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wonderfulworldofdarklords · 22 days

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In one week: good old-fashioned nightmare fuel!

#wonderful world of darklords #ravenloft #dnd #podcast #animation #studio ghibli #princess mononoke #I tried to eat pork lo mein after seeing this movie for the first time and got physically ill

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wonderfulworldofdarklords · 27 days

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Welcome to Wonderful World of Darklords! In this episode, we tackle Disney's most terrifying setting to date, as explored in a horror movie that was absolutely not a soulless cash grab: the Hundred Acre Wood. Topics discussed include:

The surprising connections between Winnie the Pooh, a darklord ruled by his basest appetites, and another darklord from a recent episode;

The rich narrative possibility of an uneasy alliance with Heffalumps and Woozles, and the pitfalls of teaming up with such untrustworthy creatures even when they're the only things the darklord fears;

The horror potential of the source material, from Rabbit's heartless kidnapping scheme to a survival-horror frozen expotition to the North Pole;

Ideas to integrate Tigger with a certain other rakshasa, and how Kalakeri's themes intersect with those from the Hundred Acre Wood;

and more!

The full writeup for the Hundred Acre Wood s is available for free on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/posts/darklord-of-very-101391105?utm_medium=clipboard_copy&utm_source=copyLink&utm_campaign=postshare_creator&utm_content=join_link

All music recordings are in the public domain (mark 1.0) and are licensed through https://musopen.org:

Chopin Nocturne in B-Flat Minor, Op. 9 No.1 (main theme), performed by Eduardo Vinuela

Chopin Etude Op. 25, No. 12 in C Minor: “Ocean” (darklord theme), performed by Edward Neeman

Chopin Nocturne in F Minor, Op. 55 No. 1 (land theme), performed by Luke Faulkner

Chopin Nocturne in E Minor, Op. 72 No. 1 (parting thoughts), performed by Luke Faulkner

Dialog for Yensid was written by Azalin Rex himself @darklordazalin

The Wonderful World of Darklords logo was designed by Halite Jones, whom you can find @halite-jones or on Instagram at http://www.instagram.com/insta_halite

Contact us on:

Gmail: [email protected]

Facebook: @wonderfulworldofdarklords

Tumblr: @wonderfulworldofdarklords

Patreon: www.patreon.com/WonderfulWorldofDarklords

#wonderful world of darklords #ravenloft #dnd #podcast #disney movies #curse of strahd #disney #animation #winnie the pooh #april fool's day #i could have sworn i saw a picture of pooh as strahd somewhere but now i can't find it

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wonderfulworldofdarklords · 1 month

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I feel compelled to add something ridiculous about OG wererats.

So in old Richemulot, the major theme was paranoia. You never knew who was a wererat and who wasn't, so you never knew who to trust.

Obviously, they couldn't have wererats be vulnerable to silver, because then you could just go around shaking people's hands with a silver ring on and you'd have a foolproof wererat detector. They couldn't have them all be vulnerable to something weird, either, because as soon as the PCs discover that all wererats are vulnerable to pine sap or whatever, they break Richemulot. So instead they decided that every individual wererat has a unique allergen, and even they don't know what that allergen is until they come into contact with it for the first time.

Sounds cool in theory. In practice it got silly.

Claude's allergen was lye. Jacqueline killed him by putting lye in his brandy. This never would have killed anyone who didn't have lye as an allergen, I suppose. (And yes, wererats are technically immune to poison other than their allergens, but lye is an acid. If you drink it, it just does to your esophagus what it would do to your hand if you spilled it on yourself. I hold that you can kill ANY wererat by putting lye in their brandy. Even Ivan and Ivana wouldn't be too thrilled about drinking something that causes corrosive burns instead of systemic toxicity, if you were wondering how I'd manage to work in Borca.)

Jacqueline's allergen is dove feathers. Why does she even have an allergen? How will anyone find this out?

