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Strahd Von Zarovich, Darklord of Barovia

Strahd Von Zarovich, Darklord of Barovia

Strahd as he appears in Curse of Strahd

The oldest established of Ravenloft's Darklords, Strahd fought a lifelong battle to reclaim his ancestral lands from the Tergs. After they were pacified, his younger brother, a cleric named Sergei, came to live with him. When Sergei fell in love with a village maiden named Tatyana, Strahd coveted her and tried to woo her away, failing due to his greater age and her love for Sergei. Finally, he transformed himself into a vampire, slaughtered his brother and his brother's wedding reception, then tried to Mind Rape Tatyana into becoming his wife with the use of his innate Charm Person ability, only for her to resist and leap to her death over the castle wall. His curse is that, every generation, Tatyana is reincarnated and he tries to woo her again, but she invariably dies, usually after or while spurning his advances in horror.

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• Affably Evil: He is very civil, and even nice when he wants or needs to be, and holds himself to the high standards of aristocratic behavior. When travelers arrive in Barovia, he usually treats them as guests provided they aren't hostile at first, and will even offer them a chance to talk peacefully. Of course, he's still a murderous vampire and a monster.
• Age Lift: Originally, Strahd was 52 when he turned into a vampire. In 5th edition, he was 45 when he turned.
• Cain and Abel: The Cain to his brother Sergei's Abel, given that he murdered Sergei out of envy.
• Classical Movie Vampire: Most of his art depicts him as resembling a certain other famous vampire. He's generally seen as the most iconic vampire in the franchise, and was called the greatest D&D villain of all time by Dragon Magazine in its final issue.
• Cosmic Keystone: As the very first darklord, Strahd is integral to the nature of the demiplane itself. Some sourcebooks imply that, if Strahd were to escape or permanently die, all domains would dissolve.
• Crazy-Prepared: He always keeps a Contingency spell cast upon himself which casts a Teleport Without Error if he's exposed to sunlight, teleporting him to a hidden lair in the mountains of Barovia where he can heal and rest.
• Deal with the Devil:
  • He makes a deal with an entity^note Likely a manifestation of the Dark Powers called Death to become a Vampire. In Curse of Strahd this pact was with a Vestige called Vamphyr.
  • He also made a deal while still mortal with the arcanaloth Inajira, bargaining for military success in return for eternal servitude, and receiving a valuable artifact from Inajira as collateral — only for Strahd and the artifact to be snatched up by the mists a few years later, frustrating Inajira. During the Grand Conjunction, Inajira finally managed to confront Strahd, only to have the artifact destroyed and end up trapped in Ravenloft too.
• Depraved Bisexual: In Curse of Strahd, it's made clear that Strahd isn't opposed to seducing attractive PCs regardless of gender, and he has a male consort as well. Of course, his true affections are for Tatyana. Who can be reincarnated as a man, as of Van Richten's Guide To Ravenloft
• Dogged Nice Guy: How he acted towards Tatyana, his brother's fiancée, at first. Later horrifically deconstructed as his attempts to woo Tatyana lead him to believe that he could never win her through kindness, leading him to trying to forcibly make her fall for him instead, leading to his Act of Ultimate Darkness.
• Elite Mooks: An accomplished necromancer, he's created legions of his own personal brand of zombies and skeletons, who are much harder to turn than normal undead and have special traits.
  • Strahd skeletons turn as wights, move unusually swiftly, and are more resistant against nonmagical weapons than normal skeletons are.
  • Strahd zombies turn as mummies, induce horror checks from their appearance, have taloned claws on their hands, and their severed limbs move independently on the ground (necessitating another horror check) continuing to attack until the zombie's hit points are completely gone.
• Enemy Without: The third of the Ravenloft Gazetteers, sourcebooks on the various domains of the Core released for 3rd edition, has a sidebar in the chapter on Mordent presenting this as a possible way to reconcile Strahd's backstory from the original Castle Ravenloft adventure, his reappearance in The House on Gryphon Hill, and Strahd's backstory after the Demiplane of Dread became its own setting. In short, the original Count Strahd von Zarovich was a decent man with a knack for alchemy who lived in the region that would become the Domain of Mordent. Harrowed by his darker impulses, he used an experimental magical-alchemic device known as the Apparatus to separate his evil side from himself and cast it away. Unbeknownst to the Alchemist, this dark side was reincarnated elsewhere in the multiverse, and became the Strahd von Zarovich who conquered/reclaimed Barovia and ultimately damned himself to vampiredom. During that nebulous period in which Barovia was alone in the Mists, with the aid of then-newcomer Azalin, the vampire was able to peer through the planes and see his "light side" as he went about his life. Bitter and resentful, Strahd was able to use the then-looser nature of his prison to try and project himself into the Alchemist's homeworld, seeking to take control of the Apparatus and use it to switch bodies with his human counterpart. Things went disastrously wrong, and thus was Mordent drawn into the Demiplane of Dread itself.
