Café de Nuit

Wizards.com link to the "The Risen Mists" Adventurers League PDF

It seems that not many people here are interested in fifth edition, but I thought some of you might be interested to see what the current generation of players is doing with the Ravenloft setting (it isn't called Ravenloft, but this module is basically an island domain). This module is intended to follow 5e's Tomb of Annihilation and uses many of the same rules and concepts as 5e's Curse of Strahd. Players must deal with the Darklord Archdruid Fotari who is bound to the storm-plagued tropical Chultian domain of Bakumora. If you ever wanted to ride dinosaurs through the mists of Ravenloft, this one's for you.

Edit: Should have put this here first but The Risen Mists module is part 2 of the Lost City of Mezro by Rich Lescouflair
Here is Part 1
https://www.dmsguild.com/product/221093 ... f-the-Wild
And Part 3
https://www.dmsguild.com/product/251151/Maze-of-Shadows
And a sourcebook for the subsetting.
https://www.dmsguild.com/product/220852/Ruins-of-Mezro

If you want to purchase "The Risen Mists" on DMs Guild
https://www.dmsguild.com/product/226245/The-Risen-Mists

It's more of a Forgotten Realms module, part of a series connected to the 5e Tomb of Annihilation adventure, where it refers you to for incidental encounters. Only the first two parts taking place in the domain before the darklord is taken down and the domain returns to Faerun. It has quite close ties with FR, coming from the region of Chult and has two famous FR NPCs from the novels appear.

The above being said, there's a fair bit to work with and elaborate upon, though it takes some work just as the adventures from the 2e Children of the Night series of accessories. I like the irony of two sides fighting when they unknowingly venerate the same god. (The humans of Kayebo Village venerate Ubtao, whereas the dracotaurs and lizard folk don't seem to realize their new storm god is a corrupted aspect of Ubtao.) This irony is unfortunately mostly passed over in the module, as only a single raiding party of lizardfolk are encounterd and the dracotaurs are all automatically hostile and cut down in a single encounter in order to get into the temple complex. Some expansion and elaboration could make this thread a lot more interesting.

The darklord Fotari is potentially interesting in his contrasts, being a corrupted druid (and perhaps the first druid DL at that) who delusionally believes he is helping the land escape the Shadowfell by sacrificing souls to Ubato's corrupted aspect (the end justifies the means sorta thing) but is just contributing to the land's degradation. Fotari's past is comparable to other darklords (benevolent before going to investigate a disaster in a nearby land and becoming corrupted "by his own power" under unknown circumstances, returning and killing the village's headchief also in vague circumstances before leaving and starting a new cult- with presumably the lizardfolk and dracotaurs as his primary followers). It's a little bit of a shame Fotari dies at the end no matter what happens, as the elimination of the domain is necessitated for the last part of the module to occur. This makes the adventure just a weekend in hell (and a fairly short, incidental side trip at that.)

The Lesser Evil wrote:It's a little bit of a shame Fotari dies at the end no matter what happens, as the elimination of the domain is necessitated for the last part of the module to occur. This makes the adventure just a weekend in hell (and a fairly short, incidental side trip at that.)

I don't think it would take too much work to tweak Fotari's story so he is forced to stick around. He uses some kind of custom spirit-based druid class the author of the module tweaked from an older edition. One of his mentioned powers is interesting, shaping leaves into creatures to communicate or spy.

The part of the module I think stands out is the cursed Omi Keyoka temple approach where the leaning, half-sunken temple is in the middle of a swamp lake, only visible when the party gets close like it is the eye of a mist storm. Getting there requires swimming to it through biting insects while a swirl of thunder-crashing storm clouds circle overhead at the temple's apex. Then the party has to dive under the black lake to reach a submerged entrance.

The Spawn of Kyuss (aka. zombie that turns into a giant wiggly botfly infection that flings its worms at you) is a great horror monster. Glad it shows up.

I'm not a big fan of the mists are evil thing that CoS started with the DP being more tangible and obviously evil. That was brought over into this module which stinks. Ignoring that, this module comes up with the idea that Ravenloft has "outposts" in other worlds. The idea of the Dark Powers outright claiming and fencing up the lands of other worlds rather than just dragging pieces off or making them wholesale from the mists adds an interesting dimension to the ways the players can interact with the setting.

Ultimately my takeaway is that this module, plus the CoS fanlore, plus CoS itself are all putting a far greater emphasis on the power of the land aspect of Ravenloft than was present in previous editions. Messing with land power can make darklords or weaken them.

Mischief wrote:I don't think it would take too much work to tweak Fotari's story so he is forced to stick around. He uses some kind of custom spirit-based druid class the author of the module tweaked from an older edition. One of his mentioned powers is interesting, shaping leaves into creatures to communicate or spy.

That is a nice little bit of flavor, although it's seemingly mentioned off-hand as a means of building the mood- I wasn't aware the author had actually drawn that from anywhere. From what I could tell Fotari seemed like a bog-standard druid (using the exact Archdruid statblock from the Volo's Guide to Monsters) without any other spirit-related abilities, spells, or skills.

Ignoring that, this module comes up with the idea that Ravenloft has "outposts" in other worlds. The idea of the Dark Powers outright claiming and fencing up the lands of other worlds rather than just dragging pieces off or making them wholesale from the mists adds an interesting dimension to the ways the players can interact with the setting.

That is a nice and elegant solution to the problem of keeping the original domain from losing the context of its original existence, for when you want to keep it attached to its original homeworld while still making it a dark and spooky place.