My personal favorite: Jacqueline's sister Louise is allergic to curry. Curry isn't a specific spice, it's a spice blend; it's like being allergic to pumpkin spice. According to Wikipedia, it typically includes turmeric, coriander, fenugreek, cinnamon, cumin, black pepper, ginger, and cardamom. Now, disregarding that this would cost a king's ransom in a faux medieval setting: so is it this specific combination that gets her? If you leave out the fenugreek, will she be fine? Or is she just allergic to one of the spices? But then why not say her allergen is cumin? For some reason, this is the exact moment when my suspension of disbelief snapped.

Azalin Reviews: Darklord Claude Renier

Darklord: Claude Renier Domain: Richemulot Domain Formation: 694 BC Sources: Realm of Terror (2e), Gazetteer 2 (3e), Gazetteer 3 (3e), Legacy of Blood (3e)

Scholars have determined that prior to being claimed by the Mists, the Renier family was made of two branches – high born nobles that used their influence for the betterment of society and a clan of wererats that did the opposite. The Renier family have a complicated history in the Demiplane of Dread and the first known Reniers to stumble into the Mists settled in Mordent. Their patriarch, Jacques Renier, built the House on Gryphon Hill as well as Heather House, the current dwelling of the Weathermay family. It becomes more complex as the wererat curse developed in Jacques’s offspring, splitting the family further. This rivalry between the human and wererat side of the family only increased when Claude Renier and his pack of wererats fled into the Mists and found themselves in the city of Silbervas in Falkovnia.

Claude quickly integrated his family with the local wererats that lived in the sewers of Silbervas and created a thriving thieves’ guild that integrated with the humanoids of Silbervas. As in the manner of rats, Claude’s influence rapidly multiplied and eventually drew the attention of Falkovnia’s little mercenary, Vlad Drakov and his band of more talented thugs, the Talons. Vlad oversaw the extermination of the wererats in Silbervas and to everyone’s surprise, was quite successful in his endeavors. Over the course of three years, which have been aptly named ‘The Years of the Impaled Rats’, Vlad flushed out the wererats from the sewers of Silbervas causing Claude to flee into the Mists once more.

As if being defeated by Vlad Drakov wasn’t torment enough, the Dark Powers created a prison in the form of Richemulot just for Claude Renier. From Chateau Delanuit in Pont-A-Museau, Claude ruled over the governing bodies of Richemulot as well as his own family. He ruled through manipulation and ensuring the other wererats were too busy vying for his attention to plot against him. He paid particular attention to his twin granddaughters, Jacqueline and Louise Renier. Seeing as Jacqueline eventually usurped her grandfather’s position as the Darklord of Richemulot, one can imagine how well this worked out for the twitchy rat.

Claude Renier is little more than a footnote in Jacqueline’s story. A footnote that was defeated by Vlad Drakov who couldn’t win a battle against a single zombie…I rarely agree with our tormentors, but in this case they were well advised to throw Claude to the rats and deliver the carcass of his domain to Jacqueline.

#ravenloft #dnd #wererat #Jacqueline Renier #Richemulot #old ravenloft lore #silly lycanthrope tricks #rules lawyering

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wonderfulworldofdarklords · 1 month

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We've had several people ask about converting some non-Disney properties to Ravenloft domains, and there aren't enough Aprils to cover them all. Thus: the Listener's Choice poll!

Last month, we asked our Discord what non-Disney domain they'd most like to see (if it's a Disney domain and we have any ideas for it at all, we're already working on it). We're presenting the top four choices on our Patreon, and we're hoping to get that domain out as a bonus episode in fall. Voting is open to everyone, not just patrons. If you've had a hankering to see us branch out into video games, anime, or R-rated live action, now is your moment!