• Entitled to Have You: Strahd feels this way about Tatyana's reincarnations. He's the lord of Barovia, wealthy, intelligent, powerful and forever beautiful, she "should" be happily falling into his arms. He fails to see that Tatyana never saw him as romance material even before he became a monstrous vampire and even if she did Tatyana's reincarnations are completely different people.
• Evil Niece: His grandniece, Lyssa von Zarovich, a vampire with power beyond her years, who plots to take over Barovia.
• Evil Versus Evil: In the past, he's counted both Azalin and Soth among his enemies. That doesn't mean they haven't collaborated when the situation calls for it; all three of them not only share an alignment and, to a point, worldview and are too pragmatic and competent not to.
• Expy: Pretty much the D&D version of Count Dracula. Taken to the next level when his art was used for Dracula on the box of Castlevania II: Simon's Quest.
  • The "optionally canon" story of the Alchemist in 3rd edition also makes him one to The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.
• Fallen Hero:
  • Originally renowned as a heroic general on his homeworld with ideals similar to a paladin's, he bravely defended Barovia from savage barbarians, becoming ruler of his people as a result. His Start of Darkness came much later.
  • Subverted with his Curse of Strahd depiction. While he was a fearless leader and did have some amount of heroic traits, it's implied that even from a young age Strahd wasn't a good person; his mother was noted to be wary of him, and some of his more infamous acts were committed before he was a vampire. The prequel novel I, Strahd meanwhile depicts him as a fair but brutal ruler, who created stability but still saw himself as inherently superior to the common rabble, and was absolutely merciless to even minor criminals.
  • Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft splits the difference a bit. It's never stated if he was ever a good person, and his Noble Demon traits from older editions goes unmentioned, but it's also stated that he worked with great heroes and defeated an evil lich. If Strahd had died younger, he would've been remembered as a hero.
• Genius Bruiser: With his vampire powers and a lifetime of combat experience, Strahd is a dangerous physical opponent and yet it is his brilliant mind that makes him a true terror. Notably, his highest score is Intelligence, at 20, and all of his other mental scores are very high as well.
• Go-to Alias: Occasionally dons the name Vasili von Holtz, a persona he constructed as the capable, yet less terrifying envoy of Strahd himself, whenever he needs to interact with his subjects in a more frank and direct manner when his own overlordship status would get in the way.
• Green-Eyed Monster: The cause of his damnation, when he returned from a lifetime of war after the raw strength of youth was spent to find his younger brother, still strong and vital, preparing to marry a woman they both loved. Invariably reverts to this when Tatyana's latest reincarnation stays out of his reach.
• Identical Grandson: Invoked. Strahd publicly pretends to be merely a long line of suspiciously identical monarchs all named Strahd. In the Curse of Strahd module, this was removed and instead he's been a Shadow Dictator from the start.
• Ignored Epiphany: A part of him still loves his brother and he is filled with sorrow when he remembers murdering him. But what he doesn't feel are regret or remorse, because those emotions would require Strahd to admit that doing anything in his lust to possess Tatyana wasn't really worth it in the end, and he's as capable of that as he is swimming through running water.
• Jack of All Stats: All of his stats are at or above 16, except his Constitution, which he lacks thanks to being undead. He's well versed in both magic and sword fighting, and with his intelligence, he's good at adapting to the situation.
• The Jailbait Wait: He is always doing this in some form or other, what with Tatyana constantly reincarnating; if he happens to find her at a point in the cycle where she's still a child, as happens with Ireena, he'll keep an eye on her but will do nothing until she's grown up.
• Know When to Fold 'Em: When he's brought into conflict with Lord Soth, he realizes Soth is both comparable in power to him and basically rampaging through his domain. His response is just to give Soth what he wants so he'll leave.
• Lawful Evil: In-Universe — it's the official Character Alignment given in his profile writeups. He is an evil parasite on the Barovian people, but he holds himself to high standards and runs a tight ship, keeping them safe from other dangers both because he still feels a twinge of aristocratic duty to ensure their protection and for the very pragmatic reason that they're essentially his larder. He also does his best to stay polite and proper, and is willing to let people go alive rather than killed if need be.
