of the [[Van Richten's Guides]] he is notable for in previous Ravenloft products. Instead, he adopts the guise of [[Rictavio]], a traveling [[half-elf]] [[bard]], [[storyteller]], and [[ringmaster]] gathering stories and watching out for talent. In reality he is gathering formation and waiting for an optimal time to strike at [[Strahd]], preferably when the vampire lord is in [[hibernation]]. Unlike other versions of van Richten, the Curse of Strahd van Richten is a [[loner]] because he knows the full extent of his [[curse]].<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> For more details, see [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Curse of Strahd)]]

The Legend.

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A Physician.

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

The Weight of Experience.

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

The Slayer.

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

The Old Hero.

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

A Cursed Man.

Van Richten suffers a curse bestowed on him by a Vistani:

Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws.

Its effect on him can best be summarized with this statement: "Van Richten Dies Last." This curse is both a boon and a bane to him. The curse is a large part of why he has lived so long--how he has accumulated so much experience and expertise. He is cursed to always see his friends and allies die--which means he has to live long enough to see it happen.

For a long time, he was unaware of the exact nature of the curse on him, but he is apparently aware of it now.

• Van Richten feels guilty. For decades he fought alongside others with monsters, completely unaware that he was a doombringer among them. Now that he knows, he is burdened by all the deaths he feels that his presence caused.

• Van Richten isolates himself. He doesn't let people get close to him for fear that his curse will take them out.

• If Van Richten is traveling with the party, he has excellent odds of surviving--if someone is going to die in the party, it'll be someone other than him.

• Van Richten's curse should have a tangible impact if he’s traveling with the party: he is a doombringer of the highest order. His mere presence among the party should invite tragedy and disaster.

The Tragedy of Ezmerelda and Van Richten. In the backstory that created Ezmerelda d’Avenir (Appendix D: Monsters and NPCs pages 230-231), there's a tragedy in there: Van Richten's curse could have been lifted years ago.

By Ravenloft Lore, the strongest of curses laid down by a Vistani can only be lifted by the Vistani who placed it, or a blood relative of that Vistani. Van Richten's curse was a Death Curse laid on him by Ezmerelda's mother. Only Ezmerelda has the ability to revoke the curse. But here's the problem...
Ezmerelda is Vistani...by nature; they are secretive about their abilities. Beyond that, Van Richten doesn't trust Vistani and likely commanded Ezmerelda to not use her Vistani abilities in his presence. As a result, Van Richten doesn't know how Vistani curses work--he doesn't know that they can be revoked by a blood relative of the one who laid it. He's a Cleric, he has undoubtedly tried remove curse on himself and it failed. As far as he knows, the curse is permanent.
Van Richten is also secretive and, as mentioned, doesn't trust the Vistani. He kept Ezmerelda at arm's length as best he could both because he couldn't trust her, but also to try to protect her from the curse...and even if he was aware of the curse when they traveled together, he never told her about it.

If either one of them had been less secretive, more open, his curse would have been revoked a long time ago.

If the players want to help Van Richten break the curse, here's the backstory:

The story of Ezmerelda and Van Richten's history was written in the Van Richten's Journal (Appendix F: Handouts pages 254-255). It involves him destroying Ezmerelda's caravan while she was very, very young. She survived the undead assault and later got picked up by another caravan of Vistani (it was actually the Zarovan tribe--Madam Eva's caravan). She originally wanted revenge on Van Richten, but time with Eva (and the presence of the most powerful Vistani of them all) showed her the tragedy of what had happened from an outside perspective. Ezmerelda realized that the whole thing was a horrible tragedy and wrongs had been committed on both sides. She, thus, set out to try to find Van Richten and try to make things right...though Eva never told her about the curse her mother had laid on Van Richten.

Van Richten and Ezmerelda must travel to the place the curse was first laid...a small clearing in the forests of Barovia where the ruins of Ezmerelda's caravan still lie. Both must verbally acknowledge the wrong that had been done and verbally forgive one another for it...then the remains of Ezmerelda's caravan must be burned.

The Disguise.

Van Richten got the idea for “Rictavio” from his exposure to Ezmerelda and her occasional methods for blending in when going somewhere that didn't like Vistani. In short: "Sometimes the best disguise is being the most obvious thing in the room." As mentioned above, Ezmerelda has never encountered the Rictavio disguise and Van Richten isn't familiar with any of the disguises Ezmerelda is currently using.

It is a rather perfect disguise. Van Richten is known as a grim and serious individual, a dour old man who roves the world slaying monsters. “Rictavio” is a flamboyant fop who tells ludicrous stories, commits crimes against music, and is constantly trying to recruit people to his Circus of Wonders. He should be portrayed as extremely over the top and completely harmless. It should be very jarring to your players if he drops the act and reveals who he truly is.
Furthermore, Rictavio knows that even if someone suspects he's hiding something, they are extremely unlikely to guess the truth. If a player rolls well on Insight against him and figures out he's full of crap, that only tells them that he's lying about something...not what he is lying about. And his response is to just carry on and ignore accusations. Sure, the PCs may figure out that he's full of it (his stories are obvious fabrications) but he just carries right along, sticking to his guns even though the players know it’s a load of BS.

The players should have a hard time to get a serious read on Rictavio's personality. He strikes them as so straight forward--a carnie who is spinning tall tales for amusement. So they shouldn’t suspect that he's any more than what he appears to be.

A Hard Man to Pin Down.

Van Richten is a man with a plan for killing Strahd Von Zarovich, and it's a plan that plays well to his aged capabilities: "wait til Strahd takes a long nap, then stake him in his sleep." Of anyone in the valley, Van Richten knows how deadly Strahd is. He has fought elder vampires before and Strahd is the greatest of them all. He may very well believe that trying to fight him head on is pure folly, but he’s the one most capable of doing so.

It's important to note: Most of the "Destined Allies" the party can draw from Madame Eva’s Tarokka card reading have notes about how the PCs can get that individual to join them. Van Richten has no such notes. Instead, it says this...

Van Richten works alone. [...] Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure.

Van Richten is aware of Madame Eva but (unlike many others in the valley) he won't immediately cave to her prophecies, drop everything he has been working on, and throw his lot in with the PCs. Here are a few important things to keep in mind if the party is trying to recruit him...

• Van Richten is quite certain that if he drops his disguise, Strahd will find him and set out to kill him. (This is one of Strahd's Primary Goals as listed in Chapter 1)

• Van Richten's disguise is magically augmented. As long as the party can't get his hat off, they cannot prove that he’s not a carnie ringmaster

• Van Richten's disguise is only useful against Strahd as long as no one knows who he really is. The ring of mind shielding only works on him...it doesn't work on the PCs. He knows that if anyone else finds out, Strahd can charm them, read their mind or otherwise extract that information from them.

• Van Richten is fully aware of his curse. He will avoid physically joining up with the party for fear that he will get them all killed.

• Van Richten does not talk about his curse. He knows well the bravery of adventurers and that telling them about his curse tends to result in responses like "Oh, you don't need to worry about us, we're strong!" followed shortly by ":dying noises:." Rebuffing their advances without mentioning the curse is much more effective at getting them to stay away from him so his curse doesn't kill them.

• Even if Van Richten consents to offer them aid, it should be indirect as much as possible. He has his plan, he's set in his ways, and he’s not going to go gallivanting off with a bunch of young adventurers. And, he should stay in character as much as possible...blowing his cover will only bring Strahd down on him AND the PCs.

Ideally, even if the party can convince him to help...his help should primarily take the form of a surprisingly knowledgeable carnival ringmaster who is "certainly not going to go out and fight monsters with you. I'm a ringmaster, not an adventurer!"

He may lend the party his carnival wagon to travel around in (once he finds somewhere else to stash his saber-toothed tiger that has been trained to hunt Vistani, or he may lend them the tiger), give them helpful advice--possibly using ravens to stay in touch over long-distance if the PCs make friends with the Keepers of the Feather, and provide the sort of support that a Carnie could offer. But, it should take rather extreme circumstances for him to actually be honest with the PCs...and they may have to do something about his curse before he'll actually travel with them.

Getting him to Join Up.

Van Richten wants to stay under cover...so how does the party get him to change his mind?

Easy: Ruin his plan.

If Van Richten's cover is blown, his plan is a wash. The whole plan depends on his identity staying a secret until Strahd goes into hibernation. If Strahd identifies Van Richten before then, he will try to kill him and Van Richten is pretty sure he can't take Strahd in a straight-up fight. Thus...if Van Richten’s cover is blown, he is stuck with two bad choices: Either he tries to keep going it alone, possibly getting killed by Strahd, and fails his “final mission,” or he accepts the risk to the PCs and joins them to try to take Strahd down directly. A few example ways to blow his cover...

• Knock his hat off. A hat of disguise only works as long as it stays on your head, so if something happens that knocks his hat off; “Rictavio” is replaced by Van Richten.

• Let the Tyger Tyger event happen (chapter 5). When Rictavio flees to the Tower of Khazan, he's inside an antimagic field and cannot disguise himself.

• Even if Van Richten is distorting his voice, if the PCs have already befriended Ezmerelda, she may still recognize it...even if what she recognizes is the cadence his voice adopts when he's explaining something.

Ability Loadout.

Van Richten is a Cleric...and his listed prepared spells speaks more of a support caster than a monster hunter who has gone solo. But, because he's a Cleric, he can swap out his prepared spells at will to any other spells on the Cleric list. Here are a few notes on spells for him to use...

• Dawn creates sunlight. If he can lock a vampire down within the area of effect, they will be dust in short order.

• Dispel Evil and Good breaks a vampire's charm. However...things can't really leave Barovia, so the dismissal part of that spell won't be terribly effective here.

• Geas is useful when he needs to find something. For example, capture a werewolf then place a geas on it to lead them to the den.

• Lesser and Greater Restoration are enormously useful, as is remove curse.

• Guiding Bolt is a great weapon against Vampires. Shuts down their regeneration, and gives the next attack advantage.

• Hallow: If Van Richten can get his hands on the material components for this, he can create holy ground to help protect the PCs. Create a bubble of hallowed ground around the antimagic field that covers the Tower of Khazan....talk about a fortress. Sure, you'll have a bubble of non-hallowed ground where the antimagic field zone is...but the territory around the tower itself will be holy ground.

• Given his skill at predicting his foes...dropping sanctuary on a creature they are about to attack can completely trash their attempts.

• Spirit Guardians is another spell that is just....awesome.

Rudolph Van Richten quotes:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Authored:==
* ''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Demons]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Witches (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Witches]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]''

Credited for marketing purposes with:
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Mists (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Mists]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]]''

==[[Associate of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]==

==Chronology==

[[671 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten born<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, son of Otto and Mrs. Van Richten
 
{{Spec|[[678 BC]] - Rudolph’s sister [[Maria Van Richten]] born.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 18 "Speculation based on BH. We only know that she is younger than Rudolph."</ref>
 

[[679 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten sent to boarding school in [[Nartok]]. A childhood friend is [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]].<ref name="VRMHCII p.25-26">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 25-26</ref>

[[680 BC]] - [[Casimir (of Richten Haus)|Casimir]] (not to be confused with [[Casimir Lukas|Harkon Lukas’ son]]) starts working at Richten Haus as the gate keeper.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 6">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 6</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[683 BC]] - The servants of [[Richten Haus]] are all killed while the family is away one day. (summer)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.18: "Speculation based on [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] pg. 15, 24: I’m going on the hunch that VR grows younger until he reaches the age he was at when this event occurred"</ref>
 

[[685 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten meets [[Robert Tatenna]], a fellow student at boarding school. (fall)<ref name="CT p.14">[[Chilling Tales]] p.14</ref>

[[688 BC]] - The [[The Crimson Death Epidemic | Crimson Death]] spreads across Darkon (winter); it claims Van Richten’s great aunt Helga, despite his efforts; Rudolph is even more driven into his medical studies.<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[689 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten attends the [[University of Il Aluk]]. While there, he meets a fellow student, [[Dr. Harmon Ruscheider]]. (fall)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]] pg. 15"</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[691 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten marries his childhood sweetheart, [[Ingrid van Richten|Ingrid]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "[[Realm of Terror]]; [[VRGtV]]: Give VR a good respectable year between their marriage and birth of Erasmus in 692"</ref>
 

[[692 BC]] - Rudolph and Ingrid Van Richten's son [[Erasmus van Richten|Erasmus]] is born.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]] p. 4; [[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 8, "fourteen summers" before [[706 BC]]</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[693 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten finishes his studies; opens his practice back home in [[Rivalis]].}},<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VR’s age, RoT; VRGtV; and ToDm pg. 86, which indicates it takes 4-5 years to get a medical education at the University of Il Aluk"</ref> 
 
{{Spec|693 BC - Dr. Van Richten travels to [[Lamordia]], hears of the [[Loud Man of Lamordia]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VRGtG pg. 9: “When I was young.”</ref> 

[[696 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Antonin Madren]] and becomes his mentor.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 21: "VRGttC pg. 6: Van Richten takes Madren on as a medical student, which implies Van Richten has time to offer such an education (which lasts up to 8 years), i.e., while he was still a simple doctor (693-706)."</ref>

[[706 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten suffers the wrath of the [[Radanavich clan]]; the Vistani steal his son Erasmus; they sell Erasmus to [[Baron Metus]]<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, a vampire from [[Richemulot]]; with the help of an amused [[Azalin]], Van Richten wipes out all but one member of the Radanavich caravan<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]</ref>; [[Madame Radanavich]] [[curse | curses]] Van Richten<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, although he doesn’t realize it until the end of his career.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

[[706 BC]] Van Richten puts his Erasmus, now a vampire, out of his misery, but in spite [[Baron Metus]] tears [[Ingrid van Richten]] to pieces; Dr. Van Richten destroys Baron Metus, starting his career of hunting evil. Unable to live with the memories in [[Richten Haus]], Van Richten moves to [[Corvia]].<ref name="VRA p. 5">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 5</ref>

[[707 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten researches vampires, and meets [[Aimon Davidovitch]], a fellow scholar of the arcane.<ref> from [[JWM Timeline]] p.22: "[[VRGtF]] pg. 4: VR knew him for “some 30-odd years”]</ref>

[[710 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten encounters his first werebeast near [[Varithne]], a small village in northern [[Darkon]]. Dr. Van Richten starts hunting werebeasts as well<ref name="VRMHC p. 109-110">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 109-110</ref>

[[711 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Gedlan Ironheart]], a fearless [[dwarven]] [[innkeeper]] in [[Corvia]]. Gedlan becomes a frequent hunting companion.<ref name="Bleah House p. 11">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p.11</ref>

[[712 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets the mage [[Shauten]]; they bond when they are attacked by one of Azalin's patrols. Shauten opens Van Richten's eyes to the existence of the [[Lich]].<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref>

[[713 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten is visited by the dying Dr. Ruscheider, who tells Rudolph all he can about several months spent as a lich's captive; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting liches.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p.111-112</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[714 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten receives a visit from his childhood friend, [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]], who is now a ghostly slave to Azalin; Dr. Van Richten learns the terrible truth about [[Azalin Rex]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on [[VRGtG]] pg. 22, [[VRMHCII]] pg. 24</ref>
 

{{Spec|714 BC - Dr. Van Richten moves to [[Mordentshire]], sensing it is politically unsafe for him to remain in [[Darkon]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on VRGttL pg. 22</ref>
 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[716 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 3 n1">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade after her death, but [[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[718 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and [[Shauten]] battle a creature they believe to be a priestly [[lich]]; it is actually Van Richten's first [[ancient dead]]}}.<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] "Speculation based on VRGAD pg. 5: “Some years ago,” and other markers. It happened after VR started hunting liches, but before he started hunting ghosts. (The latter conclusion taken from numerous references to Claudia in this Guide"</ref>
 
[[724 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten battles the [[Bog Monster of Hroth]], and meets [[Jameld of Hroth|Jameld]]. This is also Van Richten's first visit to both [[Kartakass]] and [[Sithicus]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p.153</ref> 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[726 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decade n1">[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades after her death but[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade</ref> 

{{Spec|726 BC - Dr. Van Richten visits [[Sanguinia]] with [[George Weathermay]] and [[Arametrius]]; they meet [[Claudia DeShanes]]; Claudia becomes Rudolph’s assistant, and it seems he had certain unspoken feelings for her.}}<ref>Speculation from JWM Timeline p.28: "Since Arametrius is probably [[Athasian]], Van Richten may have recently visited [[Kalidnay]] and encountered [[Ahmose Tanit]]. [VRGtG pg. 73. This is the earliest possible date for this event (due to George’s inclusion, and we know from this source and BH that VR starts hunting ghosts one year after this event. That leaves only 9 years between VR starting to hunt and writing his Guide on the subject. I chose to go with this date to keep as wide a margin of opportunity as possible.]"</ref>
 

[[727 BC]] - [[Merilee Markuza]], the Child [[Vampire]], kills Claudia. Van Richten pursues the creature relentlessly, but loses her in [[Lamordia]].<ref name="Darklords p. 63">[[Darklords]] p. 63</ref>

727 BC - While hunting the Child Vampire, Van Richten witnesses the [[Thundering Carriage]]; Van Richten decides he must put an end to these ghostly horrors, too.<ref name="Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts p. 6">[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 6</ref>

[[728 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten defeats the [[Phantom Army]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 91</ref>

[[729 BC]] - The fiend [[Elsepeth]] enters Ravenloft via [[transposition]] in a small village outside [[Stangengrad]], near the [[Grashen Falls]] (sept)<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.28: "[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] pg. 14: the diary is dated “twelve years ago.”</ref>

[[730 BC]] - {{Spec|[[Gedlan Ironheart]] killed while battling evil spirits.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: "VRGtG pg. 23: Gedlan is referred to as “Geddar” in this book. The date is an estimate based on the 727-736 available time span."</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] leaves [[Borca]], having lurked there for years.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] p. 66</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] writes to Van Richten about the death of Madren’s sister.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[734 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] shows up on Van Richten's doorstep, and gives the good doctor his notes; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting the [[Created]].}}<ref>JWM Timeline p. 30: "VRGttC pg. 6: Estimate. “Years” after Madren wrote about his sister’s death"</ref> 

[[735 BC] - Dr. Van Richten is forced to kill his old friend [[Shauten]] in self-defense, when Shauten tries to sacrifice Rudolph in a bid for [[lichdom]]<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref><ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>. {{Spec|This "near-miss" may have inspired Van Richten to start recording his collected knowledge for heroes to come.}}<ref>JWM Timeline: "Speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6"</ref>

735 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''.<ref name="RLCS p.18">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.18</ref><ref name="RLPHB p.20">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.20</ref>

[[736 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''.

