Doublechecking a planned project; "Demihumans of Ravenloft"

[Hell_Born]

I wasn't sure if this should go here or in the netbooks section, so I'm apologizing for that first. Long story short, as much as I like Ravenloft, I'm not a fan of the "humans only" gaming style. So, for the 2020 QTR (assuming I haven't missed it), I thought I might do an article offering some hopefully Dark Fantasy races or subraces for Ravenloft 5th edition games. The problem is, not only do I want to try and iron down my possible entries for this article beforehand, I wanted to make sure such an article would be okay, because I kind of remember such ideas not being all too popular here.

For what it's worth, the current races I'm planning are thus - I'll explain my "plan" for each if asked.

• Blaspheme
• Braunchen
• Caliban (Brutes & Banshees homage)
• Dhampir
• Fetch
• Ghedan
• Ghul
• Genasi, Dread
• Hagbreed
• Mortif
• Ratling

[ewancummins]

Questions:

Is the fetch like a doppelganger? A ghost?

Braunchen? Is this like a brownie? Something from the folklore of a German-speaking country?


Ghedan?

Mortifs are , what, pseudo-undead?

Blaspheme as a noun? What sort of creatures are these?

[Hell_Born]

Questions:

Is the fetch like a doppelganger? A ghost?

Braunchen? Is this like a brownie? Something from the folklore of a German-speaking country?

Ghedan?

Mortifs are , what, pseudo-undead?

Blaspheme as a noun? What sort of creatures are these?

Okay, let me break things down...

My primary inspirations here were the monster PC articles from the Books of S, the Born of Death (half-undead and the mortif, their tiefling) article for 3.5, and Quoth the Raven's caliban and dread genasi articles.

Fetches, ghedans and ghuls are essentially the dhampir analogue for ghosts, zombies/revenants and ghouls, respectively.

Mortifs are "deathtouched"; they're the result of people more generally corrupted by necrotic energy in the womb, or the distant descendants of the half-undead (dhampirs, fetches, ghedans, ghuls).

Blasphemes are "flesh-forged", warforged style living constructs made from flesh, and will essentially be a way to play either a flesh golem or a broken one (a REAL broken one, not Curse of Strahd's mongelfolk with a stolen name), inspired by the articles for both in the Books of S.

The Braunchen comes from the Book of Secrets, and is a Shadow Fey created when a Fanggen (a shadow fey hag that pretends to be a vilay, a shadow fey dryad) consumes 100 Good souls; she is purified and transformed into a less powerful creature with a soul of her own, driven to try and make amends for the evil of her past incarnation. This was mechanically handled as an Elf or Half-Elf with immunity to aging and the shadow fey's sunlight vulnerability, so it's actually not an unprecedented PC race, just an obscure one.

I hope this answers your questions directly?

I want to make it clear that I will be deliberately taking some liberties with flavoring and relying on racial feats as a way to get around 5e's... racial issues. For example, in the flavor text for the dhampir, I will offer suggestions that this statblock could be used for a redemption seeking (and thus depowered) vampire or a "cured" vorlog (as in, the homicidal madness went away, but the vampiric mutations remained) - I might even offer some mechanical basis for this.

With Hagbreed, I'll be mixing together Pathfinder's changelings and D&D's hagspawn, including mechanically supporting whether they have a "Fair Mein" or a "Foul Mein". I just need to decide on if that's a daily choice or a racial choice...

[kourkenko]

It's an interesting approach. i'm not against more races, even if i think they should be among the rarest "thing" that can be encountered.

Some of them can even be unique or so rare they're described only in legends and tales.

[ewancummins]

Those answers are quite helpful, thank you.


I've posted it before , but another gamer did a reskin of 3E as as ghoulkin, which I rather liked.

Here it is, from his site:

https://luckstat.blogspot.com/2011/05/r ... ulkin.html

[Hell_Born]

So... for what it's worth, I got the statblocks for this project all drafted up, though I haven't had any critique on how balanced they are yet. The flavor text... not so much. I mean, it's there, but I'm not happy with it. Since it's probably too late to submit this to QtR anyway, should I share the gdoc where my work resides, maybe get some ideas on how I can fix it up enough that it might be worth submitting to 2021's QTR?

[Hell_Born]

And it would probably have helped if I'd uploaded a link to the GDoc...

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1FyD ... xcKCI/edit#

[Rock of the Fraternity]

Wow... This sounds very interesting, and I look forward to seeing the finished product.

[Hell_Born]

Wow... This sounds very interesting, and I look forward to seeing the finished product.

Why, thank you! Hopefully, I'll come up with decent flavor text and be able to turn it into a proper article for submission to Quoth the Raven in 2021.

[Gonzoron of the FoS]

I wanted to make sure such an article would be okay, because I kind of remember such ideas not being all too popular here.

Sorry for not noticing this question earlier. Such an article would ABSOLUTELY be OK. Yes, there are many of here (self included) that prefer a human-centric Ravenloft, but there are plenty of people who are on your side of the subject, and we strive not to "yuck anyone's yum". Those who don't want to read it or use it don't have to, and those who do will be glad to have it. (And even a human-centric Ravenloft usually has room for the odd demihuman here and there.) So, by all means, submit this for next year.

[Hell_Born]

I wanted to make sure such an article would be okay, because I kind of remember such ideas not being all too popular here.

Sorry for not noticing this question earlier. Such an article would ABSOLUTELY be OK. Yes, there are many of here (self included) that prefer a human-centric Ravenloft, but there are plenty of people who are on your side of the subject, and we strive not to "yuck anyone's yum". Those who don't want to read it or use it don't have to, and those who do will be glad to have it. (And even a human-centric Ravenloft usually has room for the odd demihuman here and there.) So, by all means, submit this for next year.

Much appreciate the warm words of welcome. I'd welcome any comments or critique I can get on the lore I have created so far in the Gdoc linked below; I really feel I can do better than this, but I'm just drawing a total blank on how to even go about turning this into a proper article worthy of submission.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1FyD ... xcKCI/edit#

[Hell_Born]

So, I was just thinking about how much sense it would make to me for Ravenloft to include Dusk Elves - the REAL dusk elves from 4th edition, cursed and shunned outcasts from greater elfin society who have turned to shadow magic and illusion to conceal themselves from the vengeful hands of elves and drow alike and whose characterization throws around terms like "melancholic", "passionate", "grim" and "tragic", not 5e's "wood elves, but dark skinned" - and Mist Elves, based on 3e's Ghost Elves, and... well, do folks think it would make sense for this project of mine to offer new Dark Fantasy flavored subraces for the iconic D&D demihumans as well?