• Loving a Shadow: Even before becoming a vampire, Strahd's love for Tatyana seems to have been this; in I, Strahd, he views her more as an idol of perfection than a true equal. While she and Sergei fell in love while working to help the poor, he found the idea of someone as perfect as her being anywhere near the common rabble disgraceful, and never minded that she wanted to help them. He also seemed to believe the reason she rejected him was his age, rather than because she genuinely loved Sergei.
• Love Makes You Dumb: Well, for a given value of "dumb". When pursuing one of Tatyana's reincarnations, Strahd will take risks he wouldn't normally take and is subject to oversights and miscalculations in his lust to possess her that would otherwise be at odds with his brilliant mind and detached, pragmatic nature.
• Love Makes You Evil: He made his covenant with death and murdered Sergei just so he could have Tatyana. It didn't really work out.
• Magic Knight: A powerful necromantic wizard and a skilled swordfighter and general, both traits augmented by his vampiric nature.
• Monster Progenitor: As of Fifth Edition, it is rumored that he is the very first vampire ever to exist.
• Mortality Phobia: Even before Tatyana entered the equation, Strahd was already angsting over his increasing age and the knowledge that he had more of his life behind him than ahead of him (and most of that had been spent in endless war); that his much younger, stronger brother was so full of vigor didn't help matters, and Tatyana herself inadvertantly fuled this by always adressing him as "Old One" (which was supposed to be a show of respect but only made him more self-concious).
• My God, What Have I Done?: In Curse of Strahd, if the adventurers find and confront him in Sergei's tomb, he will be lying across the coffin, weeping.
• Necromancer: A very, very good one. He's invented unique variants on classic undead types, such as zombies, skeletons, and skeleton horses, that are much more powerful than standard variations. Strahd zombies, for instance, are highly resistant to turning and continue to fight with severed pieces even when they're cut apart, while Strahd skeletons make tons of attacks per round, see through invisibility, and have magic resistance.
• Ominous Pipe Organ: He is quite good at playing one, as shown when he has his duet with Jander Sunstar in Vampire of the Mists.
• Our Vampires Are Different: He became a vampire by making a Deal with the Devil instead of being infected like a lot of other vampires. Fifth edition offers the legend that he might actually be the first vampire in the broader D&D meta-continuity.
• Protectorate: Rare villainous example; while Strahd himself preys on Barovia, no other Ravenloft villain had better even think about messing with his property or people.
• Reincarnation Romance: What Strahd tries to engineer with Tatyana about once a generation. It'll NEVER work.
• Retcon: Not to the extent of some other Darklords on this list, but he was hit with some minor ones throughout his existence. Curse of Strahd had to do some reworking to make Barovia work as a setting independent of the other Domains of Dread:
  • Any reference to Strahd's family outside of Barov, Ravenovia and Sergei were removed.
  • Strahd being a Shadow Dictator through My Grandson, Myself was dropped. He now openly (if absently) rules Barovia, and his people are very aware of his nature.
  • His powers now came from a Vestige trapped in the Amber Temple, and not "Death". It's left ambiguous if these vestiges are the Dark Powers, or if they are separate entities, but the book does treat them as different entities.
• Shadow Dictator: While he's the political ruler of Barovia, few of his subjects have ever seen him, as he rarely appears in public. Few know that he's anything other than human, although they do know he is a wizard who has lived longer than any man has a right to. (Some call him "the Devil Strahd", but do not mean it literally.)
  • The burgomasters and village leaders across Barovia who have the unfortunate need to interact with Strahd more than most may suspect something of his true nature. In one novel featuring van Richten invading Castle Ravenloft to find clues as to Strahd's true history, it is stated that in his mission prep, he'd learned from those Barovian leaders that there had been no sign of Strahd in nearly twenty years, and yet they follow his last orders, collect his taxes and behave as though he'll show up to check their work at any moment.
• Sibling Triangle: His downfall; he and his brother fell in love with the same woman, who only loved his brother.
• Single-Target Sexuality: 5e takes this to its logical exteme. Tatyana can be reincarnated as a man, a blood relative or something not human at all and Strahd will still focus on winning them.
• Stronger with Age: His advanced age as a vampire has made him tougher than most. Garlic, mirrors, and holy symbols don't bother him^note He still has no reflection and can still be turned., and he can survive sunlight for a full turn (about ten minutes) safely. Thanks to the nature of Barovia as well, he isn't affected by sunlight either, which means the only weakness he can't escape from is running water.
• Villainous Incest: Implied, since one of the potential reincarnations for Tatyana in 5e is Lyssa von Zarovich, a distant niece of Strahd.

