Baron Lyron Evensong

[DeepShadow of FoS]

Wait, mind control? I know I glossed over some of his stuff, but mind control? Is this his new schtick?

[The Lesser Evil]

Hmmm, looking back at his original entry in the Book of Crypts. He intended to use mind control, as he hired a mage to enchant his harpsichord to make people obey his command when they heard it. The crafting of the item messed up, and the harpsichord became the receptacle for Evensong's soul. Rendered so immune, he began using violence and murder to spread his message.

Nocturnal Sea Gaz plays up his mentalism and use of spells before resorting to the harp in the hope of getting around the limited duration of his spells. The Gaz also discards his murder spree and has the failure of the harp draw him directly into Ravenloft rather than Evensong's murder spree resulting in the Mists claiming him. I am unsure of the reason for the latter change

[DeepShadow of FoS]

On a related note, I think the Liffen culture with all their closeted baggage and repression would make a great candidate for a market in purged emotions. Perhaps the recent arrival of the Carlyle trading company could foster such a market, and even lead to the development of Celebrant lodges outside of Paridon. I can certainly see that religion taking hold better than the watered-down Allgods religion that is currently there.

[thekristhomas]

I've always found it interesting that he is convinced that he is Lawful Good, I maybe reading way too much into that, but it suggests to me that he might be from a world where the alignments are formally recognised (like Mystara, where there are alignment languages)

Of course, it might just have been a way of saying that he thought he was right.

There's something about his hodge podge background that reminds me of the old bard from 1st ed, they had to have levels in multiple classes before training as a bard IIRC. His dagger might be from his time as a thief, his cudgel from his levels as a fighter, his spellbook (meagre as it is) represents his time as a mage and the harpsichord represents the summation of his work. Again probably reading too much in.

[thekristhomas]

I always figured that the Baron's curse didn't allow for a proper exploration of a gothic background. I wondered if it would be better to use an idea like Silent Hill 4: The Room. The heroes would be trapped in the room and can make escapes, but only into pockets of time from the Baron's history. In this way, the heroes are more like classical gothic protagonists in that their role is to bring to light horrible, forgotten secrets.
Each of the time pockets contains a key or clue which is needed to open a later pocket, culminating in a final battle.
Maybe just to be cruel, the final battle may be impossible to win - but it does allow the heroes to open one final pocket which takes them to a time just before they got locked in the study. This leaves the baron trapped, alone, but with all of his hidden secrets revealed which forces him to re-live his awful past, alone, adinfinitum.

One of the problems with the original adventure is it requires a confrontation with the DL in some form, as he is unwilling to allow the destruction of his harpsichord, and this provides an excellent solution.

For myself, I would shy away from the pockets, as it reminds me of the structure from When Black Roses Bloom. But his story definitely needs to be revealed as the puzzles are solved. Might other rooms in the manor become open, leading closer to the exit? Or would that overly detract from the claustrophobia?

In BoCrypts it says that everything in the room, however disguised, is actually a representation of Lyron, his crimes or his victims. So it seems to me that all riddles, puzzles to be solved could be contained in the room somehow.

Destroying the harpsichord seems an inelegant solution, especially considering that a harpsichord has "keys" aplenty. It might be a bit "on the nose" for a specific tune or chord to be what frees the PCs but I would make it central to the process, with at least a few of the riddle/puzzle solutions to relate to the harpsichord. Ultimately I would probably lean towards the orrery or the clock as the time reset/freedom macguffin.

An idea for a puzzle in the room: There are statuettes of similar design scattered round the room, each depicting a victim of one of Lyron's killing sprees, they need to be arranged in the order they occurred for the musical notations etched into the podiums to be revealed. In turn the order can be inferred from the lyrics of Evensong's murder ballads, or some elegantly stitched poetry.

Having at least some of the riddles come in form of songs sung by the DL allows the DM some control over how quickly the PCs progress so is useful from a structural perspective, but might require a Riddler-esque compulsion to be worked into his curse

[thekristhomas]

Something that's just occurred to me, Evensong might be a strange mix of omnipotent and impotent within the room. Maybe his curse means that while people are behaving within societal norms, reading books, examining objects etc, he is unable to act against them, even though he knows it might lead to their freedom. But, if those trapped with him, in desperation, attempt to destroy property or attack then he might unleash his powers as DL against them, possibly casting them into the void. This would play into his delusion that he is Lawful Good, maybe as long as the PCs are acting within Lawful Good parameters he is in fact compelled to assist them and his riddles and songs are his attempt to work against this compulsion by hiding his "assistance".

[The Lesser Evil]

I've always found it interesting that he is convinced that he is Lawful Good, I maybe reading way too much into that, but it suggests to me that he might be from a world where the alignments are formally recognised (like Mystara, where there are alignment languages)

Evensong is from Krynn (the world of Dragonlance) not Mystara/the Known World. Meredoth is the only one from Mystara.

[jamesfirecat]

Evensong is from Krynn (the world of Dragonlance) not Mystara/the Known World. Meredoth is the only one from Mystara.

You're quite correct.

That said, Evensong's past is so nebulous /free flowing (I may need to reread the fan Gaztteer and take a closer look) that there is nothing essentially "Krynnish" about his backstory/domain (as opposed to say Soth and Sithicus who/which are so bound to Krynn that you can still see Krynn's constellations and moon in the Sithicus sky) which means there's no reason he couldn't have come from a different world/plane fairly easily if it helps someone construct a better story in my opinion.

