Davvy reviews Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft 

Davvy is one of the Fae

I mean, it's justified.

When chaotic good is that annoying friend that does pranks regardless of your opinion. Yeah you would not think highly of them.

@@Watchin4story What makes you think that's "good"?

Not really its obnoxious the fae are amazing and hating on them really detracts I get the feeling his campaigns would be really boring

the failed thrall who keeps stealing strahd's stuff and books of necromancy to power themselves up

@@julius9943 A failed thrall who just wants Strahd's approval and to be good enough to replace him so he can leave Barovia, but learns the truth from the rest of the party.

@@caledavid4174 They just want Strahd senpai to notice them

I actually recently had that happen.

"Respectfully, Strahd... I quit."

That's actually what pushed me to Kickstart Grim Hollow. Glad I wasn't the only one with that train of thought.

They do work quite well in tandem.

And take a look at the old van richtens guides for more ideas! A lot of the older versions of the darklords presented are more interesting

Ah, so you are a man of culture as well

@@connendarf3857 Indeed good sir

I want to play a game where all the pcs are old now. Like, I built this old man twilight cleric who I've been wanting to play as for a while now.

This sounds like an amazing character, honestly. Any updates?

​@@darksev.6468 If you're talking to me, then yes there has been some development. Not a lot, but there has been some development. Though I should say the character is a bit more... specific than I let on in the OP. She's more fleshed out beyond the concept. So to tell you the update I have to be a bit more specific about her backstory and some of the bits of the campaign specifics. Before she was stripped of her power. In her bog she happened upon a battlefield, as she strolled across it looking at the corpses, she saw a young man, pierced in the side by an arrow. His wound wasn't shallow but neither would the death be swift... as he lay there in a half submerged state holding his sides... she offered him the chance at life... he just laid there, muttering something to himself... she made the offer to him again this time louder... nearly shouting at him... He muttered again, she got close enough to hear a piece of it... "Sorry Dad, I couldn't find her..." and he died. Hags are cruel by nature, they are beings distilled from it... but some small piece of her broke ever so slightly... and pity trickled in. She tried to deny it was there... pity she thought that she couldn't make a deal with him... but this gnawing sense of pity for this young man was what ultimately led her to try and overthrow the coven's grandmother. The cruelty was becoming too much for her... she wasn't making deals with the same degree of vitriol as before... she was hardly making deals at all... She was chastised by her coven-mates and when it came to it, she was chastised by the coven's grandmother. It was when she was threatened with being kicked out of the coven that she chose to try and trick the other coven-mates into overthrowing the coven grandmother... She was betrayed of course... and her grandma thought there could be a lesson in this. And so she stripped her of her hag-ness, turning her into a mortal hexblood, promising that she would return her power and her qualities back to her when (and this was the words the DM chose "When you grown up, and stop acting like a child!"). They kicked her out of her bog and she stumbled around for a bit... until she came upon an older man who agreed to shelter her.

