Nova Vaasa

		Ravenloft Third Edition Domains of Dread The Awakening
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		Secrets of the Dread Realms - pp8-9 Ravenloft Third Edition - inside cover Domains of Dread - p43 The Awakening - inside front cover Ravenloft Campaign Setting - poster map Realm of Terror - poster map Servants of Darkness - poster map

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MCS' depiction of Nova Vaasa

Flora & Fauna

Nova Vaasa is host to several species of monsters unknown elsewhere and closely related, symbolically at least, to horses. They include the tragic Doedrideres, a marriage of horse and rider in undeath, the foul Hestdrikkers, which feed on the blood of horses, vicious Hestskærere, which slit open the stomachs of horses and crawl inside, and treacherous Niksiees, which captivate with their beauty before carrying off and drowning their rider.

Things, Creatures & Personnages of Legend

The Bad Wind

The Black Duke

The Furies

The Centaur

The Mud Monster

The Red Bride of Nova Vaasa

Geography

Arbora

Bergovitsa

The Nocturnal Sea

The Mists: They are the end of the world beyond Arbora and are shunned.

The Bleak Road: This Mistway to Vorostokov (moderate reliability, two way) is little known as such. But those daring the Mists beyond Arbora may stumble upon it. [VRGttM pg. 69]

The Serpent’s Coils: This Mistway to Paridon (moderate reliability, two way) is little known as such. But those living in Eastern Nova Vaasa have noticed a corellation between disappearances and individuals being out on foggy nights during the dark of the moon. [VRGttM pg. 70-71]

Temporal Rulers

BC

• ? Zaanji (or Juungi) Højplads (“Highly Seated” or “Well Mounted”) – unifier of the Vaasan nation, empire builder with the assistance of the Lawgiver and his hordes from the Hell of Slaves, Eternal King, and founder of the Cycle of Stewarts, [GV pg. 21-22, 30]

• ? Sainted Prince Gorkyn – breaker of the false religions, breaker of the Cycle of Stewarts, self-proclaimed and recognised leader of the Church of the Lawgiver as its Himmelsk Naeve (“Divine Fist”), leader of the unsuccessful Wars of Conversion [GV pg. 21-22]

• ? Sainted Prince Jokum Rivtoff the Pacifier – restorer of the Cycle of Stewarts, 10 year prince and 25 year regent [GV pg. 23]

• 664-668 Patriarch of the Vistin family [Deduction]

• 669-671 Prince Romir Hiregaard ( - 671) [GV pg. 33]

• 671-673 Prince Tristen Hiregaard (660 -) / Regent Sergei Hiregaard [GV pg. 33]

• 674-678 Patriarch of the Chekiv family

• 679-682/683 Prince Ingemar Bolshnik (-682/683) [GV pg. 23]

• 682/683-683 Prince Kethmar Bolshnik (671 - 729) [GV pg. 23]

• 684-688 Patriarch of the Rivtoff family [Deduction]

• 689-683 Prince Bevis Vistin ( -756) [Probable speculation based on GV pg. 34]

• 694-698 Prince Tristen Hiregaard (600 - ) [GV pg. 33]

• 699-703 Patriarch of the Chekiv family [Deduction]

• 704-708 Prince Kethmar Bolshnik (671 - 729) [Deduction]

• 709-713 Prince Søren Rivtoff / Regent Lord Adal Keirin [Probable speculation based on GV pg. 34]

• 714-718 Prince Bevis Vistin ( -756) [Probable speculation based on GV pg. 34]

• 719-723 Prince Tristen Hiregaard (660 - ) [GV pg. 33]

• 724-728 Deceased father of Tunch Chekiv [Speculation based on GV pg. 37]

• 728-729 Prince Kethmar Bolshnik (671 - 729) [GV pg. 155]

• 729-733 Prince Othmar Bolshnik (708 - ) / Regent Tristen Hiregaard (660 - ) [GV pg. 32, 33, 149-151]

• 733-present Prince Othmar Bolshnik (708 - ) [GV pg. 23, 33, 149-151]