#wonderful world of darklords #ravenloft #podcast

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wonderfulworldofdarklords · 2 months

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Welcome to Wonderful World of Darklords! While superheroes and D&D are staples of geek culture, they don't necessarily go together; the occasional Sorcerer Supreme notwithstanding, superheroes are more associated with sci-fi than high fantasy. Luckily, not only is there a D&D setting that lets us embrace the technowizardry of Big Hero 6 without throwing all the fantasy tropes out the window, but it's a setting that doesn't have a full domain to its name yet. Topics discussed include:

How to get an ongoing story engine out of Callaghan/Yokai when his only goal in the movie is "kill this one guy;"

Horror possibilities for a dark superhero setting that are less obvious than the edgelord excesses of the 90s (please, we beg of you, don't make Gail Simone angry);

Settings and plot hooks suggested by the criminally underrated Big Hero 6 TV show, from secondary antagonists to sinister underworld cooking competitions, and an overarching theme to make them feel coherent with the domain;

Possibilities for the Big Hero 6 team that go beyond our go-to response of "kill them off so they aren't getting in the way of the PCs;"

and more!

The full writeup for San Fransokyo (or its non-copyright equivalent, San Franciskyoto) is available for free on DM's Guild: https://www.dmsguild.com/product/472549/San-Franciskyoto-A-Ravenloft-Domain-of-Dread?affiliate_id=241770

All music recordings are in the public domain (mark 1.0) and are licensed through https://musopen.org:

Chopin Nocturne in B-Flat Minor, Op. 9 No.1 (main theme), performed by Eduardo Vinuela

Chopin Etude Op. 25, No. 12 in C Minor: “Ocean” (darklord theme), performed by Edward Neeman

Chopin Nocturne in F Minor, Op. 55 No. 1 (land theme), performed by Luke Faulkner

Rachmaninoff Morceaux de Fantaisie, Op. 3 - 2. Prélude in C sharp minor (Dread Possibilities), performed by Sergei Rachmaninoff

Chopin Nocturne in E Minor, Op. 72 No. 1 (parting thoughts), performed by Luke Faulkner

Dialog for Yensid was written by Azalin Rex himself @darklordazalin

The Wonderful World of Darklords logo was designed by Halite Jones, whom you can find @halite-jones or on on Instagram at http://www.instagram.com/insta_halite

Contact us on:

Gmail: [email protected]

Facebook: @wonderfulworldofdarklords

Tumblr: @wonderfulworldofdarklords

Patreon: www.patreon.com/WonderfulWorldofDarklords

#wonderful world of darklords #ravenloft #dnd #podcast #disney movies #curse of strahd #disney #animation #dms guild #big hero 6 #big hero six #baymax #WE CAN BE IMMORTALS

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wonderfulworldofdarklords · 2 months

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In one week, we return to the halcyon days when we didn't have superhero fatigue.

#wonderful world of darklords #podcast #disney movies #ravenloft #curse of strahd #disney #dnd

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wonderfulworldofdarklords · 2 months

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On a Disney podcast, dear,

Why is there live theater here?

Why this Broadway musical?

It ain't right, and it ain't natural.

Listener, it's Hadestown. Regardless of how long anyone was gone and how lonesome we were or weren't, we couldn't resist such a perfect darklord and domain--especially since we're just coming off another domain with Hades as a darklord. Topics discussed include:

A bit of reiterating who we are and what we do here at Wonderful World of Darklords, since we recognize that we might have people who will just click on anything with "Hadestown" in the title (and we can't blame them);

How to adapt the gods of Hadestown to non-gods in Ravenloft, including some canonical characters who map surprisingly well to Hermes and the Fates;

The horror inherent to both Hadestown proper and Up Top, and how to make your PCs feel the loss of Persephone's summer bounty;

Plot hooks that allow your PCs to fill the Orpheus role without necessarily having a star-crossed lover;

and more!

Click on the link or not, little songbird. The choice is yours if you're willing to choose, seeing as how you've got nothing to lose...

The full writeup for Hadestown is available for free on DM's Guild: https://www.dmsguild.com/product/468990/Hades-Town-A-Ravenloft-Domain-of-Dread?affiliate_id=241770