@@darksev.6468 My character was introduced into the game when one of the party members was brought in by the other PCs claiming that the one had been gravely wounded and potions weren't helping. At this time I was working as a medicine woman and I was still pretty new to Alchemy/Artificing (it was the only thing she could attribute to being like a Hag outside of being a Sorcerer... but alas that wasn't to be) but I agreed to help as much as I could, and apparently I wasn't their first choice (also this wound occurred in a session prior to my introduction). Its important I note as well, the man who had been sheltering me had taken to referring to us as "married", I called him my "Faux husband"... but he adored acting up the bit when we were in public much to my/her embarrassment. I set about figuring out the wounds and was able to figure some of what I needed I needed. It was a specific type of toxin that came from an enemy they had been fighting (some kind of wyvern if I remember correctly)... and they needed the venom from the wyvern to make an anti-toxin. They weren't able to kill it when the PC was grievously wounded. So I set about aiming to slow the toxin down and then traveled with them to the lair of the Wyvern where we managed to kill it. I was able to gather several doses of the venom (nat 20, with a +5, babyyyyyyyy!) I agreed to be their dedicated healer after making some arrangements with them. And was mean as shit about it. While everyone initially was surprised at how mean I was, it became settled as a huge part of the character (it always was meant to be, just when someone's life was threatened we focused on the task at hand). The Party consists of a Paladin (Oath of the Ancients), Warlock (Pact of the Fiend), A Rogue (I don't know actually what his subclass is, probably thief), and a Ranger (Gloomstalker). It was the Ranger who had been wounded by the Wyvern. NOW THAT THAT ALL IS OUT OF THE WAY... lol... I can get to the update. While my character wasn't the focus of the story for much of the game, I still had moments, especially recently. My fake husband called me home... at first I didn't realize what for, but I then noticed the signs/symptoms. My fake husband was dying. In the course of trying to heal him of a condition, I as a player knew, was beyond my character's potential to solve (which helped with the RP, because I wanted badly to be wrong), he admitted, he had only moved to this town to be closer to where he suspected his son was. He had hoped he could find him in the nearby bog, but had been fearful to enter as the bog was renowned for having a Hag that lived there. He had tried to go out into the bog while I was away to see if there was any sign of his son... but then I asked him what he expected to find when it had at least been six years since his son was there. I had never told him about my being a hag... He asked me what I meant and how I would know that... I told him that I lived in that bog for longer than anyone could imagine. That my home had been nowhere near the battlefield where his body remained. Now this was a bit presumptuous of me... and I realized it... so I described the young man to him and asked him if that matched his son's description... it did. I then told him that I offered to spare his life... but his son kept muttering something... he asked me what it was and I told him "Sorry Dad, I couldn't find her..." His face went white and he wouldn't speak to me for a long time (also didn't stop me from administering his medicine and using a cold wash cloth for his face either). I told him about my backstory... about how much I had come to understand that the feelings I had at the sight of his son laying their dead broke some part of me... and that it led me to betraying my coven and our grandmother. I thought the DM was going to be a dick to me tbh... to make him where he turned the village against me or something... instead as he laid in his bed, panting... in the last moments of his life, he confessed... His son had been out looking for his mom... and when I showed up... I looked so much like her, he thought that he'd found her... but he swiftly realized that if it was his wife she had no memory of him... he had been hoping that he could reinvigorate my memory by "acting like your husband"... I took his hand and said that to me, even though I wasn't who he thought I was... that he had been. The last thing he said was "Do you think he'll find me?"... Though by the time I said "I don't think he'd ever stop looking" my husband was dead. The rogue of course had been spying and relayed some of this too the rest of the party but the player could barely do it... I was in tears, the party where in tears... The DM was smiling... But pretty much at that point forward she absolutely had no interest in going back. We haven't fully resolved her story but we're working on it. We did end up downing one of the Hags who had been one of my coven-mates. She had come for me to see if I had "matured" enough to come home. And while talked about betraying my party in return for my becoming a Hag again... I knew there wasn't any chance in hell of that happening. We ended up surrounding her, and where able to down her. The look on her face was priceless. I told her before she died, that regardless of what happened "Grandma" was going to be brought down one way or another.

@@ethanhorn6093 WOW! That is an amazing Hag backstory. I just started playing D&D recently and I'm playing through my first 2 campaigns with different people right now. Thank you for this amazing story and I hope that some day I might be able to do something like this too with my characters. 🥲👍🏻

What is RNG?

@@javierbastos8497 Random Number Generator

It is hands down my favourite bard subclass, as it really hammers home everything i like with bards: - guidance is a really nice cantrip you finally don't have to be really high level to get, fits both the role as support and skill monkey - the spirit ritual thing is like magical secrets but without the long term dedication, always been fachinated with bards both as necromancers and as diviners so it's right down my alley - focuses on bards as storytellers and the ones who preserve oral tradition, appreciate that. - the focus allows for you to excell at healing and harm, again the bard as a jack of all trades, only second to stuff like arcane firearm in terms of the boost it provides your damage and healing - the stories can be a bit overpowered but who cares

I kind of dislike the the new Bard subclass for the sole reason that it's not a roll on a d12 it's a roll on a table that GETS UP TO a d12, the actual die you roll is your bardic inspiration die which only gets to 12 at level 17.

I'm tempted to role one up who focuses on more of the RP elements. A chronicler who calls up the spirits of the dead with the promise to record in verse for the aid they give him in the moment. I fear the costs of paper and ink when living as an itinerant wanderer though...

Magnificent

Rise, Lord Doot!

So a skeleton with real sol music

If you're using a wind instrument make sure your boney buddy still has lips and lungs.

* trumpet cover of bink's sake starts playing *

I hadn’t even heard they added new backgrounds. Thanks for the heads up, I’ll be sure to check them out.

FYI - The Haunted is a reprint from Curse of Strahd

I'm pretty sure he would just get shunted over to the feywild with a sign saying 'kick me' permanently affixed to his back

@@DemonMankeyMan Why not both?

so, Tepest?