[[737 BC]] - The [[Vistana]] [[Cyrilla]]'s niece [[Vassa]] is [[kidnapped]] near [[Corvia]].<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 20: The golem appeared “the following year” after Vaasa’s soul is taken."</ref>

737 BC - [[Vassa]] returns as a [[clay golem]]; Cyrilla writes to Dr. Van Richten.<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 19 "just last year"</ref>

737 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''.

[[738 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''.

[[738 BC]] [[Emil Bollenbach]] engineers the [[kidnapping]] of Dr. Rudolph van Richten to the end of seizing his [[brain]] for [[transplantation]] into a super-golem. fortunately, several of Van Richten's friends intercede to thwart Dr. Bollenbach.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 33: "[[Children of the Night: The Created]] pg. 50; CT pg. 32 places this adventure 8 years after Emil’s disappearance (i.e., 746), but the dating used in CotN:C fits VR’s chronology better.</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] goes to [[Nartok]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 67-68">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.67-68</ref>

[[739 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and the adventuring band known as [[the Hand (Adventurer Band)|the Hand]] hunt and destroy [[the Gibbering Golem]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 265-276">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.265-276</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]] publishes ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''. This act earns him considerable ire from [[Agatha Clairmont]], whom sees it as an instruction manual to building [[dread golem]]s just much as it is hunting them.<ref name="Van Richten's Arsenal p. 149">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p. 149</ref>

[[740 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]'' (early spring).

740 BC - Dr. Van Richten inherits the [[library (Aimon Davidovitch)]] of [[Aimon Davidovitch]]. Dr. Van Richten starts studying tomes. (Sept)<ref>JWM Timeline p. 35 "Extrapolated from VRGtF pg. 4"</ref>

[[741 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]], [[Davvyd]], [[Samuel]] and [[Dr. Ottelie Farringer]] battle the fiend [[Drigor]]. Only Dr. van Richten survives. (Feb.)<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 79-85">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p. 79-85</ref>

741 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]]''.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Book)]] p.4</ref>

741 BC - [[Van Richten]] stumbles into the clutches of [[the nameless Amnizu]] and [[the nameless Barbazu]] infesting [[Chateaufaux]]. He is captured. However, he manages to join with some [[adventurer]]s to route the [[devil]]s from the town.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.72-73; Note that the encounter with these [[fiend]]s doesn't appear in the original uncompiled Van Richten's Guide to Fiends. Therefore, the encounter with the [[Fiends of Chateaufaux]] took place after took place after the first VRGtF was published.</ref><ref>[[Gazetteer III]] p.30-31, "just over 15 years ago"</ref>

741 BC<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> - Dr. Van Richten is [[depressed]]; he consults with the [[diviner]], [[Inarin Alster]]; Rudolph realizes he had been laboring under a [[curse]] all these years; Dr. Van Richten spends a year with [[Arturi Radanavich]] studying the Vistani.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]] p.5-7; 87-89</ref>

[[742 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten writes his ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]'' and retires.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> (Oct.)

[[750 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten dies in [[Richten Haus|Bleak House]] in the fight against [[Madame Radanavich]]<ref>[[Domains of Dread]] p. 17, as told in [[Bleak House]], particularly [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 58-63</ref> Meanwhile, all that is known to most, including the [[Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]] is that he [[disappeared]].<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

{{ref}}

[[category:Character]] [[category:NPC]]
[[category:2nd Edition Character]]
[[category:3rd Edition Character]]
[[category:4th Edition Character]]
[[category:5th Edition Character]]
[[category:Abused]]
[[category:Betrayed]]
[[Category:Cursed]]
[[category:Cursed by the Vistani]]
[[Category:Darkonian]]
[[Category:Demonologist]]
[[category:Energy Drained]]
[[Category:Filicide]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Rivalis]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Nartok]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Forest of Shadows]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Darkon]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordentshire]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordent]]
[[Category:Former Patients of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Dominia]]
[[Category:Former Medical Student]]
[[Category:Former Student of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[category:Gaslighted]]
[[category:Giogoto]]
[[Category:Ghost]]
[[Category:Graduate of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Graduate]]
[[Category:Herbalist]]
[[Category:Human]]
[[category:healer]]
[[category:Hero]]
[[Category:Hunter Of Monsters]]
[[Category:Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[category:Intellectual]]
[[Category:Kidnapped]]
[[category:Killer]]
[[category:Lorist]]
[[Category:Male]]
[[category:Mass Murderer]]
[[category:Medical Doctor]]
[[category:Medical Professional]]
[[category:Mentor]]
[[category:Murderer]]
[[Category:Necrologist]]
[[category:Old]]
[[Category:Planar Mechanic]]
[[category:Polymath]]
[[category:Posthumous Character]]
[[category:Potential Darklord]]
[[Category:Proprietor]]
[[category:Professional Killer]]
[[category:Punished]]
[[category:Ravenloft Lorist]]
[[Category:Ravenloft Loremaster]]
[[category:Redeemed]]
[[category:Reformed]]
[[category:Repentant]]
[[category:Researcher]]
[[category:Retired]]
[[Category:Rogue]]
[[category:Sage]]
[[category:Seduced]]
[[Category:Stasis]]
[[category:Tempted]]
[[category:Transgressed]]
[[category:Transgressor]]
[[Category:Van Richten Family]]
[[category:Victim of Medical Malpractice]]
[[Category:Victim of the van Richten Curse]]
[[category:Victimized]]
[[Category:Widowed]]
[[Category:writer]]
[[category:Births in 671 BC]]
[[category:Deaths in 750 BC]]
<references/>

==Data from the Ravenloft Catalogue==



{|
|-valign="top"
|[[Image:rldb_npc.jpg]]
|[[Image:rldb_primary.gif]]
|
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' 
''[[Bleak House]]''
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_art.gif]]
|
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - p4 
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - cover, p4 
''[[Bleak House:Homecoming]]'' - p4,p16 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - p7,8 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p92 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - p114 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 5,11 
''[[The Created]]'' - p13 
''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]'' - p5
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_stats.gif]]
|
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - pp4-5 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p91 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 3
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_desc.gif]]
|
''[[Ravenloft Third Edition]]'' - pp14,17-18,27,176 
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - throughout 
''[[Bleak House]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to The Created]]'' - throughout 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]'' - throughout 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - pp91-93 
''[[Tales of Ravenloft: The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]'' - pp1-17 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - pp 2-3 
''[[Heroes of Light]]'' - p64 
''[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]]'' - pp1-4, pp9-13, pp304-310
|-valign="top"
|}

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (NPC)

2022-01-29T15:42:27Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* In Curse of Strahd */

[[File:Original VR.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
[[File:Rudolph van richten.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten and [[Strahd]] by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
{{canon}}
'''Dr. Rudolph van Richten''' is the greatest and most well-known hero of the Lands of the Mists.

==History==
He was born in [[Rivalis]] in [[Darkon]] in [[671 BC]]. He took [[medicine]] at the [[University of Il Aluk]], completing his four or five year program of study in [[693 BC]]. This humble man was spurred into a life of monster hunting when his son [[Erasmus van Richten]] was kidnapped by the [[Radanavich clan]] and sold to [[Baron Metus]]. Metus turned Erasmus into a [[vampire groom]] and Van Richten was forced to slay his son. In revenge, Metus killed Rudolph's wife, [[Ingrid van Richten]]. Van Richten eventually slew Metus, and then, with the help of [[Azalin]], the entire [[Radanavich tribe]].

Until his disappearance in [[750 BC]], he resided in [[Mordentshire]], where he ran an [[Van Richten's Herbalist Shop|herbalist shop]], as well as wrote several of his famous [[Van Richten's Guides]], and mentored [[The Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]], who regarded him as an uncle and took up his work.

==In [[Curse of Strahd]]==
Dr. van Richten makes a notable appearance in the [[5th Edition]] [[module]], [[Curse of Strahd]], though not in his [[famous]] persona as the monster hunter and [[writer]] of the [[Van Richten's Guides]] he is notable for in previous Ravenloft products. Instead, he adopts the guise of [[Rictavio]], a traveling [[half-elf]] [[bard]], [[storyteller]], and [[ringmaster]] gathering stories and watching out for talent. In reality he is gathering formation and waiting for an optimal time to strike at [[Strahd]], preferably when the vampire lord is in [[hibernation]]. Unlike other versions of van Richten, the Curse of Strahd van Richten is a [[loner]] because he knows the full extent of his [[curse]].<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> For more details, see [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Curse of Strahd)]]

The Legend.

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A Physician.

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.

The Weight of Experience.

Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.

The Slayer.

Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

The Old Hero.

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

A Cursed Man.

Van Richten suffers a curse bestowed on him by a Vistani:

Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws.

Its effect on him can best be summarized with this statement: "Van Richten Dies Last." This curse is both a boon and a bane to him. The curse is a large part of why he has lived so long--how he has accumulated so much experience and expertise. He is cursed to always see his friends and allies die--which means he has to live long enough to see it happen.

For a long time, he was unaware of the exact nature of the curse on him, but he is apparently aware of it now.

• Van Richten feels guilty. For decades he fought alongside others with monsters, completely unaware that he was a doombringer among them. Now that he knows, he is burdened by all the deaths he feels that his presence caused.

• Van Richten isolates himself. He doesn't let people get close to him for fear that his curse will take them out.

• If Van Richten is traveling with the party, he has excellent odds of surviving--if someone is going to die in the party, it'll be someone other than him.

• Van Richten's curse should have a tangible impact if he’s traveling with the party: he is a doombringer of the highest order. His mere presence among the party should invite tragedy and disaster.

The Tragedy of Ezmerelda and Van Richten. In the backstory that created Ezmerelda d’Avenir (Appendix D: Monsters and NPCs pages 230-231), there's a tragedy in there: Van Richten's curse could have been lifted years ago.

By Ravenloft Lore, the strongest of curses laid down by a Vistani can only be lifted by the Vistani who placed it, or a blood relative of that Vistani. Van Richten's curse was a Death Curse laid on him by Ezmerelda's mother. Only Ezmerelda has the ability to revoke the curse. But here's the problem...
Ezmerelda is Vistani...by nature; they are secretive about their abilities. Beyond that, Van Richten doesn't trust Vistani and likely commanded Ezmerelda to not use her Vistani abilities in his presence. As a result, Van Richten doesn't know how Vistani curses work--he doesn't know that they can be revoked by a blood relative of the one who laid it. He's a Cleric, he has undoubtedly tried remove curse on himself and it failed. As far as he knows, the curse is permanent.
Van Richten is also secretive and, as mentioned, doesn't trust the Vistani. He kept Ezmerelda at arm's length as best he could both because he couldn't trust her, but also to try to protect her from the curse...and even if he was aware of the curse when they traveled together, he never told her about it.

If either one of them had been less secretive, more open, his curse would have been revoked a long time ago.

If the players want to help Van Richten break the curse, here's the backstory:

The story of Ezmerelda and Van Richten's history was written in the Van Richten's Journal (Appendix F: Handouts pages 254-255). It involves him destroying Ezmerelda's caravan while she was very, very young. She survived the undead assault and later got picked up by another caravan of Vistani (it was actually the Zarovan tribe--Madam Eva's caravan). She originally wanted revenge on Van Richten, but time with Eva (and the presence of the most powerful Vistani of them all) showed her the tragedy of what had happened from an outside perspective. Ezmerelda realized that the whole thing was a horrible tragedy and wrongs had been committed on both sides. She, thus, set out to try to find Van Richten and try to make things right...though Eva never told her about the curse her mother had laid on Van Richten.

Van Richten and Ezmerelda must travel to the place the curse was first laid...a small clearing in the forests of Barovia where the ruins of Ezmerelda's caravan still lie. Both must verbally acknowledge the wrong that had been done and verbally forgive one another for it...then the remains of Ezmerelda's caravan must be burned.

The Disguise.

Van Richten got the idea for “Rictavio” from his exposure to Ezmerelda and her occasional methods for blending in when going somewhere that didn't like Vistani. In short: "Sometimes the best disguise is being the most obvious thing in the room." As mentioned above, Ezmerelda has never encountered the Rictavio disguise and Van Richten isn't familiar with any of the disguises Ezmerelda is currently using.

It is a rather perfect disguise. Van Richten is known as a grim and serious individual, a dour old man who roves the world slaying monsters. “Rictavio” is a flamboyant fop who tells ludicrous stories, commits crimes against music, and is constantly trying to recruit people to his Circus of Wonders. He should be portrayed as extremely over the top and completely harmless. It should be very jarring to your players if he drops the act and reveals who he truly is.
Furthermore, Rictavio knows that even if someone suspects he's hiding something, they are extremely unlikely to guess the truth. If a player rolls well on Insight against him and figures out he's full of crap, that only tells them that he's lying about something...not what he is lying about. And his response is to just carry on and ignore accusations. Sure, the PCs may figure out that he's full of it (his stories are obvious fabrications) but he just carries right along, sticking to his guns even though the players know it’s a load of BS.

The players should have a hard time to get a serious read on Rictavio's personality. He strikes them as so straight forward--a carnie who is spinning tall tales for amusement. So they shouldn’t suspect that he's any more than what he appears to be.

A Hard Man to Pin Down.

Van Richten is a man with a plan for killing Strahd Von Zarovich, and it's a plan that plays well to his aged capabilities: "wait til Strahd takes a long nap, then stake him in his sleep." Of anyone in the valley, Van Richten knows how deadly Strahd is. He has fought elder vampires before and Strahd is the greatest of them all. He may very well believe that trying to fight him head on is pure folly, but he’s the one most capable of doing so.

It's important to note: Most of the "Destined Allies" the party can draw from Madame Eva’s Tarokka card reading have notes about how the PCs can get that individual to join them. Van Richten has no such notes. Instead, it says this...

Van Richten works alone. [...] Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure.

Van Richten is aware of Madame Eva but (unlike many others in the valley) he won't immediately cave to her prophecies, drop everything he has been working on, and throw his lot in with the PCs. Here are a few important things to keep in mind if the party is trying to recruit him...

• Van Richten is quite certain that if he drops his disguise, Strahd will find him and set out to kill him. (This is one of Strahd's Primary Goals as listed in Chapter 1)

• Van Richten's disguise is magically augmented. As long as the party can't get his hat off, they cannot prove that he’s not a carnie ringmaster

• Van Richten's disguise is only useful against Strahd as long as no one knows who he really is. The ring of mind shielding only works on him...it doesn't work on the PCs. He knows that if anyone else finds out, Strahd can charm them, read their mind or otherwise extract that information from them.

• Van Richten is fully aware of his curse. He will avoid physically joining up with the party for fear that he will get them all killed.

• Van Richten does not talk about his curse. He knows well the bravery of adventurers and that telling them about his curse tends to result in responses like "Oh, you don't need to worry about us, we're strong!" followed shortly by ":dying noises:." Rebuffing their advances without mentioning the curse is much more effective at getting them to stay away from him so his curse doesn't kill them.

• Even if Van Richten consents to offer them aid, it should be indirect as much as possible. He has his plan, he's set in his ways, and he’s not going to go gallivanting off with a bunch of young adventurers. And, he should stay in character as much as possible...blowing his cover will only bring Strahd down on him AND the PCs.

Ideally, even if the party can convince him to help...his help should primarily take the form of a surprisingly knowledgeable carnival ringmaster who is "certainly not going to go out and fight monsters with you. I'm a ringmaster, not an adventurer!"

He may lend the party his carnival wagon to travel around in (once he finds somewhere else to stash his saber-toothed tiger that has been trained to hunt Vistani, or he may lend them the tiger), give them helpful advice--possibly using ravens to stay in touch over long-distance if the PCs make friends with the Keepers of the Feather, and provide the sort of support that a Carnie could offer. But, it should take rather extreme circumstances for him to actually be honest with the PCs...and they may have to do something about his curse before he'll actually travel with them.

Getting him to Join Up.

Van Richten wants to stay under cover...so how does the party get him to change his mind?

Easy: Ruin his plan.

If Van Richten's cover is blown, his plan is a wash. The whole plan depends on his identity staying a secret until Strahd goes into hibernation. If Strahd identifies Van Richten before then, he will try to kill him and Van Richten is pretty sure he can't take Strahd in a straight-up fight. Thus...if Van Richten’s cover is blown, he is stuck with two bad choices: Either he tries to keep going it alone, possibly getting killed by Strahd, and fails his “final mission,” or he accepts the risk to the PCs and joins them to try to take Strahd down directly. A few example ways to blow his cover...

• Knock his hat off. A hat of disguise only works as long as it stays on your head, so if something happens that knocks his hat off; “Rictavio” is replaced by Van Richten.