Ivana Boritsi, Darklord of Borca

Ivana Boritsi, Darklord of Borca

The young heir of Borca

A beautiful woman who looks 18 despite being in her 60s. A scion of the noble Boritsi family, Ivana has very different backstories depending on edition.

In her original lore, Ivana is amongst the small number of "inherited" Darklords, having gained dominion over Borca when she transformed her friend Nostalia Romaine into the first ermordenung and used her to assassinate Ivana's mother Camille, which was done in retribution for Camille's abusive upbringing, most notably her seducing Ivana's lover Pieter and deliberately arranging for Ivana to catch them in bed together so she could goad her daughter into murdering her first love with a poisoned kiss. This Ivana is a decadent hedonist who simultaneously yearns to be loved and has lost all faith in love; she relishes in breaking up loving couples out of spiteful envy, and in seducing men only to then slay them with her poisons. Despite being the true Darklord of Borca, post-Grand Conjunction, she cares little for actually ruling and leaves most of Borca's daily affairs in the mercurial hands of her cousin, Ivan Dilisnya. Her curse is two-fold; in addition to her constant yearning for love that her poisonous touch denies her and which she tries to repress, her beautiful appearance changes into a hideous one at night, which she is aware of because she retains that form for the first minute of her awakeningr.

In her fifth edition lore, Ivana poisoned her mother in revenge for sleeping with her lover (whom she also poisoned), then poisoned her brothers to force her father to name her successor. Her father, however, refused to see her as the competent politician that she was, instead leaving his fortune to her cousin, Ivan. Ivana had foreseen this, however, and murdered her father as well, taking the family fortune by force. Her curse is twofold; Despite being a highly competent schemer and poisoner, her youth and the sexism of Borcan society prevents her from getting the recognition she deserves. Her orders are doubted, and, once they inevitably bear fruit, her success is assumed to be the manipulation of her cousin Ivan. Secondly, she lacks a true equal in Borca. She desires someone to rival her in intellect and ambition, someone to share her life with, but is forever disappointed by boorish nobles.