I’ve been wanting to run a reborn ancestral guardian barbarian.

yup im gonna go build a alucard clone

I made an Oatherbreaker Hexblade Dhampir for a one shot who was basically a combination of Alucard and Isaac

Mine was a Way of Mercy Monk, who was like part Alucard part Spiderman. His monk abilities are reflavoured as him getting control over his vampire powers.

@@cyborgcatrj6794 I need to turn this concept into Phantom Blood Dio

nah step two is trying to convince the party you're not doing that bc i'd be all over the bag of holding with a torch if my dm introduced that monster

@@agustinvenegas5238 That's the point. If the players are afraid of sleeping next to a bag of holding simply because of *the idea* of bag man, then the bag man already fulfilled its purpose. You don't want to make your players face the bag man, you want them to be afraid of the possibility.

@@bouboulroz Exactly. If they burn the bag they lose a super useful magic item, if they don't they're always at risk.

The bagman is just too good an idea to leave to the chance of a dice roll. The next time one of my groups gets a bag of holding I'm having it be haunted by the bagman who will do creepy but ultimately harmless things at first while a player is sleeping like leave creepy messages, move objects to places the character doesn't remember putting them, etc. like most hauntings though its behavior is going to get increasingly ominous and violent over time. eventually I'm hoping the haunting drives the character up the wall trying to figure out whats happening. eventually theyll figure out they need to pretend to be asleep to see if they can figure it out. if they succeed, its gonna be a suspenseful and creepy reveal of this dude coming out of the bag like the worlds scariest contortionist. Can't wait! the only disappointing thing is they spent all this effort to hype him up but didnt bother with a stat block!

@@companyoflosers The stat block would mean he's meant to be fought. I like him without one because I can focus on making him be a narrative tool. The instant the players would want to fight it, I'd stop making him appear, have him retreat or something. Then when they feel safe, an NPC will get pulled inside the bag. Either someone camping with them, or one of the thieves who stole their bag. Bagman doesn't want a fight. It's a boogeyman.

All the dark lords from Dragon Lance as a setting got scrubbed from the book as well and replaced with new ones often much less interesting or just boring as far as villains go. Also ugh the way they handled Isolde was criminal

Actually they did a stealth reference to both of them in that clock domain that throws stuff into entropy. There is a description of a building described as a "black rose" (Soth) and a "tower of skulls" (Vecna reference I think).

Actually you'll still be immune to sleep spells Reborn are immune to sleep spells as their Deathless Nature feature specifically states that one of the benefits granted due to you "escaping death" is that you no longer need to eat, breath, or sleep and thus you are immune to magic that would put you to sleep along with being able to do a long rest in 4 hours if you go into a motionless inactive state where you're still conscious for that long.

Kind of yeah but more boring. And it raises about a dozen questions

The problem is the carnival pre 5e was amazing had deep lore about how Isolde continues to hunt The Gentleman Caller but devotes her time to the carnival to protect them with her holy avenger being a spark of good and refuge within the demiplane and all the writing is about how the darkpowers are just waiting for the change to make her into a darklord or let her go. This powerful angelic figure is trapped in a prison as she gets worn down from her experiences. Now it is just... whoop whoop she's the darklord of this carnival or rather her sword is deal with that fuckos.

No. They sound similar but are very different. Undead pact is an updated version of the undead pact UA, while undying is very different. Think vampires vs liches as patrons.

@@pallasproserpina4118 I'm a bit sceptical. The Undead Pact UA struck me as like it was trying to one up the Undying Pact. I haven't looked at the new version, but I can't help but think its got too much thematic overlap with the Undying pact.

Goodluck?

Ez? The changes to the vistani to not make them evil was definitely a good choice

@@DiploRaptor Esmerelda

Congrats on being first and saying something orginal

The worst part is most reprints before 5e fixed the Roma issue by calling attention to it and more. But for some reason they did not here. As for Ez I don't remember any ableist language and considering she's a retconned apprentice for Van Richten *shrugs*. I have no opinions of her one way or another. She's got an artificial leg that she likes to hide doesn't she? As for the domains oozing character we talking about the same book? Actually I don't know I just know they removed my favorite darklords and replaced them with boring just generic badguy who means nothing and am still waiting on my copy

@@DiploRaptor in the og book she used to conceal her prosthetic leg like it was a dark secret, now here it’s something she’s shown sporting proudly. It’s not a massive change but it’s still a far more positive portrayal