• Let the Tyger Tyger event happen (chapter 5). When Rictavio flees to the Tower of Khazan, he's inside an antimagic field and cannot disguise himself.

• Even if Van Richten is distorting his voice, if the PCs have already befriended Ezmerelda, she may still recognize it...even if what she recognizes is the cadence his voice adopts when he's explaining something.

Ability Loadout.

Van Richten is a Cleric...and his listed prepared spells speaks more of a support caster than a monster hunter who has gone solo. But, because he's a Cleric, he can swap out his prepared spells at will to any other spells on the Cleric list. Here are a few notes on spells for him to use...

• Dawn creates sunlight. If he can lock a vampire down within the area of effect, they will be dust in short order.

• Dispel Evil and Good breaks a vampire's charm. However...things can't really leave Barovia, so the dismissal part of that spell won't be terribly effective here.

• Geas is useful when he needs to find something. For example, capture a werewolf then place a geas on it to lead them to the den.

• Lesser and Greater Restoration are enormously useful, as is remove curse.

• Guiding Bolt is a great weapon against Vampires. Shuts down their regeneration, and gives the next attack advantage.

• Hallow: If Van Richten can get his hands on the material components for this, he can create holy ground to help protect the PCs. Create a bubble of hallowed ground around the antimagic field that covers the Tower of Khazan....talk about a fortress. Sure, you'll have a bubble of non-hallowed ground where the antimagic field zone is...but the territory around the tower itself will be holy ground.

• Given his skill at predicting his foes...dropping sanctuary on a creature they are about to attack can completely trash their attempts.

• Spirit Guardians is another spell that is just....awesome.

Rudolph Van Richten quotes:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Authored:==
* ''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Demons]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Witches (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Witches]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]''

Credited for marketing purposes with:
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Mists (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Mists]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]]''

==[[Associate of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]==

==Chronology==

[[671 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten born<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, son of Otto and Mrs. Van Richten
 
{{Spec|[[678 BC]] - Rudolph’s sister [[Maria Van Richten]] born.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 18 "Speculation based on BH. We only know that she is younger than Rudolph."</ref>
 

[[679 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten sent to boarding school in [[Nartok]]. A childhood friend is [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]].<ref name="VRMHCII p.25-26">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 25-26</ref>

[[680 BC]] - [[Casimir (of Richten Haus)|Casimir]] (not to be confused with [[Casimir Lukas|Harkon Lukas’ son]]) starts working at Richten Haus as the gate keeper.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 6">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 6</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[683 BC]] - The servants of [[Richten Haus]] are all killed while the family is away one day. (summer)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.18: "Speculation based on [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] pg. 15, 24: I’m going on the hunch that VR grows younger until he reaches the age he was at when this event occurred"</ref>
 

[[685 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten meets [[Robert Tatenna]], a fellow student at boarding school. (fall)<ref name="CT p.14">[[Chilling Tales]] p.14</ref>

[[688 BC]] - The [[The Crimson Death Epidemic | Crimson Death]] spreads across Darkon (winter); it claims Van Richten’s great aunt Helga, despite his efforts; Rudolph is even more driven into his medical studies.<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[689 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten attends the [[University of Il Aluk]]. While there, he meets a fellow student, [[Dr. Harmon Ruscheider]]. (fall)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]] pg. 15"</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[691 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten marries his childhood sweetheart, [[Ingrid van Richten|Ingrid]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "[[Realm of Terror]]; [[VRGtV]]: Give VR a good respectable year between their marriage and birth of Erasmus in 692"</ref>
 

[[692 BC]] - Rudolph and Ingrid Van Richten's son [[Erasmus van Richten|Erasmus]] is born.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]] p. 4; [[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 8, "fourteen summers" before [[706 BC]]</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[693 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten finishes his studies; opens his practice back home in [[Rivalis]].}},<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VR’s age, RoT; VRGtV; and ToDm pg. 86, which indicates it takes 4-5 years to get a medical education at the University of Il Aluk"</ref> 
 
{{Spec|693 BC - Dr. Van Richten travels to [[Lamordia]], hears of the [[Loud Man of Lamordia]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VRGtG pg. 9: “When I was young.”</ref> 

[[696 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Antonin Madren]] and becomes his mentor.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 21: "VRGttC pg. 6: Van Richten takes Madren on as a medical student, which implies Van Richten has time to offer such an education (which lasts up to 8 years), i.e., while he was still a simple doctor (693-706)."</ref>

[[706 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten suffers the wrath of the [[Radanavich clan]]; the Vistani steal his son Erasmus; they sell Erasmus to [[Baron Metus]]<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, a vampire from [[Richemulot]]; with the help of an amused [[Azalin]], Van Richten wipes out all but one member of the Radanavich caravan<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]</ref>; [[Madame Radanavich]] [[curse | curses]] Van Richten<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, although he doesn’t realize it until the end of his career.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

[[706 BC]] Van Richten puts his Erasmus, now a vampire, out of his misery, but in spite [[Baron Metus]] tears [[Ingrid van Richten]] to pieces; Dr. Van Richten destroys Baron Metus, starting his career of hunting evil. Unable to live with the memories in [[Richten Haus]], Van Richten moves to [[Corvia]].<ref name="VRA p. 5">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 5</ref>

[[707 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten researches vampires, and meets [[Aimon Davidovitch]], a fellow scholar of the arcane.<ref> from [[JWM Timeline]] p.22: "[[VRGtF]] pg. 4: VR knew him for “some 30-odd years”]</ref>

[[710 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten encounters his first werebeast near [[Varithne]], a small village in northern [[Darkon]]. Dr. Van Richten starts hunting werebeasts as well<ref name="VRMHC p. 109-110">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 109-110</ref>

[[711 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Gedlan Ironheart]], a fearless [[dwarven]] [[innkeeper]] in [[Corvia]]. Gedlan becomes a frequent hunting companion.<ref name="Bleah House p. 11">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p.11</ref>

[[712 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets the mage [[Shauten]]; they bond when they are attacked by one of Azalin's patrols. Shauten opens Van Richten's eyes to the existence of the [[Lich]].<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref>

[[713 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten is visited by the dying Dr. Ruscheider, who tells Rudolph all he can about several months spent as a lich's captive; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting liches.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p.111-112</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[714 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten receives a visit from his childhood friend, [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]], who is now a ghostly slave to Azalin; Dr. Van Richten learns the terrible truth about [[Azalin Rex]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on [[VRGtG]] pg. 22, [[VRMHCII]] pg. 24</ref>
 

{{Spec|714 BC - Dr. Van Richten moves to [[Mordentshire]], sensing it is politically unsafe for him to remain in [[Darkon]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on VRGttL pg. 22</ref>
 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[716 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 3 n1">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade after her death, but [[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[718 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and [[Shauten]] battle a creature they believe to be a priestly [[lich]]; it is actually Van Richten's first [[ancient dead]]}}.<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] "Speculation based on VRGAD pg. 5: “Some years ago,” and other markers. It happened after VR started hunting liches, but before he started hunting ghosts. (The latter conclusion taken from numerous references to Claudia in this Guide"</ref>
 
[[724 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten battles the [[Bog Monster of Hroth]], and meets [[Jameld of Hroth|Jameld]]. This is also Van Richten's first visit to both [[Kartakass]] and [[Sithicus]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p.153</ref> 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[726 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decade n1">[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades after her death but[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade</ref> 

{{Spec|726 BC - Dr. Van Richten visits [[Sanguinia]] with [[George Weathermay]] and [[Arametrius]]; they meet [[Claudia DeShanes]]; Claudia becomes Rudolph’s assistant, and it seems he had certain unspoken feelings for her.}}<ref>Speculation from JWM Timeline p.28: "Since Arametrius is probably [[Athasian]], Van Richten may have recently visited [[Kalidnay]] and encountered [[Ahmose Tanit]]. [VRGtG pg. 73. This is the earliest possible date for this event (due to George’s inclusion, and we know from this source and BH that VR starts hunting ghosts one year after this event. That leaves only 9 years between VR starting to hunt and writing his Guide on the subject. I chose to go with this date to keep as wide a margin of opportunity as possible.]"</ref>
 

[[727 BC]] - [[Merilee Markuza]], the Child [[Vampire]], kills Claudia. Van Richten pursues the creature relentlessly, but loses her in [[Lamordia]].<ref name="Darklords p. 63">[[Darklords]] p. 63</ref>

727 BC - While hunting the Child Vampire, Van Richten witnesses the [[Thundering Carriage]]; Van Richten decides he must put an end to these ghostly horrors, too.<ref name="Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts p. 6">[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 6</ref>

[[728 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten defeats the [[Phantom Army]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 91</ref>

[[729 BC]] - The fiend [[Elsepeth]] enters Ravenloft via [[transposition]] in a small village outside [[Stangengrad]], near the [[Grashen Falls]] (sept)<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.28: "[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] pg. 14: the diary is dated “twelve years ago.”</ref>

[[730 BC]] - {{Spec|[[Gedlan Ironheart]] killed while battling evil spirits.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: "VRGtG pg. 23: Gedlan is referred to as “Geddar” in this book. The date is an estimate based on the 727-736 available time span."</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] leaves [[Borca]], having lurked there for years.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] p. 66</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] writes to Van Richten about the death of Madren’s sister.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[734 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] shows up on Van Richten's doorstep, and gives the good doctor his notes; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting the [[Created]].}}<ref>JWM Timeline p. 30: "VRGttC pg. 6: Estimate. “Years” after Madren wrote about his sister’s death"</ref> 

[[735 BC] - Dr. Van Richten is forced to kill his old friend [[Shauten]] in self-defense, when Shauten tries to sacrifice Rudolph in a bid for [[lichdom]]<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref><ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>. {{Spec|This "near-miss" may have inspired Van Richten to start recording his collected knowledge for heroes to come.}}<ref>JWM Timeline: "Speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6"</ref>

735 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''.<ref name="RLCS p.18">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.18</ref><ref name="RLPHB p.20">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.20</ref>

[[736 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''.

[[737 BC]] - The [[Vistana]] [[Cyrilla]]'s niece [[Vassa]] is [[kidnapped]] near [[Corvia]].<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 20: The golem appeared “the following year” after Vaasa’s soul is taken."</ref>

737 BC - [[Vassa]] returns as a [[clay golem]]; Cyrilla writes to Dr. Van Richten.<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 19 "just last year"</ref>

737 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''.

[[738 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''.

[[738 BC]] [[Emil Bollenbach]] engineers the [[kidnapping]] of Dr. Rudolph van Richten to the end of seizing his [[brain]] for [[transplantation]] into a super-golem. fortunately, several of Van Richten's friends intercede to thwart Dr. Bollenbach.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 33: "[[Children of the Night: The Created]] pg. 50; CT pg. 32 places this adventure 8 years after Emil’s disappearance (i.e., 746), but the dating used in CotN:C fits VR’s chronology better.</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] goes to [[Nartok]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 67-68">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.67-68</ref>

[[739 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and the adventuring band known as [[the Hand (Adventurer Band)|the Hand]] hunt and destroy [[the Gibbering Golem]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 265-276">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.265-276</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]] publishes ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''. This act earns him considerable ire from [[Agatha Clairmont]], whom sees it as an instruction manual to building [[dread golem]]s just much as it is hunting them.<ref name="Van Richten's Arsenal p. 149">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p. 149</ref>

[[740 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]'' (early spring).

740 BC - Dr. Van Richten inherits the [[library (Aimon Davidovitch)]] of [[Aimon Davidovitch]]. Dr. Van Richten starts studying tomes. (Sept)<ref>JWM Timeline p. 35 "Extrapolated from VRGtF pg. 4"</ref>

[[741 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]], [[Davvyd]], [[Samuel]] and [[Dr. Ottelie Farringer]] battle the fiend [[Drigor]]. Only Dr. van Richten survives. (Feb.)<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 79-85">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p. 79-85</ref>

741 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]]''.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Book)]] p.4</ref>

741 BC - [[Van Richten]] stumbles into the clutches of [[the nameless Amnizu]] and [[the nameless Barbazu]] infesting [[Chateaufaux]]. He is captured. However, he manages to join with some [[adventurer]]s to route the [[devil]]s from the town.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.72-73; Note that the encounter with these [[fiend]]s doesn't appear in the original uncompiled Van Richten's Guide to Fiends. Therefore, the encounter with the [[Fiends of Chateaufaux]] took place after took place after the first VRGtF was published.</ref><ref>[[Gazetteer III]] p.30-31, "just over 15 years ago"</ref>

741 BC<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> - Dr. Van Richten is [[depressed]]; he consults with the [[diviner]], [[Inarin Alster]]; Rudolph realizes he had been laboring under a [[curse]] all these years; Dr. Van Richten spends a year with [[Arturi Radanavich]] studying the Vistani.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]] p.5-7; 87-89</ref>

[[742 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten writes his ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]'' and retires.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> (Oct.)

[[750 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten dies in [[Richten Haus|Bleak House]] in the fight against [[Madame Radanavich]]<ref>[[Domains of Dread]] p. 17, as told in [[Bleak House]], particularly [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 58-63</ref> Meanwhile, all that is known to most, including the [[Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]] is that he [[disappeared]].<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

{{ref}}

[[category:Character]] [[category:NPC]]
[[category:2nd Edition Character]]
[[category:3rd Edition Character]]
[[category:4th Edition Character]]
[[category:5th Edition Character]]
[[category:Abused]]
[[category:Betrayed]]
[[Category:Cursed]]
[[category:Cursed by the Vistani]]
[[Category:Darkonian]]
[[Category:Demonologist]]
[[category:Energy Drained]]
[[Category:Filicide]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Rivalis]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Nartok]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Forest of Shadows]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Darkon]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordentshire]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordent]]
[[Category:Former Patients of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Dominia]]
[[Category:Former Medical Student]]
[[Category:Former Student of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[category:Gaslighted]]
[[category:Giogoto]]
[[Category:Ghost]]
[[Category:Graduate of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Graduate]]
[[Category:Herbalist]]
[[Category:Human]]
[[category:healer]]
[[category:Hero]]
[[Category:Hunter Of Monsters]]
[[Category:Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[category:Intellectual]]
[[Category:Kidnapped]]
[[category:Killer]]
[[category:Lorist]]
[[Category:Male]]
[[category:Mass Murderer]]
[[category:Medical Doctor]]
[[category:Medical Professional]]
[[category:Mentor]]
[[category:Murderer]]
[[Category:Necrologist]]
[[category:Old]]
[[Category:Planar Mechanic]]
[[category:Polymath]]
[[category:Posthumous Character]]
[[category:Potential Darklord]]
[[Category:Proprietor]]
[[category:Professional Killer]]
[[category:Punished]]
[[category:Ravenloft Lorist]]
[[Category:Ravenloft Loremaster]]
[[category:Redeemed]]
[[category:Reformed]]
[[category:Repentant]]
[[category:Researcher]]
[[category:Retired]]
[[Category:Rogue]]
[[category:Sage]]
[[category:Seduced]]
[[Category:Stasis]]
[[category:Tempted]]
[[category:Transgressed]]
[[category:Transgressor]]
[[Category:Van Richten Family]]
[[category:Victim of Medical Malpractice]]
[[Category:Victim of the van Richten Curse]]
[[category:Victimized]]
[[Category:Widowed]]
[[Category:writer]]
[[category:Births in 671 BC]]
[[category:Deaths in 750 BC]]
<references/>

==Data from the Ravenloft Catalogue==



{|
|-valign="top"
|[[Image:rldb_npc.jpg]]
|[[Image:rldb_primary.gif]]
|
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' 
''[[Bleak House]]''
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_art.gif]]
|
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - p4 
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - cover, p4 
''[[Bleak House:Homecoming]]'' - p4,p16 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - p7,8 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p92 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - p114 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 5,11 
''[[The Created]]'' - p13 
''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]'' - p5
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_stats.gif]]
|
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - pp4-5 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p91 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 3
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_desc.gif]]
|
''[[Ravenloft Third Edition]]'' - pp14,17-18,27,176 
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - throughout 
''[[Bleak House]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to The Created]]'' - throughout 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]'' - throughout 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - pp91-93 
''[[Tales of Ravenloft: The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]'' - pp1-17 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - pp 2-3 
''[[Heroes of Light]]'' - p64 
''[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]]'' - pp1-4, pp9-13, pp304-310
|-valign="top"
|}

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (NPC)

2022-01-29T15:36:53Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* In Curse of Strahd */

[[File:Original VR.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
[[File:Rudolph van richten.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten and [[Strahd]] by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
{{canon}}
'''Dr. Rudolph van Richten''' is the greatest and most well-known hero of the Lands of the Mists.

==History==
He was born in [[Rivalis]] in [[Darkon]] in [[671 BC]]. He took [[medicine]] at the [[University of Il Aluk]], completing his four or five year program of study in [[693 BC]]. This humble man was spurred into a life of monster hunting when his son [[Erasmus van Richten]] was kidnapped by the [[Radanavich clan]] and sold to [[Baron Metus]]. Metus turned Erasmus into a [[vampire groom]] and Van Richten was forced to slay his son. In revenge, Metus killed Rudolph's wife, [[Ingrid van Richten]]. Van Richten eventually slew Metus, and then, with the help of [[Azalin]], the entire [[Radanavich tribe]].

Until his disappearance in [[750 BC]], he resided in [[Mordentshire]], where he ran an [[Van Richten's Herbalist Shop|herbalist shop]], as well as wrote several of his famous [[Van Richten's Guides]], and mentored [[The Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]], who regarded him as an uncle and took up his work.

