PDA

View Full Version : Ravenloft: best domain for this?



Farastu
2013-07-09, 12:04 AM
I'm considering running a few sessions (well probably just a few sessions) that take place in the Ravenloft setting. The characters are going to be brought in from other worlds, and particularly from ones with a great amount of racial diversity. Some of them will be considered monsters in Ravenloft because they are so strange, and few if anyone will really know what they are. The humans that are in the group should be considered guilty by association with them. So I need a good domain to throw them in where it would really make sense that the populace will assume they are dangerous monsters and respond accordingly.

LibraryOgre
2013-07-09, 12:46 AM
Most of them, though I have a soft spot for Barovia.

Mordar
2013-07-09, 12:46 PM
It has been a long while since I was deep in Ravenloft...but the one that immediately occurred to me was the wererat domain (was that Richemulot?) since it had such a focus on human-vaneer-over-monstrous-truth. Presenting "monsters" with their differences clearly exposed for all to see as a natural targets/outlets for the Richemulot humans (that can't act against the lycanthropes that rule their world) to vent their frustration could give you exactly what you want.

A quick review via googology indicates that Richemulot is egalitarian from a social-class perspective, and that the racial profile is 93% human, 5% halfling with the rest half-vistani. Easy enough to handwave the halflings as outcasts, confined to the ghettos, and bingo-bango, racial profiling is ready to go.

- M

Farastu
2013-07-09, 02:08 PM
Ah, I do like the wererat domain.

Barovia would be a good one too, and it really is the sort of place that immediately comes to mind when I picture Ravenloft. However I like that Richemulot is this very cultured, civilized seeming sort of place, but that I could play up the people as being deeply frustrated underneath that all, like a powder keg just ready to blow. Looking it up, the thing about the vacant buildings, if I do it just right they could be played up in such a way that it is a bit unsettling as well.

Velaryon
2013-07-09, 05:13 PM
It kind of depends on how strong of a reaction you want. Are you looking for "The PCs aren't trusted and people are reluctant to help them very much, or "Townspeople shut their doors and bar their windows," or "Mob wielding pitchforks and torches tries to burn them at the stake?"

If the first, Richemulot is good. Perhaps some of the neighboring places like Dementlieu, Mordent, or even Falkovnia might work as well. For the second, you probably can't beat Barovia. For the third, Tepest or maybe Nova Vaasa.

Farastu
2013-07-11, 12:10 AM
A scenario where they end up being hunted by a monster hunter or group of monster hunters (maybe after initially being chased by peasants with torches and pitchforks) is one option I've considered. They could potentially have to choose whether they will really become the monsters everyone thinks they are in order to survive.

But I'm not 100% set on a specific situation just yet.

Another possibility (which is really a totally different one from the former idea, though I suppose one could lead to the other in some way) is to setup situations that will lead to the players doing terrible things, possibly without even immediately realizing fully the horror they've quite directly managed to involve themselves in. I suppose there's really many different directions I could run with it.

Kish
2013-07-11, 10:01 AM
Most would work. Not Darkon, not Sithicus, not anywhere where monsters are in open control (Verbrek, Bluetspur, the Shadow Rift). The obvious choices would be Tepest (with its inquisition) or Falkovnia (with its particularly severe racism).

Ionbound
2013-07-11, 06:52 PM
I dunno, Verbeck could be pretty effective. I can imagine them walking up to a farm and the farmer comes out with some kind of improvised weapon telling them to go away. Once they talk their way in, they realize his wife and child were hiding in a cellar.

Jeff the Green
2013-07-13, 02:53 AM
Ahem. (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=241333)

Yes, Barovia works well for this.

Farastu
2013-07-13, 01:01 PM
That game's gone on for quite a while, but the concept (from what I could gather) is similar at least in that there's various different species from different worlds all drawn there. I don't plan to have mine last nearly that long, but I'll look through it a little more in case it gives me some ideas.