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• Acquired Poison Immunity: Immune to poison, like her cousin, making their constant attempts to poison each other a wasted effort.
• Affably Evil: Regardlelss of edition, Ivana is highly adept at keeping up a façade of being a beautiful, intelligent and respectful noblewoman.
• Aristocrats Are Evil: She's the co-ruler of Borca along with being its darklord, with the rest of the aristocracy mostly being filled with her Ermordenung. And as a Darklord, she is by definition among the evilest of the evil.
• Black Widow: Pre-5th edition Ivana enjoys seducing and then murdering men just to reinforce her belief that love is a fiction and a fraud. She is even secretly known as "Ivana the Black" (as in "black widow") amongst the people of Borca for how many of her suitors have perished either mysteriously or due to having "attacked" Ivana.
• Chaotic Evil: In-Universe — it's the official Character Alignment given in her profile writeups.
• The Dragon: Hers would be Nostalia Romaine, her best friend since childhood and the first of her subjects to become one of the dreaded ermordenung. Still undyingly loyal to Ivana, she has a great deal of influence on who else receives this "gift".
• Expy: Of the title character of "Rappaccini's Daughter".

• Game Face: Pre-5th edition, Ivana reverts to the appearance of a poisoned near-corpse when she sleeps; her skin becomes a pallid grey crisscrossed with blackened veins, her face swells, her blackened tongue swells from her mouth, and her breathing visibly seems strained.
• The Hedonist: Pre-5th edition, she was defined as a terrible ruler who cares only for indulging her vanities and whims in a desperate attempt to deny how fundamentally lonely she is.
• Heir Club for Men: Not explicit, but strongly implied in her 5th edition lore. Her father never considered her worthy of inheriting the Borca legacy, despite her being a highly shrewd and competent woman. He would rather leave the fortune to her incompetent cousin Ivan, if there was no other option.
• I Have No Son!: A "Dread Possibility" planned for the Ravenloft Gazeteer IV but cut due to lack of space is that there is a persistent rumor, especially in lands beyond Borca, that Ivana has an illegitimate daughter that she had smuggled away from Borca. There have even been a number of individuals who have claimed to be this daughter, either as part of a deliberate con game or due to having been tricked by unscrupulous guardians. Such girls receive a very fatal welcome if they ever set foot in Borca; Ivana is well aware that her poisonous flesh makes her barren, and she does not take their lies gracefully...
• Immortality Begins at Twenty: Pre-5th edition, at least, she still looks like a beautiful 18 year old girl despite being 68.
• Lonely at the Top: Her explicit problem in 5E, and what makes it an Ironic Hell, is that she desperately wants a friend - not just a lover, an equal. However, she regards all equals as threats, and so she inevitable murders them, leaving her lonely and miserable.
• Kissing Cousins: During the chaos of the Grand Conjunction, she and Ivan sought comfort in each other's arms. Since they were in close proximity when it settled, and Ivana had the stronger personality, their domains merged under the name of Borca. These days, this is very much inverted, as they despise each other, largely due to Ivan's jealous belief that Ivana is hiding the secret of eternal youth from him and refusal to believe her when she insists that she doesn't know why she has stopped aging.
• Monster Progenitor: She is the creator of the Ermordenung, humans transmuted into Poisonous Persons by an alchemical concoction of Ivana's own creation. She herself is basically a uniquely powerful ermordenung, thanks to the gifts of the Dark Powers.
• Murder Is the Best Solution: Regardless of edition, Ivana's downfall stems from her willingness to punish perceived offenses with murder. Your mom is a corrupt bitch who slept with your boyfriend? Kill them both. Your brothers come before you in the line of succession? Kill'em dead. Your dad is an ass who'd rather give the family fortune to your cousin than you? Poison him and watch as he chokes to death.
• Non-Action Big Bad: She has no Levels in any class (though in 3e she was given levels in the NPC classes Aristocrat and Expert) and no combat skills, meaning she could be killed quickly if an enemy got close to her. Seeing as she can turn any substance a would-be assailant has eaten while in Borca to lethal poison, that isn't likely.
• Older Than They Look: She hasn't aged a day since becoming a Darklord. This is part of her curse, since it adds to the image of naïve childishness people see in her.
• Poisonous Person: Quite literally; her body is saturated with a potent venom, allowing her to kill with a touch and making her immune to poison. When she seals her domain's borders, it catalyzes any liquid drunk whilst within Borca into a fast-acting, deadly toxin that will kill unless the victim turns back — in 5e, she simply creates a lethally poisonous fog on her borders instead. In 3rd edition, she also can sense poison in her presence and has levels in the Court Poisoner prestige class, making her able to create and apply poisons. In 5th edition, she is able to brew fantastic toxins that can mimic the effects of various spells.
• Red Right Hand: Pre-5th edition, even during the day, Ivana's poisonous nature is revealed by the sickly blue color of her nails and lips, which she covers up with makeup. In 5th edition, she's lost her Game Face, but instead her veins are discolored in bright red and black, standing out through her pale skin.
• The Tape Knew You Would Say That: In 5th Edition, she has a toxin that creates a dream recording of herself. She explicitly uses it to fake telepathy, since she's skilled enough at reading people to guess how people react to it.
• Villainous Friendship: With Nostalia Romaine, the first of her ermordenung and her advisor.
• You Kill It, You Bought It: After she had Nostalia Romaine kill her mother, she assumed her rulership of Borca, and rose as a replacement Darklord.