==In [[Curse of Strahd]]==
Dr. van Richten makes a notable appearance in the [[5th Edition]] [[module]], [[Curse of Strahd]], though not in his [[famous]] persona as the monster hunter and [[writer]] of the [[Van Richten's Guides]] he is notable for in previous Ravenloft products. Instead, he adopts the guise of [[Rictavio]], a traveling [[half-elf]] [[bard]], [[storyteller]], and [[ringmaster]] gathering stories and watching out for talent. In reality he is gathering formation and waiting for an optimal time to strike at [[Strahd]], preferably when the vampire lord is in [[hibernation]]. Unlike other versions of van Richten, the Curse of Strahd van Richten is a [[loner]] because he knows the full extent of his [[curse]].<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> For more details, see [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Curse of Strahd)]]

The Legend.

Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A Physician.

Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.
The Weight of Experience. Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.
The Slayer. Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

The Old Hero.

Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

A Cursed Man.

Van Richten suffers a curse bestowed on him by a Vistani:

Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws.

Its effect on him can best be summarized with this statement: "Van Richten Dies Last." This curse is both a boon and a bane to him. The curse is a large part of why he has lived so long--how he has accumulated so much experience and expertise. He is cursed to always see his friends and allies die--which means he has to live long enough to see it happen.

For a long time, he was unaware of the exact nature of the curse on him, but he is apparently aware of it now.

• Van Richten feels guilty. For decades he fought alongside others with monsters, completely unaware that he was a doombringer among them. Now that he knows, he is burdened by all the deaths he feels that his presence caused.

• Van Richten isolates himself. He doesn't let people get close to him for fear that his curse will take them out.

• If Van Richten is traveling with the party, he has excellent odds of surviving--if someone is going to die in the party, it'll be someone other than him.

• Van Richten's curse should have a tangible impact if he’s traveling with the party: he is a doombringer of the highest order. His mere presence among the party should invite tragedy and disaster.

The Tragedy of Ezmerelda and Van Richten. In the backstory that created Ezmerelda d’Avenir (Appendix D: Monsters and NPCs pages 230-231), there's a tragedy in there: Van Richten's curse could have been lifted years ago.

By Ravenloft Lore, the strongest of curses laid down by a Vistani can only be lifted by the Vistani who placed it, or a blood relative of that Vistani. Van Richten's curse was a Death Curse laid on him by Ezmerelda's mother. Only Ezmerelda has the ability to revoke the curse. But here's the problem...
Ezmerelda is Vistani...by nature; they are secretive about their abilities. Beyond that, Van Richten doesn't trust Vistani and likely commanded Ezmerelda to not use her Vistani abilities in his presence. As a result, Van Richten doesn't know how Vistani curses work--he doesn't know that they can be revoked by a blood relative of the one who laid it. He's a Cleric, he has undoubtedly tried remove curse on himself and it failed. As far as he knows, the curse is permanent.
Van Richten is also secretive and, as mentioned, doesn't trust the Vistani. He kept Ezmerelda at arm's length as best he could both because he couldn't trust her, but also to try to protect her from the curse...and even if he was aware of the curse when they traveled together, he never told her about it.

If either one of them had been less secretive, more open, his curse would have been revoked a long time ago.

If the players want to help Van Richten break the curse, here's the backstory:

The story of Ezmerelda and Van Richten's history was written in the Van Richten's Journal (Appendix F: Handouts pages 254-255). It involves him destroying Ezmerelda's caravan while she was very, very young. She survived the undead assault and later got picked up by another caravan of Vistani (it was actually the Zarovan tribe--Madam Eva's caravan). She originally wanted revenge on Van Richten, but time with Eva (and the presence of the most powerful Vistani of them all) showed her the tragedy of what had happened from an outside perspective. Ezmerelda realized that the whole thing was a horrible tragedy and wrongs had been committed on both sides. She, thus, set out to try to find Van Richten and try to make things right...though Eva never told her about the curse her mother had laid on Van Richten.

Van Richten and Ezmerelda must travel to the place the curse was first laid...a small clearing in the forests of Barovia where the ruins of Ezmerelda's caravan still lie. Both must verbally acknowledge the wrong that had been done and verbally forgive one another for it...then the remains of Ezmerelda's caravan must be burned.

The Disguise.

Van Richten got the idea for “Rictavio” from his exposure to Ezmerelda and her occasional methods for blending in when going somewhere that didn't like Vistani. In short: "Sometimes the best disguise is being the most obvious thing in the room." As mentioned above, Ezmerelda has never encountered the Rictavio disguise and Van Richten isn't familiar with any of the disguises Ezmerelda is currently using.

It is a rather perfect disguise. Van Richten is known as a grim and serious individual, a dour old man who roves the world slaying monsters. “Rictavio” is a flamboyant fop who tells ludicrous stories, commits crimes against music, and is constantly trying to recruit people to his Circus of Wonders. He should be portrayed as extremely over the top and completely harmless. It should be very jarring to your players if he drops the act and reveals who he truly is.
Furthermore, Rictavio knows that even if someone suspects he's hiding something, they are extremely unlikely to guess the truth. If a player rolls well on Insight against him and figures out he's full of crap, that only tells them that he's lying about something...not what he is lying about. And his response is to just carry on and ignore accusations. Sure, the PCs may figure out that he's full of it (his stories are obvious fabrications) but he just carries right along, sticking to his guns even though the players know it’s a load of BS.

The players should have a hard time to get a serious read on Rictavio's personality. He strikes them as so straight forward--a carnie who is spinning tall tales for amusement. So they shouldn’t suspect that he's any more than what he appears to be.

A Hard Man to Pin Down.

Van Richten is a man with a plan for killing Strahd Von Zarovich, and it's a plan that plays well to his aged capabilities: "wait til Strahd takes a long nap, then stake him in his sleep." Of anyone in the valley, Van Richten knows how deadly Strahd is. He has fought elder vampires before and Strahd is the greatest of them all. He may very well believe that trying to fight him head on is pure folly, but he’s the one most capable of doing so.

It's important to note: Most of the "Destined Allies" the party can draw from Madame Eva’s Tarokka card reading have notes about how the PCs can get that individual to join them. Van Richten has no such notes. Instead, it says this...

Van Richten works alone. [...] Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure.

Van Richten is aware of Madame Eva but (unlike many others in the valley) he won't immediately cave to her prophecies, drop everything he has been working on, and throw his lot in with the PCs. Here are a few important things to keep in mind if the party is trying to recruit him...

• Van Richten is quite certain that if he drops his disguise, Strahd will find him and set out to kill him. (This is one of Strahd's Primary Goals as listed in Chapter 1)

• Van Richten's disguise is magically augmented. As long as the party can't get his hat off, they cannot prove that he’s not a carnie ringmaster

• Van Richten's disguise is only useful against Strahd as long as no one knows who he really is. The ring of mind shielding only works on him...it doesn't work on the PCs. He knows that if anyone else finds out, Strahd can charm them, read their mind or otherwise extract that information from them.

• Van Richten is fully aware of his curse. He will avoid physically joining up with the party for fear that he will get them all killed.

• Van Richten does not talk about his curse. He knows well the bravery of adventurers and that telling them about his curse tends to result in responses like "Oh, you don't need to worry about us, we're strong!" followed shortly by ":dying noises:." Rebuffing their advances without mentioning the curse is much more effective at getting them to stay away from him so his curse doesn't kill them.

• Even if Van Richten consents to offer them aid, it should be indirect as much as possible. He has his plan, he's set in his ways, and he’s not going to go gallivanting off with a bunch of young adventurers. And, he should stay in character as much as possible...blowing his cover will only bring Strahd down on him AND the PCs.

Ideally, even if the party can convince him to help...his help should primarily take the form of a surprisingly knowledgeable carnival ringmaster who is "certainly not going to go out and fight monsters with you. I'm a ringmaster, not an adventurer!"

He may lend the party his carnival wagon to travel around in (once he finds somewhere else to stash his saber-toothed tiger that has been trained to hunt Vistani, or he may lend them the tiger), give them helpful advice--possibly using ravens to stay in touch over long-distance if the PCs make friends with the Keepers of the Feather, and provide the sort of support that a Carnie could offer. But, it should take rather extreme circumstances for him to actually be honest with the PCs...and they may have to do something about his curse before he'll actually travel with them.

Getting him to Join Up.

Van Richten wants to stay under cover...so how does the party get him to change his mind?

Easy: Ruin his plan.

If Van Richten's cover is blown, his plan is a wash. The whole plan depends on his identity staying a secret until Strahd goes into hibernation. If Strahd identifies Van Richten before then, he will try to kill him and Van Richten is pretty sure he can't take Strahd in a straight-up fight. Thus...if Van Richten’s cover is blown, he is stuck with two bad choices: Either he tries to keep going it alone, possibly getting killed by Strahd, and fails his “final mission,” or he accepts the risk to the PCs and joins them to try to take Strahd down directly. A few example ways to blow his cover...

• Knock his hat off. A hat of disguise only works as long as it stays on your head, so if something happens that knocks his hat off; “Rictavio” is replaced by Van Richten.

• Let the Tyger Tyger event happen (chapter 5). When Rictavio flees to the Tower of Khazan, he's inside an antimagic field and cannot disguise himself.

• Even if Van Richten is distorting his voice, if the PCs have already befriended Ezmerelda, she may still recognize it...even if what she recognizes is the cadence his voice adopts when he's explaining something.

Ability Loadout. Van Richten is a Cleric...and his listed prepared spells speaks more of a support caster than a monster hunter who has gone solo. But, because he's a Cleric, he can swap out his prepared spells at will to any other spells on the Cleric list. Here are a few notes on spells for him to use...

• Dawn creates sunlight. If he can lock a vampire down within the area of effect, they will be dust in short order.

• Dispel Evil and Good breaks a vampire's charm. However...things can't really leave Barovia, so the dismissal part of that spell won't be terribly effective here.

• Geas is useful when he needs to find something. For example, capture a werewolf then place a geas on it to lead them to the den.

• Lesser and Greater Restoration are enormously useful, as is remove curse.

• Guiding Bolt is a great weapon against Vampires. Shuts down their regeneration, and gives the next attack advantage.

• Hallow: If Van Richten can get his hands on the material components for this, he can create holy ground to help protect the PCs. Create a bubble of hallowed ground around the antimagic field that covers the Tower of Khazan....talk about a fortress. Sure, you'll have a bubble of non-hallowed ground where the antimagic field zone is...but the territory around the tower itself will be holy ground.

• Given his skill at predicting his foes...dropping sanctuary on a creature they are about to attack can completely trash their attempts.

• Spirit Guardians is another spell that is just....awesome.

Rudolph Van Richten quotes:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Authored:==
* ''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Demons]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Witches (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Witches]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]''

Credited for marketing purposes with:
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Mists (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Mists]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]]''

==[[Associate of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]==

==Chronology==

[[671 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten born<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, son of Otto and Mrs. Van Richten
 
{{Spec|[[678 BC]] - Rudolph’s sister [[Maria Van Richten]] born.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 18 "Speculation based on BH. We only know that she is younger than Rudolph."</ref>
 

[[679 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten sent to boarding school in [[Nartok]]. A childhood friend is [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]].<ref name="VRMHCII p.25-26">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 25-26</ref>

[[680 BC]] - [[Casimir (of Richten Haus)|Casimir]] (not to be confused with [[Casimir Lukas|Harkon Lukas’ son]]) starts working at Richten Haus as the gate keeper.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 6">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 6</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[683 BC]] - The servants of [[Richten Haus]] are all killed while the family is away one day. (summer)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.18: "Speculation based on [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] pg. 15, 24: I’m going on the hunch that VR grows younger until he reaches the age he was at when this event occurred"</ref>
 

[[685 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten meets [[Robert Tatenna]], a fellow student at boarding school. (fall)<ref name="CT p.14">[[Chilling Tales]] p.14</ref>

[[688 BC]] - The [[The Crimson Death Epidemic | Crimson Death]] spreads across Darkon (winter); it claims Van Richten’s great aunt Helga, despite his efforts; Rudolph is even more driven into his medical studies.<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[689 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten attends the [[University of Il Aluk]]. While there, he meets a fellow student, [[Dr. Harmon Ruscheider]]. (fall)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]] pg. 15"</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[691 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten marries his childhood sweetheart, [[Ingrid van Richten|Ingrid]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "[[Realm of Terror]]; [[VRGtV]]: Give VR a good respectable year between their marriage and birth of Erasmus in 692"</ref>
 

[[692 BC]] - Rudolph and Ingrid Van Richten's son [[Erasmus van Richten|Erasmus]] is born.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]] p. 4; [[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 8, "fourteen summers" before [[706 BC]]</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[693 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten finishes his studies; opens his practice back home in [[Rivalis]].}},<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VR’s age, RoT; VRGtV; and ToDm pg. 86, which indicates it takes 4-5 years to get a medical education at the University of Il Aluk"</ref> 
 
{{Spec|693 BC - Dr. Van Richten travels to [[Lamordia]], hears of the [[Loud Man of Lamordia]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VRGtG pg. 9: “When I was young.”</ref> 

[[696 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Antonin Madren]] and becomes his mentor.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 21: "VRGttC pg. 6: Van Richten takes Madren on as a medical student, which implies Van Richten has time to offer such an education (which lasts up to 8 years), i.e., while he was still a simple doctor (693-706)."</ref>

[[706 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten suffers the wrath of the [[Radanavich clan]]; the Vistani steal his son Erasmus; they sell Erasmus to [[Baron Metus]]<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, a vampire from [[Richemulot]]; with the help of an amused [[Azalin]], Van Richten wipes out all but one member of the Radanavich caravan<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]</ref>; [[Madame Radanavich]] [[curse | curses]] Van Richten<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, although he doesn’t realize it until the end of his career.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

[[706 BC]] Van Richten puts his Erasmus, now a vampire, out of his misery, but in spite [[Baron Metus]] tears [[Ingrid van Richten]] to pieces; Dr. Van Richten destroys Baron Metus, starting his career of hunting evil. Unable to live with the memories in [[Richten Haus]], Van Richten moves to [[Corvia]].<ref name="VRA p. 5">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 5</ref>

[[707 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten researches vampires, and meets [[Aimon Davidovitch]], a fellow scholar of the arcane.<ref> from [[JWM Timeline]] p.22: "[[VRGtF]] pg. 4: VR knew him for “some 30-odd years”]</ref>

[[710 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten encounters his first werebeast near [[Varithne]], a small village in northern [[Darkon]]. Dr. Van Richten starts hunting werebeasts as well<ref name="VRMHC p. 109-110">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 109-110</ref>

[[711 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Gedlan Ironheart]], a fearless [[dwarven]] [[innkeeper]] in [[Corvia]]. Gedlan becomes a frequent hunting companion.<ref name="Bleah House p. 11">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p.11</ref>

[[712 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets the mage [[Shauten]]; they bond when they are attacked by one of Azalin's patrols. Shauten opens Van Richten's eyes to the existence of the [[Lich]].<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref>

[[713 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten is visited by the dying Dr. Ruscheider, who tells Rudolph all he can about several months spent as a lich's captive; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting liches.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p.111-112</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[714 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten receives a visit from his childhood friend, [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]], who is now a ghostly slave to Azalin; Dr. Van Richten learns the terrible truth about [[Azalin Rex]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on [[VRGtG]] pg. 22, [[VRMHCII]] pg. 24</ref>
 

{{Spec|714 BC - Dr. Van Richten moves to [[Mordentshire]], sensing it is politically unsafe for him to remain in [[Darkon]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on VRGttL pg. 22</ref>
 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[716 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 3 n1">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade after her death, but [[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[718 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and [[Shauten]] battle a creature they believe to be a priestly [[lich]]; it is actually Van Richten's first [[ancient dead]]}}.<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] "Speculation based on VRGAD pg. 5: “Some years ago,” and other markers. It happened after VR started hunting liches, but before he started hunting ghosts. (The latter conclusion taken from numerous references to Claudia in this Guide"</ref>
 
[[724 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten battles the [[Bog Monster of Hroth]], and meets [[Jameld of Hroth|Jameld]]. This is also Van Richten's first visit to both [[Kartakass]] and [[Sithicus]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p.153</ref> 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[726 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decade n1">[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades after her death but[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade</ref> 

{{Spec|726 BC - Dr. Van Richten visits [[Sanguinia]] with [[George Weathermay]] and [[Arametrius]]; they meet [[Claudia DeShanes]]; Claudia becomes Rudolph’s assistant, and it seems he had certain unspoken feelings for her.}}<ref>Speculation from JWM Timeline p.28: "Since Arametrius is probably [[Athasian]], Van Richten may have recently visited [[Kalidnay]] and encountered [[Ahmose Tanit]]. [VRGtG pg. 73. This is the earliest possible date for this event (due to George’s inclusion, and we know from this source and BH that VR starts hunting ghosts one year after this event. That leaves only 9 years between VR starting to hunt and writing his Guide on the subject. I chose to go with this date to keep as wide a margin of opportunity as possible.]"</ref>
 

[[727 BC]] - [[Merilee Markuza]], the Child [[Vampire]], kills Claudia. Van Richten pursues the creature relentlessly, but loses her in [[Lamordia]].<ref name="Darklords p. 63">[[Darklords]] p. 63</ref>

727 BC - While hunting the Child Vampire, Van Richten witnesses the [[Thundering Carriage]]; Van Richten decides he must put an end to these ghostly horrors, too.<ref name="Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts p. 6">[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 6</ref>

[[728 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten defeats the [[Phantom Army]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 91</ref>

[[729 BC]] - The fiend [[Elsepeth]] enters Ravenloft via [[transposition]] in a small village outside [[Stangengrad]], near the [[Grashen Falls]] (sept)<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.28: "[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] pg. 14: the diary is dated “twelve years ago.”</ref>

[[730 BC]] - {{Spec|[[Gedlan Ironheart]] killed while battling evil spirits.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: "VRGtG pg. 23: Gedlan is referred to as “Geddar” in this book. The date is an estimate based on the 727-736 available time span."</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] leaves [[Borca]], having lurked there for years.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] p. 66</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] writes to Van Richten about the death of Madren’s sister.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[734 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] shows up on Van Richten's doorstep, and gives the good doctor his notes; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting the [[Created]].}}<ref>JWM Timeline p. 30: "VRGttC pg. 6: Estimate. “Years” after Madren wrote about his sister’s death"</ref> 

[[735 BC] - Dr. Van Richten is forced to kill his old friend [[Shauten]] in self-defense, when Shauten tries to sacrifice Rudolph in a bid for [[lichdom]]<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref><ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>. {{Spec|This "near-miss" may have inspired Van Richten to start recording his collected knowledge for heroes to come.}}<ref>JWM Timeline: "Speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6"</ref>

735 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''.<ref name="RLCS p.18">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.18</ref><ref name="RLPHB p.20">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.20</ref>

[[736 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''.

