What pulled you into the mists?

[BigBadQDaddy]

So, being unemployed allows a great amount of opportunity to sit while staring off into space and simply think. And that is what brought up this question: What pulled you into the mists. In other words, what got you interested in Ravenloft?
Was it an adventure? what about the artwork? Maybe you have a favorite writer who was assigned to the project, or whatever.
For me it was a friend returning home from Marine Corp boot camp. My friend didn't have a lot of free time while he was home as the Marine recruiters put him to work for most of his leave, and he had a Sunday afternoon free which he wanted to game. Our usual DM had moved to Florida and no one else was available for this spur of the moment session. So it was up to me to keep this friend of mine whom I had not seen in quite a while (and not to mention since) entertained for the only free time he had to spend with friends.
We went to the local (by local I mean two towns away) game store to look at pre-written adventures as I had never ran a game before and had no experience or material. We looked over every 2nd edition D&D adventure they had in stock and one caught my eye. It was a Ravenloft adventure titled Servants of Darkness. Now. love or hate the adventure, this was way different than the type of adventure I was used to in my buddies home brew high fantasy world. Never before had I even thought about horror in any other context than sheer force in the amount of skeletons you could fit on a sheet of notebook paper. No, sir. This adventure was about an innocent girl being burned at the stake. And the irrationality of that simple truth blew my mind! of course in America we are taught about the Salem witch trial and such, and some of us learn about the even more devastating witch hunts in Europe, but as an adventure, this was way different from the "End of the World" high fantasy gaming I was used to.
So, I bought the adventure and I tried to run it. But alas, something happened. By the end of the first chapter of the adventure, I was winging it. The adventure was no longer about a simple innocent girl about to be burned at the stake. There was now a silent stalker, trailing my friends Paladin. Not only that, he started having nightmares, hearing voices, and becoming increasingly paranoid as an unexpected adventure was unfolding from my imagination.
I had found my home.
We never did finish that adventure, and that was over ten years ago, and as I stated earlier, I have not heard from him since. But what came out of that experience has stayed with me over the years as my obsession has grown. I think even if I tried, I wouldn't be able to leave Ravenloft entirely. Heck, even now that I am no longer running it, I find myself buying adventures that are missing from my almost complete collection, and I keep coming back here for the great experiences I am having in the PbP's I am a part of.
So, that's me, how about you?

[Pamela]

I had played a heavily edited RL game (the one with the alchemist and the machine?) way back in the 80's; it was set in our homebrew campaign. I used to sorta look at the old Strahd covers but I never looked any further into it.

In 2003, my boyfriend (now husband) asked if I'd play Ravenloft with him, I accepted very grudgingly. I got the impression by then that it was a completely pessimistic setting; I also wasn't thrilled with the idea that the gods without the Land of the Mists had no power and the gods within were merely masks of evil powers. I finally accepted with the proviso that I would be allowed to play a character from the only domain that interested me: Zherisia.

Two months later, Jon finally started his game with four players. Two played Faerunians kidnapped by the Mists; the other, a Darkonese caliban. My first character was originally supposed to be a cop (fighter) but I'd been drawn to play my favourite class a paladin again - to hell with the Dark Powers!

The campaign was based on a very heavily edited Dark of the Moon. Our characters began at 7th level. It took two years and several changes of characters for that particular campaign to end; Jon was now living with me and I became DM in his stead for its end.

We are still playing three of the original characters after five years. We've now got two more (VAN and tarlyn's) and Molly is my all-time favourite character. We've outlived three boards and are now in the fourth book of the campaign;we've literally written hundreds if not thousands of pages (and these are not small posts!). Our characters have only aged six months in that time! I would regret how slow we are in time but I've enjoyed the writing of their minutes and days far too much to do so.

[DilisnyaRevenge]

Simple answer... The black box ad on the back of an X-Men comic book. From the minute I saw it, I was hooked.

[Gonzoron of the FoS]

previous thread on the subject, including my answer...

http://www.fraternityofshadows.com/Foru ... php?t=2666

[MadStepDad]

Hilarious link, GRon. I bet you forgot about that one, didn't ya QDaddy? Forgot that you even posted a reply to it!

After we got really caught up in the D&D mix circa 1993-95ish, we used to hit up this place called Hobby Barn at the local mall. We had the moves all planned out and that's how a group of impoverished, fatherless bastards wound up with the largest D&D collection East of the Mississippi (the documentary has more detail).

Bottom line - saw the BLACK BOX - with STRAHD on the front - told my boy B-SWEEZY (R.I.P.) it looked ill and he grabbed it for us. It's been on ever since. Let me ALSO just say (so y'all don't hate more than you already do), that as we got older and actually got money I always voted for RAVENLOFT. Same themes apply these day with the proliferation of downloadable music. Yeah I'll take the free stuff, but if its something noteworthy or important to me, I WILL cast my vote and buy it. I'm a big enough fan to support what I love.

With that said, we tried playing RAVENLOFT but my little juvenile mind was too overwhelmed by the writing in the BLACK BOX to ever think I could pull it off. But I always borrowed references and ideas and inspiration from the setting and BOUGHT all the adventures (I swear). In 1997ish we played a one-shot VECNA REBORN adventure with high-level homebrewed PCs. Then we tried a real RAVENLOFT campaign that went well but died when the group did in early 2000.