Spiritual Rulers

BC

• ? Sainted Prince Gorkyn - first Himmelsk Naeve (“Divine Fist”) [GV pg. 22]

• ? Princes recognised as Himmelsk Naeves - three subsequent to Gorkyn [GV pg. 23]

• ?-present Himmelsk Naeve Pieter Jergaar – cleric

Note: It is unclear whether Pieter Jergaar himself or his predecessor initiated the policy of supporting the ambitions of Othmar Bolshnik

Gods

Gods - Focus - Domains

Lawgiver - Domination - Binding, Evil, Law, Scrutiny, War [GV pg. 128]

Mytteri - Rebellion, Nihilism, Hedonism - Chaos, Destruction, Evil, Liberation, Magic [speculation based on GV pg. 126-127]

Bubahkaa - Cats - Animals, Trickery [speculation based on GV pg. 23]

Sehkmaa - Cats - Animals, Luck, Liberation [speculation based on GV pg. 23]

Cat Lord - Paka - Chaos, Evil, Trickery [DD pg. 112]

Tygas -Horses - Animals, Travel [speculation based on GV pg. 23]

Fjodor, Hero Cult [GV pg. 23]

Fyldor, Hero Cult [GV pg. 23]

Chronology

BC

• Kingdom of Vaasa: Centuries ago Persarval Hiregaard seizes the cat’s paw (a minor artefact) from cat cultists who had themselves acquired it following its loss by the Paka. [LoB pg. 85]

• 660 Kingdom of Vaasa: Tristen Hiregaard is born. [The given date of 664 is inconsistent with him being 11 when his father commits suicide in 671 and with the 11 years between his first love and the formation of Nova Vaasa; see GV pg. 33, 154-155]

• 670 Kingdom of Vaasa: Prince Romir Hiregaard, father of Tristen, kills his wife in an unjustified fit of jealous rage and is cursed by her to kill any woman he loves. (Tristen is ten.) [GV pg. 155]

• 671 Kingdom of Vaasa: Prince Romir Hiregaard commits suicide, his son Tristen Hiregaard becomes prince at the age of 11, Sergei Hiregaard is regent, and the curse jumps to Tristen. [GV pg. 155]

• 674 Tristen Hiregaard and Sergei Hiregaard step down and the Patriarch of the Chekiv family becomes prince. [Deduction]

• 676 The curse lays dormant for five years until Lord Tristen Hiregaard falls in love with a peasant girl, kisses her, and kills her. The crime is covered up, Tristen is remorseful, but enjoyed the deed in the moment. [GV pg. 155]

• 677-682 Lord Tristen Hiregaard kills a total of nine women over the next six years, doubts his sanity, and decides to commit suicide, but the Mists intervene. [GV pg. 155]

• 682 In the Second Judgement of the Lawgiver, the Vaasans are wrenched from the Faldverden (“Fallen World”) into the Falskverden (“False World”). Nova Vaasa emerges from the Mists. [GV pg. 125-126]

• 682 Prince Ingemar Bolshnik describes the appearance of Barovia, Arak, the Nightmare Lands, and the Mists upon the frontiers of his land with the words: “howling fear to the west, stone death to the north, shapeless nightmares to the east, and nothing but ominous swirling to the south”. (Winter) [GV pg. 23]

• 682 The Clever Gray Malken tavern hosts the first murder of the Signature Killer. [GV pg. 38]
• 682 or 683 Prince Ingemar Bolshnik dies in office and is replaced by his son Prince Kethmar Bolshnik.[GV pg. 23]

• 682-700 A man lures nearly a score of his neighbours into his home to see his arcane fireplace which burns without wood. It explodes consuming them all and the house too. The dangerous arcane essence that lingers afterwards in the ashes is extinguished by a priest of the Lawgiver. [This story is recounted frequently by clergy of the Lawgiver in Nova Vaasa and its time and place varies. It may be but a cautionary tale devised to slander arcane magic and promote its betrayal to the authorities before something bad happens; VRGttM pg. 61]