[[737 BC]] - The [[Vistana]] [[Cyrilla]]'s niece [[Vassa]] is [[kidnapped]] near [[Corvia]].<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 20: The golem appeared “the following year” after Vaasa’s soul is taken."</ref>

737 BC - [[Vassa]] returns as a [[clay golem]]; Cyrilla writes to Dr. Van Richten.<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 19 "just last year"</ref>

737 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''.

[[738 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''.

[[738 BC]] [[Emil Bollenbach]] engineers the [[kidnapping]] of Dr. Rudolph van Richten to the end of seizing his [[brain]] for [[transplantation]] into a super-golem. fortunately, several of Van Richten's friends intercede to thwart Dr. Bollenbach.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 33: "[[Children of the Night: The Created]] pg. 50; CT pg. 32 places this adventure 8 years after Emil’s disappearance (i.e., 746), but the dating used in CotN:C fits VR’s chronology better.</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] goes to [[Nartok]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 67-68">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.67-68</ref>

[[739 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and the adventuring band known as [[the Hand (Adventurer Band)|the Hand]] hunt and destroy [[the Gibbering Golem]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 265-276">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.265-276</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]] publishes ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''. This act earns him considerable ire from [[Agatha Clairmont]], whom sees it as an instruction manual to building [[dread golem]]s just much as it is hunting them.<ref name="Van Richten's Arsenal p. 149">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p. 149</ref>

[[740 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]'' (early spring).

740 BC - Dr. Van Richten inherits the [[library (Aimon Davidovitch)]] of [[Aimon Davidovitch]]. Dr. Van Richten starts studying tomes. (Sept)<ref>JWM Timeline p. 35 "Extrapolated from VRGtF pg. 4"</ref>

[[741 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]], [[Davvyd]], [[Samuel]] and [[Dr. Ottelie Farringer]] battle the fiend [[Drigor]]. Only Dr. van Richten survives. (Feb.)<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 79-85">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p. 79-85</ref>

741 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]]''.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Book)]] p.4</ref>

741 BC - [[Van Richten]] stumbles into the clutches of [[the nameless Amnizu]] and [[the nameless Barbazu]] infesting [[Chateaufaux]]. He is captured. However, he manages to join with some [[adventurer]]s to route the [[devil]]s from the town.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.72-73; Note that the encounter with these [[fiend]]s doesn't appear in the original uncompiled Van Richten's Guide to Fiends. Therefore, the encounter with the [[Fiends of Chateaufaux]] took place after took place after the first VRGtF was published.</ref><ref>[[Gazetteer III]] p.30-31, "just over 15 years ago"</ref>

741 BC<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> - Dr. Van Richten is [[depressed]]; he consults with the [[diviner]], [[Inarin Alster]]; Rudolph realizes he had been laboring under a [[curse]] all these years; Dr. Van Richten spends a year with [[Arturi Radanavich]] studying the Vistani.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]] p.5-7; 87-89</ref>

[[742 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten writes his ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]'' and retires.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> (Oct.)

[[750 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten dies in [[Richten Haus|Bleak House]] in the fight against [[Madame Radanavich]]<ref>[[Domains of Dread]] p. 17, as told in [[Bleak House]], particularly [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 58-63</ref> Meanwhile, all that is known to most, including the [[Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]] is that he [[disappeared]].<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

{{ref}}

[[category:Character]] [[category:NPC]]
[[category:2nd Edition Character]]
[[category:3rd Edition Character]]
[[category:4th Edition Character]]
[[category:5th Edition Character]]
[[category:Abused]]
[[category:Betrayed]]
[[Category:Cursed]]
[[category:Cursed by the Vistani]]
[[Category:Darkonian]]
[[Category:Demonologist]]
[[category:Energy Drained]]
[[Category:Filicide]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Rivalis]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Nartok]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Forest of Shadows]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Darkon]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordentshire]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordent]]
[[Category:Former Patients of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Dominia]]
[[Category:Former Medical Student]]
[[Category:Former Student of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[category:Gaslighted]]
[[category:Giogoto]]
[[Category:Ghost]]
[[Category:Graduate of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Graduate]]
[[Category:Herbalist]]
[[Category:Human]]
[[category:healer]]
[[category:Hero]]
[[Category:Hunter Of Monsters]]
[[Category:Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[category:Intellectual]]
[[Category:Kidnapped]]
[[category:Killer]]
[[category:Lorist]]
[[Category:Male]]
[[category:Mass Murderer]]
[[category:Medical Doctor]]
[[category:Medical Professional]]
[[category:Mentor]]
[[category:Murderer]]
[[Category:Necrologist]]
[[category:Old]]
[[Category:Planar Mechanic]]
[[category:Polymath]]
[[category:Posthumous Character]]
[[category:Potential Darklord]]
[[Category:Proprietor]]
[[category:Professional Killer]]
[[category:Punished]]
[[category:Ravenloft Lorist]]
[[Category:Ravenloft Loremaster]]
[[category:Redeemed]]
[[category:Reformed]]
[[category:Repentant]]
[[category:Researcher]]
[[category:Retired]]
[[Category:Rogue]]
[[category:Sage]]
[[category:Seduced]]
[[Category:Stasis]]
[[category:Tempted]]
[[category:Transgressed]]
[[category:Transgressor]]
[[Category:Van Richten Family]]
[[category:Victim of Medical Malpractice]]
[[Category:Victim of the van Richten Curse]]
[[category:Victimized]]
[[Category:Widowed]]
[[Category:writer]]
[[category:Births in 671 BC]]
[[category:Deaths in 750 BC]]
<references/>

==Data from the Ravenloft Catalogue==



{|
|-valign="top"
|[[Image:rldb_npc.jpg]]
|[[Image:rldb_primary.gif]]
|
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' 
''[[Bleak House]]''
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_art.gif]]
|
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - p4 
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - cover, p4 
''[[Bleak House:Homecoming]]'' - p4,p16 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - p7,8 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p92 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - p114 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 5,11 
''[[The Created]]'' - p13 
''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]'' - p5
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_stats.gif]]
|
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - pp4-5 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p91 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 3
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_desc.gif]]
|
''[[Ravenloft Third Edition]]'' - pp14,17-18,27,176 
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - throughout 
''[[Bleak House]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to The Created]]'' - throughout 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]'' - throughout 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - pp91-93 
''[[Tales of Ravenloft: The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]'' - pp1-17 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - pp 2-3 
''[[Heroes of Light]]'' - p64 
''[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]]'' - pp1-4, pp9-13, pp304-310
|-valign="top"
|}

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (NPC)

2022-01-29T15:29:55Z

Blade Runner Rock: /* In Curse of Strahd */

[[File:Original VR.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
[[File:Rudolph van richten.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten and [[Strahd]] by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
{{canon}}
'''Dr. Rudolph van Richten''' is the greatest and most well-known hero of the Lands of the Mists.

==History==
He was born in [[Rivalis]] in [[Darkon]] in [[671 BC]]. He took [[medicine]] at the [[University of Il Aluk]], completing his four or five year program of study in [[693 BC]]. This humble man was spurred into a life of monster hunting when his son [[Erasmus van Richten]] was kidnapped by the [[Radanavich clan]] and sold to [[Baron Metus]]. Metus turned Erasmus into a [[vampire groom]] and Van Richten was forced to slay his son. In revenge, Metus killed Rudolph's wife, [[Ingrid van Richten]]. Van Richten eventually slew Metus, and then, with the help of [[Azalin]], the entire [[Radanavich tribe]].

Until his disappearance in [[750 BC]], he resided in [[Mordentshire]], where he ran an [[Van Richten's Herbalist Shop|herbalist shop]], as well as wrote several of his famous [[Van Richten's Guides]], and mentored [[The Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]], who regarded him as an uncle and took up his work.

==In [[Curse of Strahd]]==
Dr. van Richten makes a notable appearance in the [[5th Edition]] [[module]], [[Curse of Strahd]], though not in his [[famous]] persona as the monster hunter and [[writer]] of the [[Van Richten's Guides]] he is notable for in previous Ravenloft products. Instead, he adopts the guise of [[Rictavio]], a traveling [[half-elf]] [[bard]], [[storyteller]], and [[ringmaster]] gathering stories and watching out for talent. In reality he is gathering formation and waiting for an optimal time to strike at [[Strahd]], preferably when the vampire lord is in [[hibernation]]. Unlike other versions of van Richten, the Curse of Strahd van Richten is a [[loner]] because he knows the full extent of his [[curse]].<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> For more details, see [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Curse of Strahd)]]

The Legend. Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A Physician. Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.
The Weight of Experience. Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.
The Slayer. Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

The Old Hero. Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

A Cursed Man. Van Richten suffers a curse bestowed on him by a Vistani:

Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws.

Its effect on him can best be summarized with this statement: "Van Richten Dies Last." This curse is both a boon and a bane to him. The curse is a large part of why he has lived so long--how he has accumulated so much experience and expertise. He is cursed to always see his friends and allies die--which means he has to live long enough to see it happen.

For a long time, he was unaware of the exact nature of the curse on him, but he is apparently aware of it now.
• Van Richten feels guilty. For decades he fought alongside others with monsters, completely unaware that he was a doombringer among them. Now that he knows, he is burdened by all the deaths he feels that his presence caused.

• Van Richten isolates himself. He doesn't let people get close to him for fear that his curse will take them out.

• If Van Richten is traveling with the party, he has excellent odds of surviving--if someone is going to die in the party, it'll be someone other than him.

• Van Richten's curse should have a tangible impact if he’s traveling with the party: he is a doombringer of the highest order. His mere presence among the party should invite tragedy and disaster.

The Tragedy of Ezmerelda and Van Richten. In the backstory that created Ezmerelda d’Avenir (Appendix D: Monsters and NPCs pages 230-231), there's a tragedy in there: Van Richten's curse could have been lifted years ago.

By Ravenloft Lore, the strongest of curses laid down by a Vistani can only be lifted by the Vistani who placed it, or a blood relative of that Vistani. Van Richten's curse was a Death Curse laid on him by Ezmerelda's mother. Only Ezmerelda has the ability to revoke the curse. But here's the problem...
Ezmerelda is Vistani...by nature; they are secretive about their abilities. Beyond that, Van Richten doesn't trust Vistani and likely commanded Ezmerelda to not use her Vistani abilities in his presence. As a result, Van Richten doesn't know how Vistani curses work--he doesn't know that they can be revoked by a blood relative of the one who laid it. He's a Cleric, he has undoubtedly tried remove curse on himself and it failed. As far as he knows, the curse is permanent.
Van Richten is also secretive and, as mentioned, doesn't trust the Vistani. He kept Ezmerelda at arm's length as best he could both because he couldn't trust her, but also to try to protect her from the curse...and even if he was aware of the curse when they traveled together, he never told her about it.

If either one of them had been less secretive, more open, his curse would have been revoked a long time ago.

If the players want to help Van Richten break the curse, here's the backstory:

The story of Ezmerelda and Van Richten's history was written in the Van Richten's Journal (Appendix F: Handouts pages 254-255). It involves him destroying Ezmerelda's caravan while she was very, very young. She survived the undead assault and later got picked up by another caravan of Vistani (it was actually the Zarovan tribe--Madam Eva's caravan). She originally wanted revenge on Van Richten, but time with Eva (and the presence of the most powerful Vistani of them all) showed her the tragedy of what had happened from an outside perspective. Ezmerelda realized that the whole thing was a horrible tragedy and wrongs had been committed on both sides. She, thus, set out to try to find Van Richten and try to make things right...though Eva never told her about the curse her mother had laid on Van Richten.

Van Richten and Ezmerelda must travel to the place the curse was first laid...a small clearing in the forests of Barovia where the ruins of Ezmerelda's caravan still lie. Both must verbally acknowledge the wrong that had been done and verbally forgive one another for it...then the remains of Ezmerelda's caravan must be burned.

The Disguise. Van Richten got the idea for “Rictavio” from his exposure to Ezmerelda and her occasional methods for blending in when going somewhere that didn't like Vistani. In short: "Sometimes the best disguise is being the most obvious thing in the room." As mentioned above, Ezmerelda has never encountered the Rictavio disguise and Van Richten isn't familiar with any of the disguises Ezmerelda is currently using.

It is a rather perfect disguise. Van Richten is known as a grim and serious individual, a dour old man who roves the world slaying monsters. “Rictavio” is a flamboyant fop who tells ludicrous stories, commits crimes against music, and is constantly trying to recruit people to his Circus of Wonders. He should be portrayed as extremely over the top and completely harmless. It should be very jarring to your players if he drops the act and reveals who he truly is.
Furthermore, Rictavio knows that even if someone suspects he's hiding something, they are extremely unlikely to guess the truth. If a player rolls well on Insight against him and figures out he's full of crap, that only tells them that he's lying about something...not what he is lying about. And his response is to just carry on and ignore accusations. Sure, the PCs may figure out that he's full of it (his stories are obvious fabrications) but he just carries right along, sticking to his guns even though the players know it’s a load of BS.

The players should have a hard time to get a serious read on Rictavio's personality. He strikes them as so straight forward--a carnie who is spinning tall tales for amusement. So they shouldn’t suspect that he's any more than what he appears to be.

A Hard Man to Pin Down. Van Richten is a man with a plan for killing Strahd Von Zarovich, and it's a plan that plays well to his aged capabilities: "wait til Strahd takes a long nap, then stake him in his sleep." Of anyone in the valley, Van Richten knows how deadly Strahd is. He has fought elder vampires before and Strahd is the greatest of them all. He may very well believe that trying to fight him head on is pure folly, but he’s the one most capable of doing so.

It's important to note: Most of the "Destined Allies" the party can draw from Madame Eva’s Tarokka card reading have notes about how the PCs can get that individual to join them. Van Richten has no such notes. Instead, it says this...

Van Richten works alone. [...] Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure.

Van Richten is aware of Madame Eva but (unlike many others in the valley) he won't immediately cave to her prophecies, drop everything he has been working on, and throw his lot in with the PCs. Here are a few important things to keep in mind if the party is trying to recruit him...

• Van Richten is quite certain that if he drops his disguise, Strahd will find him and set out to kill him. (This is one of Strahd's Primary Goals as listed in Chapter 1)

• Van Richten's disguise is magically augmented. As long as the party can't get his hat off, they cannot prove that he’s not a carnie ringmaster

• Van Richten's disguise is only useful against Strahd as long as no one knows who he really is. The ring of mind shielding only works on him...it doesn't work on the PCs. He knows that if anyone else finds out, Strahd can charm them, read their mind or otherwise extract that information from them.

• Van Richten is fully aware of his curse. He will avoid physically joining up with the party for fear that he will get them all killed.

• Van Richten does not talk about his curse. He knows well the bravery of adventurers and that telling them about his curse tends to result in responses like "Oh, you don't need to worry about us, we're strong!" followed shortly by ":dying noises:." Rebuffing their advances without mentioning the curse is much more effective at getting them to stay away from him so his curse doesn't kill them.

• Even if Van Richten consents to offer them aid, it should be indirect as much as possible. He has his plan, he's set in his ways, and he’s not going to go gallivanting off with a bunch of young adventurers. And, he should stay in character as much as possible...blowing his cover will only bring Strahd down on him AND the PCs.

Ideally, even if the party can convince him to help...his help should primarily take the form of a surprisingly knowledgeable carnival ringmaster who is "certainly not going to go out and fight monsters with you. I'm a ringmaster, not an adventurer!"

He may lend the party his carnival wagon to travel around in (once he finds somewhere else to stash his saber-toothed tiger that has been trained to hunt Vistani, or he may lend them the tiger), give them helpful advice--possibly using ravens to stay in touch over long-distance if the PCs make friends with the Keepers of the Feather, and provide the sort of support that a Carnie could offer. But, it should take rather extreme circumstances for him to actually be honest with the PCs...and they may have to do something about his curse before he'll actually travel with them.

Getting him to Join Up. Van Richten wants to stay under cover...so how does the party get him to change his mind?
Easy: Ruin his plan.

If Van Richten's cover is blown, his plan is a wash. The whole plan depends on his identity staying a secret until Strahd goes into hibernation. If Strahd identifies Van Richten before then, he will try to kill him and Van Richten is pretty sure he can't take Strahd in a straight-up fight. Thus...if Van Richten’s cover is blown, he is stuck with two bad choices: Either he tries to keep going it alone, possibly getting killed by Strahd, and fails his “final mission,” or he accepts the risk to the PCs and joins them to try to take Strahd down directly. A few example ways to blow his cover...

• Knock his hat off. A hat of disguise only works as long as it stays on your head, so if something happens that knocks his hat off; “Rictavio” is replaced by Van Richten.