[thekristhomas]

I've always found it interesting that he is convinced that he is Lawful Good, I maybe reading way too much into that, but it suggests to me that he might be from a world where the alignments are formally recognised (like Mystara, where there are alignment languages)

Evensong is from Krynn (the world of Dragonlance) not Mystara/the Known World. Meredoth is the only one from Mystara.

I'm not great with Dragonlance, but aren't the alignments formally recognized there as well? by which I mean that a PC might "in character" refer to himself as Lawful Good, rather than it being an OOC descriptor like it is in RL.

It seems to me that one of the interesting possibilities of characters who come from worlds where the varying positions on the alignment system are recognized by institutions as valid, if not necessarily welcome standpoints, is that, when they fail to live within their chosen alignment, it is not just a personal, possibly spiritual failure, but a failure towards the group, the alignment as a team, which I imagine would have quite a different psychological effect on one.

[thekristhomas]

On a related note, I think the Liffen culture with all their closeted baggage and repression would make a great candidate for a market in purged emotions. Perhaps the recent arrival of the Carlyle trading company could foster such a market, and even lead to the development of Celebrant lodges outside of Paridon. I can certainly see that religion taking hold better than the watered-down Allgods religion that is currently there.

Risibulos in particular, might have joy seekers starved by their own willfully gloomy community.

[jamesfirecat]

I'm not great with Dragonlance, but aren't the alignments formally recognized there as well? by which I mean that a PC might "in character" refer to himself as Lawful Good, rather than it being an OOC descriptor like it is in RL.

It seems to me that one of the interesting possibilities of characters who come from worlds where the varying positions on the alignment system are recognized by institutions as valid, if not necessarily welcome standpoints, is that, when they fail to live within their chosen alignment, it is not just a personal, possibly spiritual failure, but a failure towards the group, the alignment as a team, which I imagine would have quite a different psychological effect on one.

I'm fairly well versed in Dragonlance.

The alignments are sort of recognized in Dragonlance, but only along the Good, Neutral, and Evil axis, in that you have gods of Good, gods of Neutrality and gods of Evil, along with spell casters who wear either white, red or black robes depending upon how/why they study /use magic.

The Lawful/Chaotic axis of the alignment system in Krynn is not anywhere near as strongly codified /considered /entrenched, it isn't really something that people think/talk about much.

[The Lesser Evil]

I'm not great with Dragonlance, but aren't the alignments formally recognized there as well? by which I mean that a PC might "in character" refer to himself as Lawful Good, rather than it being an OOC descriptor like it is in RL.

It seems to me that one of the interesting possibilities of characters who come from worlds where the varying positions on the alignment system are recognized by institutions as valid, if not necessarily welcome standpoints, is that, when they fail to live within their chosen alignment, it is not just a personal, possibly spiritual failure, but a failure towards the group, the alignment as a team, which I imagine would have quite a different psychological effect on one.

I mostly made the correction just for accuracy's sake/pedantic nitpicking, but the conversation is engaging, so I'll throw in my thoughts on the matter.

Even if there are formally recognized alignments, I can see a few who are denialist of the truth of alignments. There's all sorts of denialists of various scientific truths and historical events in the real world, so I shouldn't see why they couldn't exist in a fantasy world. The human psyche is complex and able to compartmentalize all sorts of things, even when the person is otherwise intelligent. (Sometimes especially because they are intelligent, as it can make explaining or rationalizing errant understandings when compared to the facts easier.)

[Mortavius]

The Seventh Guest, ....I think I even recall one bit of fan material that wrote up the backstory for the game as the setting for a minor Island of Terror.

http://fraternityofshadows.com/wiki/Hijikal

Wow...I had completely forgotten I wrote that. Doesn't that bring up some memories.

Also...I'm kind of embarrassed about it, looking back on it. It's not really a good piece of work. I was just obsessed with The 7th Guest at the time, and wanted to re-create it in Ravenloft.

[Mortavius]

Though the writeup is a little bit disjointed if you're not familiar with the game, Hijikal and its DL sounds like it would make for a harrowing adventure as typical of a pocket domain. His backstory is great enough that you'd almost want to go out and investigate things related to his past and then go back into the tower several times rather than just be stuck inside of it all the time.

Yeah, I have to apologize for that. All I can say is that it was a really early piece of work for me, and I'm not necessarily proud of it.

In another note, there's a group of people working on a third game in the series called The 13th Doll. They've been working on it for years, so I have no idea when or if it would actually be finished, but here's hoping, right?

[DeepShadow of FoS]

Hmmm, looking back at his original entry in the Book of Crypts. He intended to use mind control, as he hired a mage to enchant his harpsichord to make people obey his command when they heard it. The crafting of the item messed up, and the harpsichord became the receptacle for Evensong's soul. Rendered so immune, he began using violence and murder to spread his message.

Hmmmmm...I kinda like that idea. His goal was mind control through music.

Nocturnal Sea Gaz plays up his mentalism and use of spells before resorting to the harp in the hope of getting around the limited duration of his spells. The Gaz also discards his murder spree and has the failure of the harp draw him directly into Ravenloft rather than Evensong's murder spree resulting in the Mists claiming him. I am unsure of the reason for the latter change

Yeah, I can see a case either way. He's kind of like d'Polarno in that sense, except that his condition was self-inflicted.