Ivan Dilisnya, Darklord of Borca (former Darklord of Dorvinia)

Ivan Dilisnya, Darklord of Borca (former Darklord of Dorvinia)

Cousin of Ivana Boritsi, Ivan was originally conceived of as the Darklord of his own small domain, Dorvinia, but his redundancy with his cousin led to him being downgraded. Like Ivana, he has very different lore between editions.

In Ivan's original lore, he was Ivana's cousin who was born on the same night as she; this led to the people of their lands nicknaming them "The Dark Twins" and the night of their birth as "The Day of the Dark Moon's Get". A sociopath, Ivan was torturing small animals from the age of six and murdered his first human victim (a servant girl who stole a pastry) at the age of ten. By age twelve, he had fatally poisoned his own mother for no reason. The only exception to his cruelty was his beloved elder sister, Kristina, who refused to see her brother's wickedness and doted on him. His love for her became a twisted, possessive feeling, and when she fell in love and married, he took that as a betrayal; when she gave birth, that pushed him over the edge, and he murdered his sister and her husband both — only the brave intervention of the midwife, who fled with the child, kept him from killing the baby too. This was the last straw for his family, who drove him away. He briefly became the ruler of his own realm, Dorvinia, but after the Grand Conjunction, it was absorbed into Borca. Ivan now exists as a kind of "sub-Darklord"; he retains his former curse and inability to leave Borca's borders, but has no ability to close its borders. Despite being in his seventies, he still appears only middle-aged, with thick grey hair streaked with blonde and still-handsome features, and has the vigor of a man half his age. He is largely the one who runs Borca, as his cousin Ivana prefers to wallow in her own hedonism, but he is a notoriously corrupt, mercurial and hedonistic individual himselfe.

In 5th edition, Ivan was brought up wanting for nothing. His family indulged his every wish and petty desire, and none dared oppose him. Ivan never had any interest in inheriting the family business, however, and would rather spend his days playing with clockwork toys and his sister, the only person he ever showed any affection. Over time, his family grew concerned over his childish attitude, and elected to send their daughter to a boarding school. Ivan did not take this well, and that night the Dilisnya estate was filled by screams and the whirring of clockwork. Before the sun rose, the estate had been claimed by the Mists. This iteration of Ivan has no official Darklord status, but remains largely sessile in his lair. He appears as an ancient man in an intricately designed clockwork chair cum life-support system.