• Let the Tyger Tyger event happen (chapter 5). When Rictavio flees to the Tower of Khazan, he's inside an antimagic field and cannot disguise himself.

• Even if Van Richten is distorting his voice, if the PCs have already befriended Ezmerelda, she may still recognize it...even if what she recognizes is the cadence his voice adopts when he's explaining something.

Ability Loadout. Van Richten is a Cleric...and his listed prepared spells speaks more of a support caster than a monster hunter who has gone solo. But, because he's a Cleric, he can swap out his prepared spells at will to any other spells on the Cleric list. Here are a few notes on spells for him to use...

• Dawn creates sunlight. If he can lock a vampire down within the area of effect, they will be dust in short order.

• Dispel Evil and Good breaks a vampire's charm. However...things can't really leave Barovia, so the dismissal part of that spell won't be terribly effective here.

• Geas is useful when he needs to find something. For example, capture a werewolf then place a geas on it to lead them to the den.

• Lesser and Greater Restoration are enormously useful, as is remove curse.

• Guiding Bolt is a great weapon against Vampires. Shuts down their regeneration, and gives the next attack advantage.

• Hallow: If Van Richten can get his hands on the material components for this, he can create holy ground to help protect the PCs. Create a bubble of hallowed ground around the antimagic field that covers the Tower of Khazan....talk about a fortress. Sure, you'll have a bubble of non-hallowed ground where the antimagic field zone is...but the territory around the tower itself will be holy ground.

• Given his skill at predicting his foes...dropping sanctuary on a creature they are about to attack can completely trash their attempts.

• Spirit Guardians is another spell that is just....awesome.

Rudolph Van Richten quotes:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Authored:==
* ''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Demons]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Witches (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Witches]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]''

Credited for marketing purposes with:
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Mists (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Mists]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]]''

==[[Associate of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]==

==Chronology==

[[671 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten born<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, son of Otto and Mrs. Van Richten
 
{{Spec|[[678 BC]] - Rudolph’s sister [[Maria Van Richten]] born.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 18 "Speculation based on BH. We only know that she is younger than Rudolph."</ref>
 

[[679 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten sent to boarding school in [[Nartok]]. A childhood friend is [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]].<ref name="VRMHCII p.25-26">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 25-26</ref>

[[680 BC]] - [[Casimir (of Richten Haus)|Casimir]] (not to be confused with [[Casimir Lukas|Harkon Lukas’ son]]) starts working at Richten Haus as the gate keeper.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 6">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 6</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[683 BC]] - The servants of [[Richten Haus]] are all killed while the family is away one day. (summer)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.18: "Speculation based on [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] pg. 15, 24: I’m going on the hunch that VR grows younger until he reaches the age he was at when this event occurred"</ref>
 

[[685 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten meets [[Robert Tatenna]], a fellow student at boarding school. (fall)<ref name="CT p.14">[[Chilling Tales]] p.14</ref>

[[688 BC]] - The [[The Crimson Death Epidemic | Crimson Death]] spreads across Darkon (winter); it claims Van Richten’s great aunt Helga, despite his efforts; Rudolph is even more driven into his medical studies.<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[689 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten attends the [[University of Il Aluk]]. While there, he meets a fellow student, [[Dr. Harmon Ruscheider]]. (fall)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]] pg. 15"</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[691 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten marries his childhood sweetheart, [[Ingrid van Richten|Ingrid]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "[[Realm of Terror]]; [[VRGtV]]: Give VR a good respectable year between their marriage and birth of Erasmus in 692"</ref>
 

[[692 BC]] - Rudolph and Ingrid Van Richten's son [[Erasmus van Richten|Erasmus]] is born.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]] p. 4; [[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 8, "fourteen summers" before [[706 BC]]</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[693 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten finishes his studies; opens his practice back home in [[Rivalis]].}},<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VR’s age, RoT; VRGtV; and ToDm pg. 86, which indicates it takes 4-5 years to get a medical education at the University of Il Aluk"</ref> 
 
{{Spec|693 BC - Dr. Van Richten travels to [[Lamordia]], hears of the [[Loud Man of Lamordia]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VRGtG pg. 9: “When I was young.”</ref> 

[[696 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Antonin Madren]] and becomes his mentor.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 21: "VRGttC pg. 6: Van Richten takes Madren on as a medical student, which implies Van Richten has time to offer such an education (which lasts up to 8 years), i.e., while he was still a simple doctor (693-706)."</ref>

[[706 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten suffers the wrath of the [[Radanavich clan]]; the Vistani steal his son Erasmus; they sell Erasmus to [[Baron Metus]]<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, a vampire from [[Richemulot]]; with the help of an amused [[Azalin]], Van Richten wipes out all but one member of the Radanavich caravan<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]</ref>; [[Madame Radanavich]] [[curse | curses]] Van Richten<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, although he doesn’t realize it until the end of his career.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

[[706 BC]] Van Richten puts his Erasmus, now a vampire, out of his misery, but in spite [[Baron Metus]] tears [[Ingrid van Richten]] to pieces; Dr. Van Richten destroys Baron Metus, starting his career of hunting evil. Unable to live with the memories in [[Richten Haus]], Van Richten moves to [[Corvia]].<ref name="VRA p. 5">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 5</ref>

[[707 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten researches vampires, and meets [[Aimon Davidovitch]], a fellow scholar of the arcane.<ref> from [[JWM Timeline]] p.22: "[[VRGtF]] pg. 4: VR knew him for “some 30-odd years”]</ref>

[[710 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten encounters his first werebeast near [[Varithne]], a small village in northern [[Darkon]]. Dr. Van Richten starts hunting werebeasts as well<ref name="VRMHC p. 109-110">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 109-110</ref>

[[711 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Gedlan Ironheart]], a fearless [[dwarven]] [[innkeeper]] in [[Corvia]]. Gedlan becomes a frequent hunting companion.<ref name="Bleah House p. 11">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p.11</ref>

[[712 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets the mage [[Shauten]]; they bond when they are attacked by one of Azalin's patrols. Shauten opens Van Richten's eyes to the existence of the [[Lich]].<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref>

[[713 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten is visited by the dying Dr. Ruscheider, who tells Rudolph all he can about several months spent as a lich's captive; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting liches.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p.111-112</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[714 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten receives a visit from his childhood friend, [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]], who is now a ghostly slave to Azalin; Dr. Van Richten learns the terrible truth about [[Azalin Rex]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on [[VRGtG]] pg. 22, [[VRMHCII]] pg. 24</ref>
 

{{Spec|714 BC - Dr. Van Richten moves to [[Mordentshire]], sensing it is politically unsafe for him to remain in [[Darkon]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on VRGttL pg. 22</ref>
 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[716 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 3 n1">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade after her death, but [[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[718 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and [[Shauten]] battle a creature they believe to be a priestly [[lich]]; it is actually Van Richten's first [[ancient dead]]}}.<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] "Speculation based on VRGAD pg. 5: “Some years ago,” and other markers. It happened after VR started hunting liches, but before he started hunting ghosts. (The latter conclusion taken from numerous references to Claudia in this Guide"</ref>
 
[[724 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten battles the [[Bog Monster of Hroth]], and meets [[Jameld of Hroth|Jameld]]. This is also Van Richten's first visit to both [[Kartakass]] and [[Sithicus]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p.153</ref> 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[726 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decade n1">[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades after her death but[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade</ref> 

{{Spec|726 BC - Dr. Van Richten visits [[Sanguinia]] with [[George Weathermay]] and [[Arametrius]]; they meet [[Claudia DeShanes]]; Claudia becomes Rudolph’s assistant, and it seems he had certain unspoken feelings for her.}}<ref>Speculation from JWM Timeline p.28: "Since Arametrius is probably [[Athasian]], Van Richten may have recently visited [[Kalidnay]] and encountered [[Ahmose Tanit]]. [VRGtG pg. 73. This is the earliest possible date for this event (due to George’s inclusion, and we know from this source and BH that VR starts hunting ghosts one year after this event. That leaves only 9 years between VR starting to hunt and writing his Guide on the subject. I chose to go with this date to keep as wide a margin of opportunity as possible.]"</ref>
 

[[727 BC]] - [[Merilee Markuza]], the Child [[Vampire]], kills Claudia. Van Richten pursues the creature relentlessly, but loses her in [[Lamordia]].<ref name="Darklords p. 63">[[Darklords]] p. 63</ref>

727 BC - While hunting the Child Vampire, Van Richten witnesses the [[Thundering Carriage]]; Van Richten decides he must put an end to these ghostly horrors, too.<ref name="Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts p. 6">[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 6</ref>

[[728 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten defeats the [[Phantom Army]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 91</ref>

[[729 BC]] - The fiend [[Elsepeth]] enters Ravenloft via [[transposition]] in a small village outside [[Stangengrad]], near the [[Grashen Falls]] (sept)<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.28: "[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] pg. 14: the diary is dated “twelve years ago.”</ref>

[[730 BC]] - {{Spec|[[Gedlan Ironheart]] killed while battling evil spirits.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: "VRGtG pg. 23: Gedlan is referred to as “Geddar” in this book. The date is an estimate based on the 727-736 available time span."</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] leaves [[Borca]], having lurked there for years.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] p. 66</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] writes to Van Richten about the death of Madren’s sister.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[734 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] shows up on Van Richten's doorstep, and gives the good doctor his notes; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting the [[Created]].}}<ref>JWM Timeline p. 30: "VRGttC pg. 6: Estimate. “Years” after Madren wrote about his sister’s death"</ref> 

[[735 BC] - Dr. Van Richten is forced to kill his old friend [[Shauten]] in self-defense, when Shauten tries to sacrifice Rudolph in a bid for [[lichdom]]<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref><ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>. {{Spec|This "near-miss" may have inspired Van Richten to start recording his collected knowledge for heroes to come.}}<ref>JWM Timeline: "Speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6"</ref>

735 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''.<ref name="RLCS p.18">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.18</ref><ref name="RLPHB p.20">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.20</ref>

[[736 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''.

[[737 BC]] - The [[Vistana]] [[Cyrilla]]'s niece [[Vassa]] is [[kidnapped]] near [[Corvia]].<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 20: The golem appeared “the following year” after Vaasa’s soul is taken."</ref>

737 BC - [[Vassa]] returns as a [[clay golem]]; Cyrilla writes to Dr. Van Richten.<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 19 "just last year"</ref>

737 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''.

[[738 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''.

[[738 BC]] [[Emil Bollenbach]] engineers the [[kidnapping]] of Dr. Rudolph van Richten to the end of seizing his [[brain]] for [[transplantation]] into a super-golem. fortunately, several of Van Richten's friends intercede to thwart Dr. Bollenbach.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 33: "[[Children of the Night: The Created]] pg. 50; CT pg. 32 places this adventure 8 years after Emil’s disappearance (i.e., 746), but the dating used in CotN:C fits VR’s chronology better.</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] goes to [[Nartok]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 67-68">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.67-68</ref>

[[739 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and the adventuring band known as [[the Hand (Adventurer Band)|the Hand]] hunt and destroy [[the Gibbering Golem]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 265-276">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.265-276</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]] publishes ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''. This act earns him considerable ire from [[Agatha Clairmont]], whom sees it as an instruction manual to building [[dread golem]]s just much as it is hunting them.<ref name="Van Richten's Arsenal p. 149">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p. 149</ref>

[[740 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]'' (early spring).

740 BC - Dr. Van Richten inherits the [[library (Aimon Davidovitch)]] of [[Aimon Davidovitch]]. Dr. Van Richten starts studying tomes. (Sept)<ref>JWM Timeline p. 35 "Extrapolated from VRGtF pg. 4"</ref>

[[741 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]], [[Davvyd]], [[Samuel]] and [[Dr. Ottelie Farringer]] battle the fiend [[Drigor]]. Only Dr. van Richten survives. (Feb.)<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 79-85">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p. 79-85</ref>

741 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]]''.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Book)]] p.4</ref>

741 BC - [[Van Richten]] stumbles into the clutches of [[the nameless Amnizu]] and [[the nameless Barbazu]] infesting [[Chateaufaux]]. He is captured. However, he manages to join with some [[adventurer]]s to route the [[devil]]s from the town.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.72-73; Note that the encounter with these [[fiend]]s doesn't appear in the original uncompiled Van Richten's Guide to Fiends. Therefore, the encounter with the [[Fiends of Chateaufaux]] took place after took place after the first VRGtF was published.</ref><ref>[[Gazetteer III]] p.30-31, "just over 15 years ago"</ref>

741 BC<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> - Dr. Van Richten is [[depressed]]; he consults with the [[diviner]], [[Inarin Alster]]; Rudolph realizes he had been laboring under a [[curse]] all these years; Dr. Van Richten spends a year with [[Arturi Radanavich]] studying the Vistani.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]] p.5-7; 87-89</ref>

[[742 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten writes his ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]'' and retires.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> (Oct.)

[[750 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten dies in [[Richten Haus|Bleak House]] in the fight against [[Madame Radanavich]]<ref>[[Domains of Dread]] p. 17, as told in [[Bleak House]], particularly [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 58-63</ref> Meanwhile, all that is known to most, including the [[Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]] is that he [[disappeared]].<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

{{ref}}

[[category:Character]] [[category:NPC]]
[[category:2nd Edition Character]]
[[category:3rd Edition Character]]
[[category:4th Edition Character]]
[[category:5th Edition Character]]
[[category:Abused]]
[[category:Betrayed]]
[[Category:Cursed]]
[[category:Cursed by the Vistani]]
[[Category:Darkonian]]
[[Category:Demonologist]]
[[category:Energy Drained]]
[[Category:Filicide]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Rivalis]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Nartok]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Forest of Shadows]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Darkon]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordentshire]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordent]]
[[Category:Former Patients of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Dominia]]
[[Category:Former Medical Student]]
[[Category:Former Student of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[category:Gaslighted]]
[[category:Giogoto]]
[[Category:Ghost]]
[[Category:Graduate of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Graduate]]
[[Category:Herbalist]]
[[Category:Human]]
[[category:healer]]
[[category:Hero]]
[[Category:Hunter Of Monsters]]
[[Category:Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[category:Intellectual]]
[[Category:Kidnapped]]
[[category:Killer]]
[[category:Lorist]]
[[Category:Male]]
[[category:Mass Murderer]]
[[category:Medical Doctor]]
[[category:Medical Professional]]
[[category:Mentor]]
[[category:Murderer]]
[[Category:Necrologist]]
[[category:Old]]
[[Category:Planar Mechanic]]
[[category:Polymath]]
[[category:Posthumous Character]]
[[category:Potential Darklord]]
[[Category:Proprietor]]
[[category:Professional Killer]]
[[category:Punished]]
[[category:Ravenloft Lorist]]
[[Category:Ravenloft Loremaster]]
[[category:Redeemed]]
[[category:Reformed]]
[[category:Repentant]]
[[category:Researcher]]
[[category:Retired]]
[[Category:Rogue]]
[[category:Sage]]
[[category:Seduced]]
[[Category:Stasis]]
[[category:Tempted]]
[[category:Transgressed]]
[[category:Transgressor]]
[[Category:Van Richten Family]]
[[category:Victim of Medical Malpractice]]
[[Category:Victim of the van Richten Curse]]
[[category:Victimized]]
[[Category:Widowed]]
[[Category:writer]]
[[category:Births in 671 BC]]
[[category:Deaths in 750 BC]]
<references/>

==Data from the Ravenloft Catalogue==



{|
|-valign="top"
|[[Image:rldb_npc.jpg]]
|[[Image:rldb_primary.gif]]
|
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' 
''[[Bleak House]]''
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_art.gif]]
|
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - p4 
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - cover, p4 
''[[Bleak House:Homecoming]]'' - p4,p16 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - p7,8 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p92 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - p114 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 5,11 
''[[The Created]]'' - p13 
''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]'' - p5
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_stats.gif]]
|
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - pp4-5 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p91 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 3
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_desc.gif]]
|
''[[Ravenloft Third Edition]]'' - pp14,17-18,27,176 
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - throughout 
''[[Bleak House]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to The Created]]'' - throughout 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]'' - throughout 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - pp91-93 
''[[Tales of Ravenloft: The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]'' - pp1-17 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - pp 2-3 
''[[Heroes of Light]]'' - p64 
''[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]]'' - pp1-4, pp9-13, pp304-310
|-valign="top"
|}

Dr. Rudolph van Richten (NPC)

2022-01-29T15:29:23Z

Blade Runner Rock:

[[File:Original VR.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
[[File:Rudolph van richten.jpg|thumb|alt=Dr. Rudolph van Richten|Dr. Rudolph van Richten and [[Strahd]] by [[Talon Dunning]], used with permission]]
{{canon}}
'''Dr. Rudolph van Richten''' is the greatest and most well-known hero of the Lands of the Mists.

==History==
He was born in [[Rivalis]] in [[Darkon]] in [[671 BC]]. He took [[medicine]] at the [[University of Il Aluk]], completing his four or five year program of study in [[693 BC]]. This humble man was spurred into a life of monster hunting when his son [[Erasmus van Richten]] was kidnapped by the [[Radanavich clan]] and sold to [[Baron Metus]]. Metus turned Erasmus into a [[vampire groom]] and Van Richten was forced to slay his son. In revenge, Metus killed Rudolph's wife, [[Ingrid van Richten]]. Van Richten eventually slew Metus, and then, with the help of [[Azalin]], the entire [[Radanavich tribe]].

Until his disappearance in [[750 BC]], he resided in [[Mordentshire]], where he ran an [[Van Richten's Herbalist Shop|herbalist shop]], as well as wrote several of his famous [[Van Richten's Guides]], and mentored [[The Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]], who regarded him as an uncle and took up his work.

