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Dungeons and Dragons 5th Edition – A Return to Ravenloft

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RavenloftHello Nerdarchists and RPG enthusiasts.  I am sure by now you have heard the wonderful new of the release of the Curse of Strahd.  Players get to be sucked into the evil world of Ravenloft and forced to contend with the evil power that is Count Strahd von Zarovich.  You can read the full article here.

Will You Descend in Ravenloft and Deal with Strahd?

Here is an excerpt.  “Heroes from the Forgotten Realms and other D&D worlds can easily be drawn into Strahd’s cursed land. Once there, they must contend with the horrors of Barovia. Its people are melancholy, misshapen and grotesque, living in fear of the wolves and other creatures that serve Strahd’s evil will.

The only hope for the trapped adventurers is to heed the warnings of a mysterious fortune-teller named Madam Eva. Drawing random cards from her tarroka deck, she directs adventurers to search Strahd’s domain for artifacts and allies to help the master of Castle Ravenloft. That is, before he orchestrates your Strahddemise for his amusement and feasts on your terror.”

I have been playing Dungeons and Dragons for over 20 years.  So it is only natural that at some point my character has been pulled into Ravenloft.  Many years ago we played a game that did quite a bit of plane hopping and we spent some time in Ravenloft.

You can also have this cool bit of info. “While waiting for the adventure, experience the power of Madam Eva for yourself each day. Head to Twitter and retweet the official @Wizards_DnD Twitter account using the hashtag #DNDFortune. Madam Eva’s fortunes are based on which random card she draws from her tarokka deck and displays for each reading. Check back each day with Madam Eva to see what your #DNDFortune will foretell.”

If that is not enough for you the same company that produced the Spell cards for 5th edition, Gale Force 9, are releasing a physical Tarokka Deck to increase your immersion into the land of mists.  Dungeons and Dragons

So now on to speculation.  The articles I have read talking about this show that it is expected to be 224 pages, most of which will be the adventure.  Nerdarchy rarely runs pre-printed adventures, preferring to write our own.  So will there be any new spells.  In a land full of necromancy I should hope so.  Will there be some new monsters or undead to send against your players, I would think this would be a must.

But will there be any new player options?  Will we get any backgrounds or class archetypes? With just under two months until it releases on March 15th, looks like I need to go pre-order my copy now.

If you are looking to get your hands on this first you can do so here. Also of note this adventure is written in collaboration with Tracy and Laura Hickman, the authors of the original Ravenloft adventure published in 1983. As always thanks for reading and Until Next Time, Stay Nerdy!

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Ted Adams

The nerd is strong in this one. I received my bachelors degree in communication with a specialization in Radio/TV/Film. I have been a table op role player for about 20 years 17 of which with the current group. I have played several itterations of D&D, Mutants and Masterminds 2nd and 3rd editions, Star wars RPG, Shadowrun and World of Darkness. I am an avid fan of books and follow a few authors reading all they write. Favorite author is Jim Butcher I have been an on/off larper for around 15 years even doing a stretch of running my own for a while. I have played a number of Miniature games including Warhammer 40K, Warhammer Fantasy, Heroscape, Mage Knight, Dreamblade and D&D Miniatures. I have practiced with the art of the German long sword with an ARMA group for over 7 years studying the German long sword, sword and buckler, dagger, axe and polearm. By no strecth of the imagination am I an expert but good enough to last longer than the average person if the Zombie apocalypse ever happens. I am an avid fan of board games and dice games with my current favorite being Quarrios.

9 Comments

  • Garth Sketch
    January 19, 2016 at 9:23 pm

    Totally looking forward to it … this is going to be a blast! =)

  • Ty Johnston
    January 19, 2016 at 10:33 pm

    I have to say, this is the first "worlds" book from 5e that's actually got me excited. I do hope there are some new options for players, but I'll take what I can get.

  • J. Scott Garibay
    January 20, 2016 at 3:31 am

    Great article. I hope they give some mechanics around the Ravenloft Realm's spatial shifting.

  • David Friant
    January 20, 2016 at 7:52 am

    I totally agree Ty. I even went as far as to pre-order this baby. Enough with the Forgettable Realms already.

  • David Friant
    January 20, 2016 at 7:53 am

    Sure is. Even got the original authers on board super bad ass.

  • David Friant
    January 20, 2016 at 7:54 am

    Yea I think the rule is your screwed.

  • MarkyD
    July 30, 2018 at 6:05 am

    Bit late coming to this I know, but I’ve been running a ravenloft campaign for a few months now on roll20 using homebew(ish) ravenloft campaign rules based on the 2nd edition box set. I’ve still not played or run a CoS module but from what I hear it’s lacking the real flavour of an old school horror/ravenloft game. Or more likely, the players I know who have played it have played it with dms running it as forgotten realms with a vampire. In fact one player literally said their dm placed Barovia in faerun! I’m really hoping they bring out a totally updated Ravenoft campaign box set for 5e – it’s been my favourite campaign for 30+ years now!

    • Doug Vehovec
      July 30, 2018 at 12:36 pm

      Better late than never! Thank you for visiting, reading and sharing your thoughts. I’ve run CoS and one thing I noticed is the adventure is pretty creepy and horrific even if I just read the text boxes and presented the scenes and encounters straight out of the book. I was really impressed with the writing and themes running throughout the adventure. I will say that the 2E stuff was dripping with flavor though. The art, different domains and other material from back then is bursting at the seams with tone and style. – Nerditor Doug

      • MarkyD
        July 31, 2018 at 9:59 am

        Thanks Doug. Yep it sounds, as I suspected, that the players I spoke to have just had the experience of having the game run in a more generic pseudo-medieval style rather than as gothic horror. At some point I’ll have to check CoS out!

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