By 2002 I was back on and the rest is history (check my campaign recaps in the Smoking Room... I mean "veranda!!!")

peace,

MSD

[NeoTiamat]

P. N. Elrod

This was a few years ago, I was bored and wandering around Barnes & Nobles. Hrm... what is this I, Strahd book? This was before I read any of Anne Rice's works, so 'Autobiography of a Vampire' still promised something intriguing to me.

I was hooked. Blame Strahd, basically.

From there, it took me an insane amount of time to actually get into a stable campaign. I lurked around the FoS forums for a while, tried to join one game and made a rogue for it, which promptly fell apart before ever getting started.

Then I joined another game on another forum with that same rogue, which lasted for about six months than died for lack of activity.

I didn't manage to actually get into a campaign till I gave up and made my own. Which still has that rogue as a villainous NPC. (I think the frustration of never having gotten a chance to be a PC turned him evil. Or evil-er)

[Yaoi Huntress Earth]

For me, I became interested in Ravenloft when I came across the characters in the Spellfire card game and read about the characters in the Spellfire strategy guide. The deep history and non-typical villians really drew me in.

[Archedius]

A couple of years ago, I became heavily enamored of H.P. Lovecraft. His story, the Outsider, got me interested in horror based on ruins and such.

I soon discovered that the literature from the Gothic period and the Gothic revival were all about that theme. I dove right in. Gothicism later merged with my growing interest in DnD, and my dislike for typical fantasy (especially Drizzt *shakes fist*). I typed in 'gothic horror, dnd' into a search engine and found the Fraternity.

Later, I heard someone here mention the Midnight Campaign setting. Between Ravenloft and Midnight- I am content settings-wise.

[Catman Jim]

I had first read about the upcoming I6 Ravenloft (coming out just in time for Halloween!) in a Dragon Magazine ad. I bought & played it the weekend it hit my local gamestore back in 1983 (first year of my marriage, & first year living in Seattle). Totally hooked on it then, was thrilled when the Black Box came out in 1990 (last year I lived in Seattle, before WotC) and expanded Ravenloft to a full setting. I bought every novel & accessory as they were released, just couldn't get enough. Still have all of it!

[BigBadQDaddy]

previous thread on the subject, including my answer...

http://www.fraternityofshadows.com/Foru ... php?t=2666

Hilarious link, GRon. I bet you forgot about that one, didn't ya QDaddy? Forgot that you even posted a reply to it!

ROFL, I just re-read that thread from 2005, funny thing is I posted on it. Man that is priceless.
Oh well, feel free to retell your tale here, or if you are a newer member to the boards, lets hear it.

[steveflam]

At the time, I had been looking for something different than the normal
settings of A.D&D. I just liked the look of the Black Box and boy am I happy I did buy it. Ravenloft is my favorite setting ever since! I actually got to introduce quite a few teenagers to D&D through RL [MY ex had 3 kids, 1 being a teenage boy] Thus the basement was full weekends for D&D!

[ewancummins]

In 9th grade I moved back to my hometown of Portland, OR, after having lived out of state for a year. First day of school , i ran into my old friend Rob. He wanted to run AD&D 2E Ravenloft. I was down for RL right away, and have been a big fan ever since. My first character which I actually played in RL was Miles De Brice, an illusionist from the City of Greyhawk, on Oerth. The Mists snagged him, and he never did get home. I really had fun with that PC. Maybe someday I'll reprise him....

[crazybantha]

It was around 1998.

I was the veteran GM and had a high fantasy campaign for some time, when one of the players decided he wanted to GM a campaign also. We started it in this high fantasy, greek-like world he made from scratch. This lasted for a few months, and our characters were chasing the major villain, a fallen paladin turned demon a thounsand years ago.

We were finally facing the ancient paladin-demon, and then... mists engulfed us all.

That's how my friend introduced us to RL 2nd edition. His villain was a perfect dark lord candidate in the land of mists. His narrative was so talented we never forgot the scenes. Too bad he started feeling heavy with all this dark campaign and we had to stop.

[The Giamarga]

A friend introduced me to 2E AD&D in (late) high school around 1992. We played a homebrew campaign for years. I bought a few supplements here and there. The same friend also introduced me to Call of Cthulhu and I read all the Lovecraft books my library had. There were a few german AD&D novels out then which i devoured. They were the first two Drizzt trilogies, and the first 6 of the Ravenloft novels and the Dark Sun Prism Pentad. While i liked the Forgotten Realms novels i liked the Ravenloft ones better. Soon after I found out that the english paperbacks where split in two german novels each, i started reading the english ones to save money and because there where so many more.

It also helped that there was an awesome RPG shop in Hannover at that time. Later a friend from university introduced me to ebay.com, and i delved into collecting and reselling in earnest. I researched the roots of the game that so fascinated me. My collection spread from 2E to 1E, and I discovered Greyhawk, Planescape, Al'Qadim and Ravenloft. Sadly I wasn't aware of the Kargatane until after I joined this site here. The first Ravenloft product i bought is either a used Black Box from that great FLGS i mentioned above or the RL novels, I can't quite remember which.

[High Priest Mikhal]

I knew AD&D from PC games and Ravenloft specifically from Stone Prophet. It was DoD that finally hooked me, and a boxed set I can't remember what it was called (had the Tarokka, secrect societies, and psionics in Ravenloft books, among others). It was love at first sight.