==In [[Curse of Strahd]]==
Dr. van Richten makes a notable appearance in the [[5th Edition]] [[module]], [[Curse of Strahd]], though not in his [[famous]] persona as the monster hunter and [[writer]] of the [[Van Richten's Guides]] he is notable for in previous Ravenloft products. Instead, he adopts the guise of [[Rictavio]], a traveling [[half-elf]] [[bard]], [[storyteller]], and [[ringmaster]] gathering stories and watching out for talent. In reality he is gathering formation and waiting for an optimal time to strike at [[Strahd]], preferably when the vampire lord is in [[hibernation]]. Unlike other versions of van Richten, the Curse of Strahd van Richten is a [[loner]] because he knows the full extent of his [[curse]].<ref name="Curse of Strahd">[[Curse of Strahd]] p. 238</ref> For more details, see [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten (Curse of Strahd)]]

ROLE PLAYING NOTES
The Legend. Rudolph Van Richten is an old monster hunter. Let me say that again...he is an old monster hunter. He got into the monster hunting trade around the time his son was 14, which would probably put Van Richten in his late thirties to early forties. Ball-parking it, he's probably at least in his 80s by now. This is a man who has been hunting and slaying monsters for decades.

The name Van Richten is known; the common folk know it; the monsters know it--he is a legend. Imagine if you will, the “scary stories” that parents tell their kids to possibly frighten them away from certain things. Van Richten is the scary story that monsters tell their children. By the time your players meet him (for real--not just his disguise), they should have heard the name several times. So, how should this play out? Here are a few ideas...

• Van Richten wrote a series of books, detailing all he knew about monsters of all sorts. The 'Van Richten's Guide to the [monster]' series. Perhaps your players find a copy of one...perhaps when they succeed on a monster-knowledge check, you tell them that they remember reading [fact] in the book Van Richten's Guide to [monster].

• If the players do something impressive involving slaying monsters, have NPCs compare them to the legends they have heard of Van Richten.

• Perhaps work with a player to inject an encounter with Van Richten into their backstory.

• If the PCs are hanging around somewhere, perhaps someone in a tavern launches into a story of one of Rudolph Van Richten's exploits.

• Some monsters are afraid of him. If Van Richten drops the Rictavio disguise and when he becomes known, intelligent monsters may balk at the idea of fighting him. Others may specifically target him for the “glory of killing Van Richten.”

• If NPCs become aware of who he is, their treatment of him should border on worship...albeit, distant. Just imagine if Batman suddenly turned up in the local pub. They are astounded by him, admire him, but are kind of afraid of him.

A Physician. Before Van Richten became the great monster hunter he is known as today, he was a doctor. His medical background should carry through into how he operates today.

• He does have a good Medicine check, and should be quick to look for cause of death, stabilize injured people, treat injuries, etc.

• He should have a great deal of understanding about anatomy and has extended this knowledge to include monster anatomy and biology. He knows what harms them and why, he knows where to hit them to make it hurt. He has figured this out by doing autopsies on monsters he killed.

• To reflect his medical background, he has the Healer feat.

• His way of thinking and his approach to things has a scholarly bent. He is not quick to rush into danger and instead gathers information before he acts.
The Weight of Experience. Van Richten is (certainly within Ravenloft) the most experienced monster hunter to have ever lived. Additionally, we know that he has taken out creatures far outside of his weight class. Canonically to Ravenloft Lore, Van Richten has taken out full vampires, lycanthropes of all sorts, and even a few Mummy Lords. So, what does this mean? Well...basically, mix together a Witcher and Batman, and then pack it into a really old physician.

• If it involves monsters, Van Richten knows it. No check necessary.

• If a monster is vulnerable to something, he's carrying it. Feel free to include “traditional” vulnerabilities that monsters could have that aren't necessarily in the books. Wolfsbane (specially prepared Aconite) repels or poisons werewolves, garlic repulses vampires, etc.

• If there is something you can create that a monster is harmed by, he knows how to make it.

• If he knows in advance what sort of monster he is going to go up against and there is a Cleric spell that would be useful, assume he prepared it.

• His ability to predict the actions of monsters should be nearly flawless. As the DM...straight up cheat with his predictive abilities. You know what your monsters are going to do next, so have him react accordingly. He sees the werewolves in front and correctly predicts that another group would be moving in stealth to flank the party. If one is about to rush him and attack him, he moves out of its movement range before it can charge. When it comes to getting attacked by monsters, he is simply never surprised by what they do. Strahd Von Zarovich is an exception...elder vampires are extremely hard to predict.

• His understanding of how monsters behave should be uncanny. He doesn't need to track them; he can generally make a reliable guess at where their lair would be. If he decides to stake out a monster to ambush it when it next attacks someone, he always stakes out the right place.

• He can produce non-traditional solutions to dealing with certain kinds of monsters. For example, he may be able to figure out a way to put a ghost to rest (by breaking its ties to the world), rather than having to fight it.

• He will use his skills to help the party coordinate. He's not a specialist in small unit tactics, so he won't actually try to command the PCs, but he will give them advice and call warnings. For example: "The attack from the front is a decoy!"

Van Richten's skill-set should be eclectic in the extreme. He has picked up bits and pieces of useful knowledge from all over the place. He is not proficient with Smith's tools, but knows how to Silver a weapon. He's not proficient with a Poisoner's Kit, but knows how to make several toxins and compounds that are effective against various sorts of monster. He's not a proficient survivalist, but can identify monster tracks on sight. He's not proficient in Investigation, but he can piece together the evidence of a monster attack easy as breathing.

Van Richten's campaign against monsters is obsessive. He is on a lifelong rampage of revenge over what Baron Metus did to his son. He has gathered up every single possible tool that he can get his hands on that makes him more effective at killing monsters and discarded most of the rest.
The Slayer. Van Richten kills monsters. He doesn't fight or battle or hunt monsters, he kills them. And he does all of this, despite only having a CR of 9. The players that travel with him should be constantly shocked (and appalled) at all the sneaky, filthy, under-handed tricks he pulls in order to kill the maximum number of monsters as swiftly and efficiently as possible. That is how Van Richten operates.

• Necromancer and his undead holed up in an old mansion? Bar the doors and set it on fire.

• Vampire built his lair on low ground? Divert a river to flood the whole thing with running water.

• Vampire didn't make sure his coffin was under enough layers of solid material? Blow/tear the top off and bathe the coffin in daylight.

• Found the vampire's coffin before you go to kill it? Anyone know the spell leomund's tiny hut? That'll prevent the vampire's mist form from getting back to its coffin.

• Cave full of werewolves? Set large fires in the entrances, then cave the entrance in beyond the fire...then just wait for the fire to eat all the air out of the cave.

• Necromancer with an army? Infect the army with Corpseblight then put a crossbow bolt through the necromancer's throat while he struggles to figure out why his undead army is falling apart.

In short...if you can think of a horrific, brutal, and/or efficient way for him to kill things with the environment, without really endangering himself directly...he'll do it.

The Old Hero. Van Richten is not as young as he once was. If anything, this has emphasized his traits mentioned above. Once upon a time, he was young and strong and agile--able to fight monsters directly and come out on top. But now he's old. His body can't keep up with his old way of fighting, so he's had to adapt. He focuses more on magic now, but mostly focuses on killing things without having to actually fight them.

In a straight fight, he’s more likely to let the PCs handle the front lines. They're young enough to handle it, after all, which could be where you use his support-caster loadout.

As to his personality, he’s not a generic crotchety old man. He’s a really old monster hunter...master of his trade and too old to put up with any shenanigans or BS from players. He's mellowed out somewhat since he got started, but he’s still quite determined to see the end of any monsters he can.

His age is a balancing factor that should keep him from turning into the star of the campaign. While Van Richten’s personality and aura should boarder on the mythic, he has worked with countless groups of adventurers and heroes...it would be easy for him to steal the spotlight from the PCs. So the DM should balance this with the fact that he's old and he's cautious.

A Cursed Man. Van Richten suffers a curse bestowed on him by a Vistani:

Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws.

Its effect on him can best be summarized with this statement: "Van Richten Dies Last." This curse is both a boon and a bane to him. The curse is a large part of why he has lived so long--how he has accumulated so much experience and expertise. He is cursed to always see his friends and allies die--which means he has to live long enough to see it happen.

For a long time, he was unaware of the exact nature of the curse on him, but he is apparently aware of it now.
• Van Richten feels guilty. For decades he fought alongside others with monsters, completely unaware that he was a doombringer among them. Now that he knows, he is burdened by all the deaths he feels that his presence caused.

• Van Richten isolates himself. He doesn't let people get close to him for fear that his curse will take them out.

• If Van Richten is traveling with the party, he has excellent odds of surviving--if someone is going to die in the party, it'll be someone other than him.

• Van Richten's curse should have a tangible impact if he’s traveling with the party: he is a doombringer of the highest order. His mere presence among the party should invite tragedy and disaster.

The Tragedy of Ezmerelda and Van Richten. In the backstory that created Ezmerelda d’Avenir (Appendix D: Monsters and NPCs pages 230-231), there's a tragedy in there: Van Richten's curse could have been lifted years ago.

By Ravenloft Lore, the strongest of curses laid down by a Vistani can only be lifted by the Vistani who placed it, or a blood relative of that Vistani. Van Richten's curse was a Death Curse laid on him by Ezmerelda's mother. Only Ezmerelda has the ability to revoke the curse. But here's the problem...
Ezmerelda is Vistani...by nature; they are secretive about their abilities. Beyond that, Van Richten doesn't trust Vistani and likely commanded Ezmerelda to not use her Vistani abilities in his presence. As a result, Van Richten doesn't know how Vistani curses work--he doesn't know that they can be revoked by a blood relative of the one who laid it. He's a Cleric, he has undoubtedly tried remove curse on himself and it failed. As far as he knows, the curse is permanent.
Van Richten is also secretive and, as mentioned, doesn't trust the Vistani. He kept Ezmerelda at arm's length as best he could both because he couldn't trust her, but also to try to protect her from the curse...and even if he was aware of the curse when they traveled together, he never told her about it.

If either one of them had been less secretive, more open, his curse would have been revoked a long time ago.

If the players want to help Van Richten break the curse, here's the backstory:

The story of Ezmerelda and Van Richten's history was written in the Van Richten's Journal (Appendix F: Handouts pages 254-255). It involves him destroying Ezmerelda's caravan while she was very, very young. She survived the undead assault and later got picked up by another caravan of Vistani (it was actually the Zarovan tribe--Madam Eva's caravan). She originally wanted revenge on Van Richten, but time with Eva (and the presence of the most powerful Vistani of them all) showed her the tragedy of what had happened from an outside perspective. Ezmerelda realized that the whole thing was a horrible tragedy and wrongs had been committed on both sides. She, thus, set out to try to find Van Richten and try to make things right...though Eva never told her about the curse her mother had laid on Van Richten.

Van Richten and Ezmerelda must travel to the place the curse was first laid...a small clearing in the forests of Barovia where the ruins of Ezmerelda's caravan still lie. Both must verbally acknowledge the wrong that had been done and verbally forgive one another for it...then the remains of Ezmerelda's caravan must be burned.

The Disguise. Van Richten got the idea for “Rictavio” from his exposure to Ezmerelda and her occasional methods for blending in when going somewhere that didn't like Vistani. In short: "Sometimes the best disguise is being the most obvious thing in the room." As mentioned above, Ezmerelda has never encountered the Rictavio disguise and Van Richten isn't familiar with any of the disguises Ezmerelda is currently using.

It is a rather perfect disguise. Van Richten is known as a grim and serious individual, a dour old man who roves the world slaying monsters. “Rictavio” is a flamboyant fop who tells ludicrous stories, commits crimes against music, and is constantly trying to recruit people to his Circus of Wonders. He should be portrayed as extremely over the top and completely harmless. It should be very jarring to your players if he drops the act and reveals who he truly is.
Furthermore, Rictavio knows that even if someone suspects he's hiding something, they are extremely unlikely to guess the truth. If a player rolls well on Insight against him and figures out he's full of crap, that only tells them that he's lying about something...not what he is lying about. And his response is to just carry on and ignore accusations. Sure, the PCs may figure out that he's full of it (his stories are obvious fabrications) but he just carries right along, sticking to his guns even though the players know it’s a load of BS.

The players should have a hard time to get a serious read on Rictavio's personality. He strikes them as so straight forward--a carnie who is spinning tall tales for amusement. So they shouldn’t suspect that he's any more than what he appears to be.

A Hard Man to Pin Down. Van Richten is a man with a plan for killing Strahd Von Zarovich, and it's a plan that plays well to his aged capabilities: "wait til Strahd takes a long nap, then stake him in his sleep." Of anyone in the valley, Van Richten knows how deadly Strahd is. He has fought elder vampires before and Strahd is the greatest of them all. He may very well believe that trying to fight him head on is pure folly, but he’s the one most capable of doing so.

It's important to note: Most of the "Destined Allies" the party can draw from Madame Eva’s Tarokka card reading have notes about how the PCs can get that individual to join them. Van Richten has no such notes. Instead, it says this...

Van Richten works alone. [...] Furthermore, he believes too much is at stake to risk exposure.

Van Richten is aware of Madame Eva but (unlike many others in the valley) he won't immediately cave to her prophecies, drop everything he has been working on, and throw his lot in with the PCs. Here are a few important things to keep in mind if the party is trying to recruit him...

• Van Richten is quite certain that if he drops his disguise, Strahd will find him and set out to kill him. (This is one of Strahd's Primary Goals as listed in Chapter 1)

• Van Richten's disguise is magically augmented. As long as the party can't get his hat off, they cannot prove that he’s not a carnie ringmaster

• Van Richten's disguise is only useful against Strahd as long as no one knows who he really is. The ring of mind shielding only works on him...it doesn't work on the PCs. He knows that if anyone else finds out, Strahd can charm them, read their mind or otherwise extract that information from them.

• Van Richten is fully aware of his curse. He will avoid physically joining up with the party for fear that he will get them all killed.

• Van Richten does not talk about his curse. He knows well the bravery of adventurers and that telling them about his curse tends to result in responses like "Oh, you don't need to worry about us, we're strong!" followed shortly by ":dying noises:." Rebuffing their advances without mentioning the curse is much more effective at getting them to stay away from him so his curse doesn't kill them.

• Even if Van Richten consents to offer them aid, it should be indirect as much as possible. He has his plan, he's set in his ways, and he’s not going to go gallivanting off with a bunch of young adventurers. And, he should stay in character as much as possible...blowing his cover will only bring Strahd down on him AND the PCs.

Ideally, even if the party can convince him to help...his help should primarily take the form of a surprisingly knowledgeable carnival ringmaster who is "certainly not going to go out and fight monsters with you. I'm a ringmaster, not an adventurer!"

He may lend the party his carnival wagon to travel around in (once he finds somewhere else to stash his saber-toothed tiger that has been trained to hunt Vistani, or he may lend them the tiger), give them helpful advice--possibly using ravens to stay in touch over long-distance if the PCs make friends with the Keepers of the Feather, and provide the sort of support that a Carnie could offer. But, it should take rather extreme circumstances for him to actually be honest with the PCs...and they may have to do something about his curse before he'll actually travel with them.

Getting him to Join Up. Van Richten wants to stay under cover...so how does the party get him to change his mind?
Easy: Ruin his plan.

If Van Richten's cover is blown, his plan is a wash. The whole plan depends on his identity staying a secret until Strahd goes into hibernation. If Strahd identifies Van Richten before then, he will try to kill him and Van Richten is pretty sure he can't take Strahd in a straight-up fight. Thus...if Van Richten’s cover is blown, he is stuck with two bad choices: Either he tries to keep going it alone, possibly getting killed by Strahd, and fails his “final mission,” or he accepts the risk to the PCs and joins them to try to take Strahd down directly. A few example ways to blow his cover...

• Knock his hat off. A hat of disguise only works as long as it stays on your head, so if something happens that knocks his hat off; “Rictavio” is replaced by Van Richten.

• Let the Tyger Tyger event happen (chapter 5). When Rictavio flees to the Tower of Khazan, he's inside an antimagic field and cannot disguise himself.

• Even if Van Richten is distorting his voice, if the PCs have already befriended Ezmerelda, she may still recognize it...even if what she recognizes is the cadence his voice adopts when he's explaining something.

Ability Loadout. Van Richten is a Cleric...and his listed prepared spells speaks more of a support caster than a monster hunter who has gone solo. But, because he's a Cleric, he can swap out his prepared spells at will to any other spells on the Cleric list. Here are a few notes on spells for him to use...

• Dawn creates sunlight. If he can lock a vampire down within the area of effect, they will be dust in short order.

• Dispel Evil and Good breaks a vampire's charm. However...things can't really leave Barovia, so the dismissal part of that spell won't be terribly effective here.

• Geas is useful when he needs to find something. For example, capture a werewolf then place a geas on it to lead them to the den.

• Lesser and Greater Restoration are enormously useful, as is remove curse.

• Guiding Bolt is a great weapon against Vampires. Shuts down their regeneration, and gives the next attack advantage.

• Hallow: If Van Richten can get his hands on the material components for this, he can create holy ground to help protect the PCs. Create a bubble of hallowed ground around the antimagic field that covers the Tower of Khazan....talk about a fortress. Sure, you'll have a bubble of non-hallowed ground where the antimagic field zone is...but the territory around the tower itself will be holy ground.

• Given his skill at predicting his foes...dropping sanctuary on a creature they are about to attack can completely trash their attempts.

• Spirit Guardians is another spell that is just....awesome.