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• Acquired Poison Immunity: Like his cousin, he's immune to poison. In fact he's addicted to a certain deadly poison and puts it in all his food, making breaking bread with him a dicey proposition.
• Age Without Youth: In 5th edition, he is a hideously ancient old man, but the Dark Powers will not let him actually die of old age. It only intensifies his desire to learn the secret behind Ivana's eternal youth. The joke here being that eternal youth is part of Ivana's curse; no matter how old she actually is, she looks so young people will always see her as an upstart.
• Aristocrats Are Evil: Co-ruler of Borca, and a Darklord like his cousin.
• Bad Boss: See Perfect Poison below. Yes, that one comes with the payroll.
• Brother–Sister Incest: Was obsessed with his sister, Kristina, to the point of being deeply envious of her husband, and poisoned them both, shortly after she gave birth. (Fortunately, the midwife snuck the baby away.)
• Chaotic Evil: In-Universe — it's the official Character Alignment given in his profile writeups.
• Foil: 5th edition makes him a perfect mirror to his cousin. Whereas Ivana is eternally young and struggles to be taken seriously as an aristocrat, Ivan has the body of a decrepit old man and really just wants to play childishly, and his only interest in power is out of petty jealousy for Ivana.
• Gadgeteer Genius: 5th edition Ivan is a brilliant construct builder, capable of creating Ridiculously Human Robots and virtually any construct he could want.
• Immortality Seeker: Desperately wants to learn the secret to his cousin Ivana's agelessness, and refuses to believe that she has no idea why it happened (even though this is the truth). This drove a wedge between them, when originally they had been close friends, in their original lore at least.
• Kissing Cousins: During the chaos of the Grand Conjunction, he and Ivana sought comfort in each other's arms. Since they were in close proximity when it settled, and Ivana had the stronger personality, their domains merged under the name of Borca. These days, this is very much inverted, as they despise each other.
• Large Ham: A rare in-universe example.
• Matricide: Poisoned his mother when he was twelve.
• Non-Action Big Bad: Same deal as his cousin; Ivan has no levels in actual character classes prior to 3rd edition, which gave him ranks in the NPC classes "Aristocrat" and "Expert" combined with the "Court Poisoner" prestige class. He still technically can fight especially when armed with his poisoned rapier, but he's not very good at it compared to player characters. Exaggerated in 5th edition, where his body is too decrepit to be any threat on its own.
• Offing the Offspring: Invoked but subverted in the Ravenloft Gazetteer IV web enhancement; during both her pregnancies, Lucretia Marzeya was so afraid of Ivan that she arranged for the babies to be smuggled out of Dorvinia and Ivan to be told they were stillborn, lest he murder them. Considering he went on to murder her, probably a good idea.
• Older Than They Look: Pre-5th edition Ivan is in his seventies, but looks a good deal younger, and has the vitality of a man half his age. That's not good enough for him, though.
• Perfect Poison: "Borrowed Time", which stays in your bloodstream for life and causes lethal convulsions every sunset unless you ingest the antidote, "Mercy", every day. Of course, Ivan is the only one who can create both.
• Poison and Cure Gambit: How Ivan typically uses "Borrowed Time" and "Mercy" - once successfully affecting someone with the former, he holds out on the latter unless the afflicted work for him. Not surprisingly, he sets this up in basically all who take his coin, and he's not above using this as a recruitment tool.
• Poisonous Person: Similar to his cousin, Ivana Boritsi, he has the ability to create and control poisons and drugs. He can transform an object he touches to be permanently poisonous, is an absolute master at brewing and wielding toxins, wields a permanently envenomed magical rapier called Wasptongue as his weapon of choice, and is immune to poison himself. He loses this trait in 5th edition for his Gadgeteer Genius trait.
• Psychopathic Man Child: 5th edition plays up this trait of his. Since he was always indulged as a child and never told no, he never really grew up. Even as an adult, all he cares about is childish games and his clockwork toys, and he feels that the world revolves around him.
• Sense Loss Sadness: His curse. When he was younger, fine food and drink were his greatest pleasure alongside killing people. When he became a darklord, he lost his sense of taste, leaving him empty and unsatisfied, unable to truly enjoy the luxury that surrounds him.
• Spoiled Brat: Ivan is basically what happens when you take one of these, make them capable of murder to get what they want or if they are denied, and then let them grow to adulthood without ever learning better or being punished.
• Til Murder Do Us Part: A "Dread Possibility" deleted for space from the Ravenloft Gazetteer IV establishes that Ivan was briefly married to a woman named Lucretia Marzeya, who bore him three children (twins and a single birth) over the four years of their marriage before he poisoned her in a fit of paranoid jealousy.
• Took a Level in Badass: Inverted. He lost his Poisonous Person traits in 5th edition, since it was considered redundant next to his cousin. His mechanical skills were played up instead. Likewise, he went from being the effective ruler of Borca due to his cousin's hedonism to being a crazy old man locked away on his estate whilst Ivana runs everything.

