Café de Nuit

Last evening, I happened to see the movie "Brothers Grimm" and wondered, how a "18nth-century germany" Ravenloft-domain would look like ? (To me, Lamordia is more or less Switzerland and Falknovia has more in common with the 3rd Reich of the 1930ties)
So, what "german" aspects would have to be part of a domain, that mirrors the Germany of the late 18nth century ? What kind of myth´s and legends would you use ?
Perhaps the stories of Baron Münchhausen ? Grimms Fairytales ? The "cold heart" from Wilhelm Hauff ? The gothic novels of ETA Hoffmann ?

Kartakass has some elements of the "Black Forest fairy-tale" about it, so it's an excellent place for a Brothers Grimm-inspired adventure. It's not so much Germanic as generic "once upon a time...", though.

Yes, Kartakass has really some "medieval bavarian" elements (such as the whole Meistersinger-Stuff) but you can use it also easily for "scandinavian" inspired Plots (Kartakass could also be "Norway" or "Sweden") I like this domain very much, though Kartakass is also far to medieval to catch the flair of the 18nth century...

When you wrote Prussian, all i can think of is the rigid military discipline that Prussia is famous for. The steroetype is that Germans are a very rigid, disciplined, and efficient people. So what about taking that to the next extreme.

The population lives by the clock - they do everything on a schedule and tend to get upset if anything is late or early. They call this "Clock-wise"; as in "That fellow is really clock-wise." Each town has a large clock tower, located on the tallest building in the center. villagers take special pride in their town clocks, and often make them the unofficial center of town. Burgoemesiters and their staff of notaries keep their offices in or around the clock towers - since who ever controls the clock, controls the town.

The citizens are very lawful. they perfer to have casual agreements written out in offical language. The people don't consider anything real until it is "gestemplt" - or stamped, preferably by a notary.

Concepts like kindness and thoughfulness aren't as important as being dependable and orderly. Thrift is important, and though they can be generous with firends and family, they take careful note (if not written records) of what favours or monies have changed hands. Should you doa favour for one of these folk, expect them to go out fo their ways to pay you back, even (or expecially) if they don't like you.

Creative thought is less important than a precise, photographic memory. There isn't a child in all the land who can't recite the alphabet, the times-tables, or the whole written history of their village - but only a tiny few of them can answer any questions, let alone apply what they "know".

Most of the population are neat-freaks - there is an entire caste of people drafted into cleaning the streets, sewars and other areas that accumulate filth.

Wow, great points !!! (Sometimes I like stereotypes )
The (often forgotten) poets, philosophers and authors (Kant, Lessing and Goethe spend much time in Prussia or at least northern Germany) could be a kind of intellectual countermovement....driving literature and philosophy to an extreme...

How about a Darklord that in order to make himself more efficient, took his body own body and began to turn it into a clockwork golem? His desire is perfection, decisiveness, and cleanliness. His curse is that no matter how much he perfects his system, there will always be some error.

Could potentially go hand in hand with the train master.

Wow..that´s a cool concept for a "prussian" darklord !! I wounder, what his "act of ultimate evil" could have been ? Killed he his fatherly mentor, a old engineer who tought him everything about clockworks ? Is he obsessed with controlling time itself ? Or something completely else ?
Beside the darklord, We also need a excentric King !!!
The classical prussian king would be this one:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frederick_ ... of_Prussia
How would he look like in Ravenloft ?

Perhaps the DL simply removed all aspects of his life that caused 'friction' and 'disorder' in his life, seeing them as sources of error. More specifically, he may have had his supposed loved ones killed for the sake of efficiency.

It may not fit a Prussian theme, but there is this particular fellow
Prince Ludwig of Bavaria http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludwig_II_of_Bavaria

He was a flighty, delusional man obsessed with fantasy and being isolated from the outside world. Maybe this would make a good darklord - he hates the boring, preicatable people of his domain - but he also depends on them on being too lawful to question his insane orders.

Oh, another good idea !!!! The "Kini" as DL....not bad !! His "act of ultimate evil" could have been, that he sacrificed literaly everything to create his dream - the wonderous beautyfull fairytale-castle on the top of the highest mountain of the domain. But by achieving this goal, he lost all other things in his live, even his sanity. He is completely alone - all his family-members are dead; He is not longer the real king of the domain - the national parliament declared him "unzurechnungsfähig" and gouverns the land now without him and even his dreams shattered after the castles construction - his life did not change into an everlasting fairytale of high adventure and romance. Instead, it became even more boring because the beautyfull castle is some kind of selfcreated prison for the mad king.

Another good point for a "ravenloftian" Prussia could be the "pagan" heritage of the prussians. The "Pruzzen", as they where called during the middleadges remained pagen for a very long time and where conquered in a bloody crusade by the knights of the teutonic order.
Perhaps it could have been similar in our Ravenloft-domain ? And deep in the woods dwells a old hag (once the high-druid of a pagan tribe) who hates the modern and orderly times...that would picture the difference between the stereotypical savage and dense dark woods and the high civilised and orderly cultivated lands inhabited by the humans...