Rudolph Van Richten quotes:

"It is my sincere wish that any soul who comes into possession of this booklet may employ the dearly-bought wisdom herein to strike at the heart of monstrous villainy wherever it arises. Make no mistake: it is a bloody business, and not for the faint of heart. Often, it is those of us familiar with tragedy who can best pierce the darkness. We hunt monsters so the innocent don’t have to."

"For more than three decades now, I have undertaken to investigate and expose creatures of darkness to the purifying light of truth and knowledge. “Hero” I am named in some circles; “sage” and “master hunter” I am called in others. Today I am a man who has simply lived too long."

"The fight against creatures of darkness is a difficult, and often painful one! But it is a good fight, and one that must be fought."

"Destroying everything seems like the best option."

==Authored:==
* ''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Demons]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Witches (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to Witches]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]''

Credited for marketing purposes with:
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Mists (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Mists]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Shadow Fey]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead (Item)|Van Richten's Guide to the Walking Dead]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]]''
* ''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]]''

==[[Associate of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]==

==Chronology==

[[671 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten born<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, son of Otto and Mrs. Van Richten
 
{{Spec|[[678 BC]] - Rudolph’s sister [[Maria Van Richten]] born.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 18 "Speculation based on BH. We only know that she is younger than Rudolph."</ref>
 

[[679 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten sent to boarding school in [[Nartok]]. A childhood friend is [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]].<ref name="VRMHCII p.25-26">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 25-26</ref>

[[680 BC]] - [[Casimir (of Richten Haus)|Casimir]] (not to be confused with [[Casimir Lukas|Harkon Lukas’ son]]) starts working at Richten Haus as the gate keeper.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 6">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 6</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[683 BC]] - The servants of [[Richten Haus]] are all killed while the family is away one day. (summer)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.18: "Speculation based on [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] pg. 15, 24: I’m going on the hunch that VR grows younger until he reaches the age he was at when this event occurred"</ref>
 

[[685 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten meets [[Robert Tatenna]], a fellow student at boarding school. (fall)<ref name="CT p.14">[[Chilling Tales]] p.14</ref>

[[688 BC]] - The [[The Crimson Death Epidemic | Crimson Death]] spreads across Darkon (winter); it claims Van Richten’s great aunt Helga, despite his efforts; Rudolph is even more driven into his medical studies.<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>

 
{{Spec|[[689 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten attends the [[University of Il Aluk]]. While there, he meets a fellow student, [[Dr. Harmon Ruscheider]]. (fall)}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]] pg. 15"</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[691 BC]] - Rudolph Van Richten marries his childhood sweetheart, [[Ingrid van Richten|Ingrid]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "[[Realm of Terror]]; [[VRGtV]]: Give VR a good respectable year between their marriage and birth of Erasmus in 692"</ref>
 

[[692 BC]] - Rudolph and Ingrid Van Richten's son [[Erasmus van Richten|Erasmus]] is born.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]] p. 4; [[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 8, "fourteen summers" before [[706 BC]]</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[693 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten finishes his studies; opens his practice back home in [[Rivalis]].}},<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VR’s age, RoT; VRGtV; and ToDm pg. 86, which indicates it takes 4-5 years to get a medical education at the University of Il Aluk"</ref> 
 
{{Spec|693 BC - Dr. Van Richten travels to [[Lamordia]], hears of the [[Loud Man of Lamordia]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p. 20 "Speculation based on VRGtG pg. 9: “When I was young.”</ref> 

[[696 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Antonin Madren]] and becomes his mentor.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 21: "VRGttC pg. 6: Van Richten takes Madren on as a medical student, which implies Van Richten has time to offer such an education (which lasts up to 8 years), i.e., while he was still a simple doctor (693-706)."</ref>

[[706 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten suffers the wrath of the [[Radanavich clan]]; the Vistani steal his son Erasmus; they sell Erasmus to [[Baron Metus]]<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, a vampire from [[Richemulot]]; with the help of an amused [[Azalin]], Van Richten wipes out all but one member of the Radanavich caravan<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]</ref>; [[Madame Radanavich]] [[curse | curses]] Van Richten<ref name="VRA p. 4">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 4</ref>, although he doesn’t realize it until the end of his career.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

[[706 BC]] Van Richten puts his Erasmus, now a vampire, out of his misery, but in spite [[Baron Metus]] tears [[Ingrid van Richten]] to pieces; Dr. Van Richten destroys Baron Metus, starting his career of hunting evil. Unable to live with the memories in [[Richten Haus]], Van Richten moves to [[Corvia]].<ref name="VRA p. 5">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 5</ref>

[[707 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten researches vampires, and meets [[Aimon Davidovitch]], a fellow scholar of the arcane.<ref> from [[JWM Timeline]] p.22: "[[VRGtF]] pg. 4: VR knew him for “some 30-odd years”]</ref>

[[710 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten encounters his first werebeast near [[Varithne]], a small village in northern [[Darkon]]. Dr. Van Richten starts hunting werebeasts as well<ref name="VRMHC p. 109-110">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]] p. 109-110</ref>

[[711 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets [[Gedlan Ironheart]], a fearless [[dwarven]] [[innkeeper]] in [[Corvia]]. Gedlan becomes a frequent hunting companion.<ref name="Bleah House p. 11">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p.11</ref>

[[712 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten meets the mage [[Shauten]]; they bond when they are attacked by one of Azalin's patrols. Shauten opens Van Richten's eyes to the existence of the [[Lich]].<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref>

[[713 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten is visited by the dying Dr. Ruscheider, who tells Rudolph all he can about several months spent as a lich's captive; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting liches.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p.111-112</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[714 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten receives a visit from his childhood friend, [[Eldrenn Van Dorn]], who is now a ghostly slave to Azalin; Dr. Van Richten learns the terrible truth about [[Azalin Rex]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on [[VRGtG]] pg. 22, [[VRMHCII]] pg. 24</ref>
 

{{Spec|714 BC - Dr. Van Richten moves to [[Mordentshire]], sensing it is politically unsafe for him to remain in [[Darkon]].}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: Speculation based on VRGttL pg. 22</ref>
 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[716 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="Bleak House: Homecoming p. 3 n1">[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade after her death, but [[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades</ref>
 
{{Spec|[[718 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and [[Shauten]] battle a creature they believe to be a priestly [[lich]]; it is actually Van Richten's first [[ancient dead]]}}.<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] "Speculation based on VRGAD pg. 5: “Some years ago,” and other markers. It happened after VR started hunting liches, but before he started hunting ghosts. (The latter conclusion taken from numerous references to Claudia in this Guide"</ref>
 
[[724 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten battles the [[Bog Monster of Hroth]], and meets [[Jameld of Hroth|Jameld]]. This is also Van Richten's first visit to both [[Kartakass]] and [[Sithicus]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p.153</ref> 

{{questionably-canon-small}}[[726 BC]] - The evil spirit of [[Madame Radanavich]] and her undead retinue discover [[Richten Haus]] and claim it for their own.<ref name="[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decade n1">[[Bleak House: Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]] p.16 says two decades after her death but[[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 3 says one decade</ref> 

{{Spec|726 BC - Dr. Van Richten visits [[Sanguinia]] with [[George Weathermay]] and [[Arametrius]]; they meet [[Claudia DeShanes]]; Claudia becomes Rudolph’s assistant, and it seems he had certain unspoken feelings for her.}}<ref>Speculation from JWM Timeline p.28: "Since Arametrius is probably [[Athasian]], Van Richten may have recently visited [[Kalidnay]] and encountered [[Ahmose Tanit]]. [VRGtG pg. 73. This is the earliest possible date for this event (due to George’s inclusion, and we know from this source and BH that VR starts hunting ghosts one year after this event. That leaves only 9 years between VR starting to hunt and writing his Guide on the subject. I chose to go with this date to keep as wide a margin of opportunity as possible.]"</ref>
 

[[727 BC]] - [[Merilee Markuza]], the Child [[Vampire]], kills Claudia. Van Richten pursues the creature relentlessly, but loses her in [[Lamordia]].<ref name="Darklords p. 63">[[Darklords]] p. 63</ref>

727 BC - While hunting the Child Vampire, Van Richten witnesses the [[Thundering Carriage]]; Van Richten decides he must put an end to these ghostly horrors, too.<ref name="Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts p. 6">[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 6</ref>

[[728 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten defeats the [[Phantom Army]].<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]] p. 91</ref>

[[729 BC]] - The fiend [[Elsepeth]] enters Ravenloft via [[transposition]] in a small village outside [[Stangengrad]], near the [[Grashen Falls]] (sept)<ref>[[JWM Timeline]] p.28: "[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] pg. 14: the diary is dated “twelve years ago.”</ref>

[[730 BC]] - {{Spec|[[Gedlan Ironheart]] killed while battling evil spirits.}}<ref>[[JWM Timeline]]: "VRGtG pg. 23: Gedlan is referred to as “Geddar” in this book. The date is an estimate based on the 727-736 available time span."</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] leaves [[Borca]], having lurked there for years.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]] p. 66</ref>

[[732 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] writes to Van Richten about the death of Madren’s sister.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6</ref>
 

{{Spec|[[734 BC]] - [[Antonin Madren]] shows up on Van Richten's doorstep, and gives the good doctor his notes; Dr. Van Richten starts hunting the [[Created]].}}<ref>JWM Timeline p. 30: "VRGttC pg. 6: Estimate. “Years” after Madren wrote about his sister’s death"</ref> 

[[735 BC] - Dr. Van Richten is forced to kill his old friend [[Shauten]] in self-defense, when Shauten tries to sacrifice Rudolph in a bid for [[lichdom]]<ref name="VRMHCII p. 102">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium II]] p. 102</ref><ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>. {{Spec|This "near-miss" may have inspired Van Richten to start recording his collected knowledge for heroes to come.}}<ref>JWM Timeline: "Speculation based on [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 6"</ref>

735 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]''.<ref name="RLCS p.18">[[Ravenloft Third Edition]] p.18</ref><ref name="RLPHB p.20">[[Ravenloft Player's Handbook]] p.20</ref>

[[736 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]''.

[[737 BC]] - The [[Vistana]] [[Cyrilla]]'s niece [[Vassa]] is [[kidnapped]] near [[Corvia]].<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 20: The golem appeared “the following year” after Vaasa’s soul is taken."</ref>

737 BC - [[Vassa]] returns as a [[clay golem]]; Cyrilla writes to Dr. Van Richten.<ref>JWM Timeline points to [[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]] p. 19 "just last year"</ref>

737 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Lich]]''.

[[738 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]''.

[[738 BC]] [[Emil Bollenbach]] engineers the [[kidnapping]] of Dr. Rudolph van Richten to the end of seizing his [[brain]] for [[transplantation]] into a super-golem. fortunately, several of Van Richten's friends intercede to thwart Dr. Bollenbach.<ref>JWM Timeline p. 33: "[[Children of the Night: The Created]] pg. 50; CT pg. 32 places this adventure 8 years after Emil’s disappearance (i.e., 746), but the dating used in CotN:C fits VR’s chronology better.</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Elsepeth]] goes to [[Nartok]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 67-68">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.67-68</ref>

[[739 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten and the adventuring band known as [[the Hand (Adventurer Band)|the Hand]] hunt and destroy [[the Gibbering Golem]].<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 265-276">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.265-276</ref>

[[739 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]] publishes ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Created]]''. This act earns him considerable ire from [[Agatha Clairmont]], whom sees it as an instruction manual to building [[dread golem]]s just much as it is hunting them.<ref name="Van Richten's Arsenal p. 149">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]] p. 149</ref>

[[740 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead]]'' (early spring).

740 BC - Dr. Van Richten inherits the [[library (Aimon Davidovitch)]] of [[Aimon Davidovitch]]. Dr. Van Richten starts studying tomes. (Sept)<ref>JWM Timeline p. 35 "Extrapolated from VRGtF pg. 4"</ref>

[[741 BC]] - [[Dr. Rudolph van Richten]], [[Davvyd]], [[Samuel]] and [[Dr. Ottelie Farringer]] battle the fiend [[Drigor]]. Only Dr. van Richten survives. (Feb.)<ref name="VRMHCIII p. 79-85">[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p. 79-85</ref>

741 BC - Dr. Van Richten publishes the ''[[Van Richten's Guide to Fiends]]''.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to Demons (Book)]] p.4</ref>

741 BC - [[Van Richten]] stumbles into the clutches of [[the nameless Amnizu]] and [[the nameless Barbazu]] infesting [[Chateaufaux]]. He is captured. However, he manages to join with some [[adventurer]]s to route the [[devil]]s from the town.<ref>[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium III]] p.72-73; Note that the encounter with these [[fiend]]s doesn't appear in the original uncompiled Van Richten's Guide to Fiends. Therefore, the encounter with the [[Fiends of Chateaufaux]] took place after took place after the first VRGtF was published.</ref><ref>[[Gazetteer III]] p.30-31, "just over 15 years ago"</ref>

741 BC<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> - Dr. Van Richten is [[depressed]]; he consults with the [[diviner]], [[Inarin Alster]]; Rudolph realizes he had been laboring under a [[curse]] all these years; Dr. Van Richten spends a year with [[Arturi Radanavich]] studying the Vistani.<ref>[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]] p.5-7; 87-89</ref>

[[742 BC]] - Dr. Van Richten writes his ''[[Van Richten's Guide to the Vistani]]'' and retires.<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref> (Oct.)

[[750 BC]] - Dr. Rudolph Van Richten dies in [[Richten Haus|Bleak House]] in the fight against [[Madame Radanavich]]<ref>[[Domains of Dread]] p. 17, as told in [[Bleak House]], particularly [[Bleak House: Homecoming]] p. 58-63</ref> Meanwhile, all that is known to most, including the [[Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]] is that he [[disappeared]].<ref name="VRA p. 6">[[Van Richten's Arsenal]], p. 6</ref>

{{ref}}

[[category:Character]] [[category:NPC]]
[[category:2nd Edition Character]]
[[category:3rd Edition Character]]
[[category:4th Edition Character]]
[[category:5th Edition Character]]
[[category:Abused]]
[[category:Betrayed]]
[[Category:Cursed]]
[[category:Cursed by the Vistani]]
[[Category:Darkonian]]
[[Category:Demonologist]]
[[category:Energy Drained]]
[[Category:Filicide]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Rivalis]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Nartok]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Forest of Shadows]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Darkon]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordentshire]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Mordent]]
[[Category:Former Patients of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of the Asylum for the Mentally Disturbed]]
[[Category:Former Inhabitants of Dominia]]
[[Category:Former Medical Student]]
[[Category:Former Student of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[category:Gaslighted]]
[[category:Giogoto]]
[[Category:Ghost]]
[[Category:Graduate of the University of Il Aluk]]
[[Category:Graduate]]
[[Category:Herbalist]]
[[Category:Human]]
[[category:healer]]
[[category:Hero]]
[[Category:Hunter Of Monsters]]
[[Category:Inhabitants of Richten Haus]]
[[category:Intellectual]]
[[Category:Kidnapped]]
[[category:Killer]]
[[category:Lorist]]
[[Category:Male]]
[[category:Mass Murderer]]
[[category:Medical Doctor]]
[[category:Medical Professional]]
[[category:Mentor]]
[[category:Murderer]]
[[Category:Necrologist]]
[[category:Old]]
[[Category:Planar Mechanic]]
[[category:Polymath]]
[[category:Posthumous Character]]
[[category:Potential Darklord]]
[[Category:Proprietor]]
[[category:Professional Killer]]
[[category:Punished]]
[[category:Ravenloft Lorist]]
[[Category:Ravenloft Loremaster]]
[[category:Redeemed]]
[[category:Reformed]]
[[category:Repentant]]
[[category:Researcher]]
[[category:Retired]]
[[Category:Rogue]]
[[category:Sage]]
[[category:Seduced]]
[[Category:Stasis]]
[[category:Tempted]]
[[category:Transgressed]]
[[category:Transgressor]]
[[Category:Van Richten Family]]
[[category:Victim of Medical Malpractice]]
[[Category:Victim of the van Richten Curse]]
[[category:Victimized]]
[[Category:Widowed]]
[[Category:writer]]
[[category:Births in 671 BC]]
[[category:Deaths in 750 BC]]
<references/>

==Data from the Ravenloft Catalogue==



{|
|-valign="top"
|[[Image:rldb_npc.jpg]]
|[[Image:rldb_primary.gif]]
|
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' 
''[[Bleak House]]''
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_art.gif]]
|
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - p4 
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - cover, p4 
''[[Bleak House:Homecoming]]'' - p4,p16 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - p7,8 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p92 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - p114 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 5,11 
''[[The Created]]'' - p13 
''[[Van Richten's Arsenal]]'' - p5
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_stats.gif]]
|
''[[Bleak House:Heroes, Monsters, and Settings]]'' - pp4-5 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - p91 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - p 3
|-valign="top"
|
|[[Image:rldb_desc.gif]]
|
''[[Ravenloft Third Edition]]'' - pp14,17-18,27,176 
''[[Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendium I]]'' - throughout 
''[[Bleak House]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to The Created]]'' - throughout 
''[[Dungeon #55: The Seawolf]]'' 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Ghosts]]'' - throughout 
''[[Van Richten's Guide to Vampires]]'' - throughout 
''[[Ravenloft Campaign Setting:Domains and Denizens]]'' - pp91-93 
''[[Tales of Ravenloft: The Crucible of Dr. Rudolph van Richten]]'' - pp1-17 
''[[Realm of Terror]]'' - pp114-115 
''[[Chilling Tales]]'' - pp 2-3 
''[[Heroes of Light]]'' - p64 
''[[I, Strahd, The War Against Azalin]]'' - pp1-4, pp9-13, pp304-310
|-valign="top"
|}