• 683 Tristen Hiregaard is knighted by Prince Kethmar Bolshnik and the men become friends. [GV pg. 155]

• 683 Sir Tristen Hiregaard becomes an officer of the Kantora City Guard and begins the hunt for the Signature Killer. He will rise to be the Constable of the guard by 717 at the latest. Malken will murder his first wife, Ailsa, and child, Ivaar. The tortured spirt of Ivaar may survive as a ghost in a haunted Kantora orphanage. [GV pg. 23, 155, ANtVRGttM]

• 685 Armand Ironhand (Sir Armand Rivtoff) confronts and is put to flight by the Black Duke, the fiendish leader of a cult (The Brotherhood of the Whip) responsible for the destruction of the village of Drataan in the Ehrendton. [GV pg. 42]

• 685-700 The gathering cloth is woven by Welse in Arbora using silk supplied by an Abber Nomad. It brings doom to his family and in short order passes out of Nova Vaasa. [This cannot happen before trading relations are well established with the Abber Nomads and must occure well before 700 according to Mangrum; ToR pg. 252]

• 691 Tepest emerges from the Mists. The event is marked in that land by deformity and crop failure. [GV pg. 54]

• 691-692 Tepestani famine is relieved by assistance from Sir Tristen Hiregaard in particular. (Winter - Spring) [GV pg. 54]

• 694-698 Sir Tristen Hiergaard serves as prince.

• 695 Sir Armand Rivtoff publishes The Beast of Ehrendton. It is widely acclaimed, although as fiction and (by some) as political commentary.. [GV pg. 42]

• 698 Markovia is born and the Dyskov forest is effectively put off limits for four decades. [GV pg. 14]

• 702 H’Genna appears. [RCS pg. 17]

• 705 A band of wererats devastates the population and provokes the abandonment of a village in Northern Nova Vaasa named Mel Fira. [The event happens several decades before the publication of Van Ritchen’s Guide to Werebeasts in 735; VRGtW]

• 703-721 Katya Chekiv, the unloved second wife of Tristen Hiregaard, gives birth to three sons some time within this period. The oldest is Yorgi, next is Sasha, and the youngest is Myar. All three are middle-aged in 756 BC. [Middle-aged is assumed to be not younger than 35 and not older than 53. It is best to assume that Katya was very young, say 15, when she gave birth to her first son. This way she is not older than 60 but not younger than 43 when she dies giving birth to her fourth son in 748 BC; seeGV pg. 155, SoDR pg. 46]

• 708 Othmar Bolshnik is born the second son of Kethmar Bolshnik. [GV pg. 149]

• 713 The council elders of Briggdarrow in Tepest convince Falkovian investors to fund the construction of The Spider House inn to profit from and to bolster burgeoning traffic between Nova Vaasa and Falkovnia. [GV pg. 77, 79]

• 714 Hazlan appears and is converted rapidly the faith of the Lawgiver. The relatively benign reputation of the Skyggeskov forest is retained. [RCS pg. 14, 17, GV pg. 126]

• 717 The cult of the Claws of Sehkmaa sees the light of day. It is led by the high priest Malken and its message of easing poverty and reversing disenfranshisement proves popular. The Church of the Lawgiver is strangely disarmed before the threat. Sir Tristen Hiregaard unmasks the new religion as a criminal organisation, breaks its back, and is widely thought to have slain its high priest. He pays for his meddling with the life of his son Ivaar. [GV pg. 23-24]

• 719-723 Sir Tristen Hiregaard serves as prince. [GV pg. 33]

• 720 Trade tops out along the Old Timori Road joining the Eastern and Western Core across Tepest and G’Henna. [GV pg. 55]

• 720-726 Talgaard Bolshnik, older brother of Othmar and victim of a long-standing mental illness, begins his six year reign of terror as the Kantora Strangler. It is ended with his institutionalisation in the Clinic of the Mentally Distressed outside Egertus as the first patient of alienist Dr. Gregorian Illhousen. [GV pg. 155]

• 720-743 Yorgi discovers the cats paw in the secret compartment of a wardrobe and makes use of it during his youthful adventures until attacked by Paka. [The youthful adventures can begin anywhere between 720 and 738 depending on when Yorgi is deemed to have been born; LoB pg. 85]

• 722 A diseased, maimed and crippled foreigner is found dead within sight of Arbora and the Nocturnal Sea. Behind him, stretching back to the frontier with Barovia, he leaves a half-dozen people miraculously cured of their aliments. [Any date from 700 is possible; BoSor pg. 55-57]

• 728 Gerald Ferrier, a Falkovnian, opens the Hawk’s Haven Inn in Kellee to profit from and to bolster traffic between Nova Vaasa and Falkovnia along the Old Timori Road. [GV pg. 55, 72]

• 728 Lukas Durmke is born in a hamlet in the Ehrendton north of Egertus. [BoSec pg. 112]

• 728 A cell of the Order of Twilight, dedicated to the study of dreams, is established in Nova Vaasa. [This can be anytime after 725 and probably best before 740; BoSha pg. 86-88]

• 728 or 729 Othmar Bolshnik begins poisoning his father with tiny doses of a substance supplied by the Vistani outcast and bandit leader Chezna the Blood-cat. [GV pg. 150]

• 729 Prince Kethmar Bolshnik dies in office, but not before consulting with the other great families and devising a regency for his 21 year old son. [GV pg. 32-33, 149-151]

• 729-733 Othmar Bolshnik becomes prince, Tristen Hiregaard becomes regent, the latter runs the government and the former prepares his revenge. [GV pg. 149-151]

• 730 A vampire slays the best friend of a man known only as Mader. Mader pursues the creature out of Nova Vaasa to Levkarest where it is slain with the help of Ronald Kranston. The pair subsequently found the society of the Huntsmen in 733. [BoSha pg. 79]

• 733 Regent Tristen Hiregaard steps down. Prince Othmar Bolshnik breaks the Cycle of Stewarts by refusing to do the same. He defends his cause by insisting that he has been cheated out of his turn. Normally regency is for children and ends at age 16. Bribes to the Kantora City Guard and especially to the Church of the Lawgiver (its Himmelsk Naeve issues a supportive decree) prove decisive. [GV pg. 33, 149-151]

• 733 Prince Othmar reaches secret understandings with Malken and with the bandits, offering them a measure of protection from legal authorities in return for gold. Malken contacts the bandits, including Chezna the Blood-cat, to compile evidence that might be used to blackmail Othmar should the need ever arise. [GV pg. 150]

• 733 Prince Othmar begins the formation of a personal police force called the Straffers with extrajudicial powers. At the insistence of the other great families, they are limited to Bolshnik territory and Kantora. They have the curious effect of reducing random attacks by creatures of the night but increasing the number of attacks with political undertones by these same creatures. [GV pg. 32, ANtVRGttM]

• 737 Prince Othmar appoints the uncorruptible Sturm Androv, endorsed by Tristen Hiregaard, Constable of the Kantora City Guard. [BoSec pg. 111-112]

• 738 Prince Othmar commissions paintings and sculptures of himself bearing the Whip of Right and the Rod of Might (devices of the Eternal King Højplads) eliminating all doubt as to his pretensions. [GV pg. 30]

• 738 Sulo Boristi, brother of Ivana Boristi, relocates his family from Borca to Bergovista shortly before the Great Upheaval and continues the expansion of the Boristi Trading Company. The appearance of the Nocturnal Sea will prove a particular boon to him and a Boristi trade ship will eventually ply its waters. [LoB pg. 12]

• 740 The Great Upheaval, ending with the first full moon in August, shakes the foundations of known existence. The Lawgiver goes silent, spawning the heresy that he died. The official account is that he was preoccupied with saving the world from Mytteri, god of rebellion, nihilism, self-interest, self-gratification and magic. The Nightmare Lands, Markovia and G’Henna disappear and are replaced by the Shadow Rift and the Nocturnal Sea. The rift severs the trade route to the West and the mist shrouded sea proves to be nigh unnavigable. A thin corridor of land between the Mountains of Misery and the new coast permits the development of overland trade with Darkon however. [GV pg. 14, 55, 36-37, 126-128]

• 741 Othmar tries and fails to have Chezna the Blood-cat silenced for all eternity. The Vistani outcast and bandit leader replies with a reign of terror. She is, however, driven out of her base in Briarweed Forest and obliged to roam the land. [GV pg. 15, 150]

• 741 Disappearances and madness plague the workers of the quarries in the Koshka Bluffs after the discovery of ancient tombs. Sir Tristen Hiregaard forbids the removal of treasures and scales back the quarrying. [GV pg. 16]

• 741 The first trial of the Tepestani Inquisition is organised by Wyan of Viktal. Foreigners are accused of consorting with the Fey and what little trade remains pretty much dries up West of Kellee. In Kellee Gerald Ferrier succeeds in maintaining a degree of calm. He seeks the assistance of the Church of the Lawgiver to fight back the superstition of the masses. [GV pg. 55-56]

• 741 Narana Hiregaard is born. She is the youngest, by over 10 years, of 5 (or more) children (at least 3 girls and at least 2 boys) of Sasha Hiregaard. If Sasha has only 5 children he is not more than 33 and not less than 21 at the time. [GV pg. 155, SoDR pg. 46, LoB pg. 142]

• 741 Lumbering in the Dyskov forest resumes but tales of the sortvingebute (“black fairies”) and of the Centaur soon enter into circulation. Disappearances are attributed to the former and half-eaten corpses to the latter. [GV pg. 15]

• 743 Prince Othmar dispenses with the seals of the five great families and mints money in his own image. [GV pg. 30]

• 743 Lukas Durmke is driven from a temple of the Lawgiver and subsequently from the city of Egertus for spouting heresy. [BoSec pg. 112]

• 746-747 Malken is credited with the murders of men in Kantora is followed by the murders of men on the eve of their weddings in Egertus. The true culprit is Emily, a patient of Dr. Gregorian Illhousen who is murdering in her dreams. [BoSha pg. 69]

• 748 Sir Tristen Hiregaard discovers to his horror that he is Malken. During his fits of madness, when he has himself locked away in a tower, he transforms into his nemesis and sets out to sow evil and chaos across the land. [GV pg. 156]

• 748 Katya Chekiv, the unloved second wife of Tristen Hiregaard, dies giving birth to their fourth son Mikhail. [GV pg. 155, SoDR pg. 46]

• 749 The patients, including Talgaard Bolshnik, and the physicians, including Dr. Gregorian Illhousen, of the Clinic of the Mentally Distressed outside of Egertus vanish without a trace. [GV pg. 41]

• 750 The Mists roll back from the Nocturnal Sea opening it to navigation and revealing its islands. Commerce begins in earnest. [RCS pg. 18]

• 750 Babetta l’Jeunese, an explorer from Dementlieu, alone lives to tell the tale of an encounter with the sorceress of the Isle of Ravens but at the price of being sent back to Egertus in a skiff bearing a sentient sword that is the stuff of nightmare. It passes out of her possession within hours of her reaching Nova Vaasa. [BoSac pg. 155-156]

• 751 The Tepestani Inquisition falters as the daughter of Wyan of Viktal is revealed to have fallen under the influence of the Fey who were manipulating her to orchestrate the burning at the stake of an innocent girl. [GV pg. 56]

• 752 Kiev Hiregaard, son of Sasha Hiregaard, goes to Falkovnia to assist the struggle against its military dictatorship. [Geographically this would make more sense before the Great Upheaval. But in terms of age that is unlikely, hence just after Vlad Drakov’s fourth futile and ruinous invasion of Darkon; LoB pg. 78]

• 753 Sasha Hiregaard and his daughter Naranna visit Egertus and see the newly expanded port. [LoB pg. 142]

• 753 Prince Othmar begins sitting in the Great Blackstone Throne (reserved to the Eternal King Højplads) nearly provoking a revolt by the Rivtoff and Vistin families and necessitating the intervention of the Himmelsk Naeve to legitimise the act. [GV pg. 30]

• 754 Paka, and not for the first time, attempt to steal the cat’s paw from Castle Faerhaven in the days immediately following its use. Sir Tristen Hiregaard captures and questions one, but learns nothing, and his conditional offer to surrender the item goes unanswered. [LoB pg. 85]

• 754 Lukas Durmke settles in Arbora and leads a movement within the church of the Lawgiver that would have the spiritual and temporal authorities assist rather than oppress the masses. [The Aerkebiskop of the Pommel appears to be fragrantly shirking his duty and may have to be replaced by someone with more iron in the belly ; The BoSec pg. 112, GV pg. 38]

• 755 The Avener’s Distinct of Bergovitsa becomes the haunt of a creature of mud. [speculation based on VRGttM pg. 60, 156, ANtVRGttM]

• 755 Illyana Hiregaard, daughter of Sasha Hiregaard, marries a Darkonese merchant living in Kantora. [LoB pg. 86]

• 755 The seaside hamlet of Mavalga is driven mad by the Bad Wind. The scope of the attack is somewhat blunted by the efforts of a Borcan aristocrat named Josef Zhitoff who captains the Bulwark and who has been hunting the Bad Wind for the last year. There are unconfirmed rumours of subsequent attacks along the coast of the Nocturnal Sea. [Unless there is a way for a ship to pass from the Sea of Sorrows to the Nocturnal Sea this should not happen before 751 and probably somewhat later; CoTN:F pg. 24-29]

• 756 Bevis Rivtoff dies leaving his two year old son Grigor duke and his wife Lady Lara regent. [GV pg. 34]

• 756- Repeated Nova Vaasan attempts to cut a road North through Tepest to ultimately join the Strigos road in Darkon fail. [GV pg. 37]

• 756 The newly wedded wife of Gerald Ferrier is murdered by a shapeshifter. Wyan of Viktal accuses the Fey of this new and unprovoked atrocity. The Ferrier family harbour different suspicions. (late Fall) [GV pg. 56]

• 756 The Tepestani Inquisition rediscovers its lost vigour and is resisted less strenuously than before in Kellee by Gerald Ferrier. [GV pg. 56]

• 758 A build up of royal forces within easy reach of the Tepestani border is interpreted variously as a warning to the Tepestani to stop sabotaging the road or as a prelude to an invasion to civilise the domain by force. [GV pg. 37]

• 757 Stepan Ivan Hiregaard, eldest grandson of Tristen Hiregaard, replaces Sturm Androv and becomes chief constable of Kantora. He begins to investigate quietly rumours that Malken is the half-brother of his grandfather and was responsible for the deaths in mysterious circumstances of his great grandfather and great grandmother. [LoB pg. 75-76, 78, 86]

• 758 Illyana Hiregaard is institutionalised at the recently reopened Clinic of the Mentally Distressed outside of Egertus and kills an orderly. There are rumours that she is Malken. [If one ascribes to the Dread Possibility that the clinic serves once a month as a Mistway to the Nightmare Lands, then the doctors and the patients vanish once more; GV pg. 41, LoB pg. 86]

• 758 Naranna Hiregaard is to lead the crew of the Waveprowler, an effort sponsored by her family to fight the growing piracy on the Nocturnal Sea. The ship is to be captained by Onid Rhelarian. [LoB pg. 78, 143]

• 758 An agent of Azalin known as S interviews Sir Tristen Hiregaard and finds him to be “smug and self-satisfied” and unforthcoming about his struggle with Malken. (Fall) [GV pg. 43]

WIKISEED FROM CATALOGUE : Ruled by Prince Othmar Bolshnik(Please edit freely, then remove this note and WIKISEED label)

WIKISEED FROM CATALOGUE : Lord is Sir Tristen Hiregaard/Malken(Please edit freely, then remove this note and WIKISEED label)