Tristen ApBlanc, Darklord of Forlorn

Tristen ApBlanc, Darklord of Forlorn

Altered in the womb when his newly-turned vampire father fed upon his pregnant wife but couldn't bring himself to kill her, Tristen's parents was murdered by a lynch mob shortly after his birth, but Tristen himself was saved by druids. When his vampyre nature emerged at age 15, he was seen running down and drinking the blood of a doe by his adopted mother, Rual. Knowing she had seen him, and later seeing her talking to some of the other druids, Tristen was convinced she had betrayed him and attacked her while she was meditating. She impaled him upon the point of a blessed deer antler when he leaped at her, and so he went into a frenzy and drunk her blood — as she had just drunk holy water before, though, this caused him intense pain. Believing she had poisoned him, he beat her to death, unaware that he was actually being cured of his vampyre nature. With her dying breath, she berated him for his fatal distrust of her and cursed him, causing him to be trapped in the small grove in which they had fought, as well as condemning him to walk as a vampyre by day, then painfully die and become a ghost each night, only to be resurrected equally painfully every morning. Tristen did not become Darklord of Forlorn until over three centuries later, after engineering a bloody civil war to become the ruler of the land that became Forlorn after the Mists took it.

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• Animorphism: He can transform into a worg.
• The Beastmaster: Wolves and worgs (giant evil wolves), with the added twist that he can raise dead ones as zombies.
• Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Tristen's good at pretending to be nice, but that's all it is — a pretense.
• Haunted Castle: Castle Tristenoira is home to the ghosts of Tristen's family.
• Neutral Evil: His official In-Universe alignment.
• Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot: Through the series of events that led to his curse, Tristen exists at alternating periods as a vampyre, a ghost, and as a human.
• Offing the Offspring: Tristen's first son died at the jaws of wolves his angry father set on his dog (Tristen didn't intend to kill him, and in fact attacked the wolves trying to save his son, but failed), and murdered his second son while intending to kill his son's priestly mentor. He merely locked his daughter up in the dungeon, but she was spirited away by unknown powers (revealed in the official adventure to be time-travelling adventurers).
• Our Ghosts Are Different: He's only a ghost at night, as the result of Rual's Dying Curse. As a fourth-magnitude D&D ghost, he can cause Rapid Aging among those who meet his gaze, keen twice per night (forcing a save vs. death at a -1 penalty among those who hear him), cause overwhelming revulsion with his touch, and dominate people in their sleep, requires +3 weapons to harm, and attempts to turn him are made at a penalty.
• Our Vampires Are Different: Tristen is a vampyre, a living species similar to vampires that also drinks blood. However, he also gained a few traits from his vampire father: Weapons need at least +1 Enchantment to harm him in vampyre form, he has unnatural strength, he can summon and temporarily control wolves and worgs, and he can take the form of a worg at will.
• Painful Transformation: Every sunset, Tristen dies and becomes a ghost; every sunrise, he rises once more as a vampyre. The process is agonizing.
• The Paralyzer: Aside from his ability to paralyze people as a ghost, he also closes his borders by paralyzing those who attempt to cross them.
• Pater Familicide: Falls short only because his daughter's fate is undetermined (see above).
• Super-Strength: He has 18/76 strength, meaning peak human strength plus a good deal extra.
• Tailor-Made Prison: Of particular note in Tristen's case; he can't go more than 300 feet beyond a specific tree in the courtyard of Castle Tristenoira. The domain itself is somewhat larger.
• Telepathy: With every goblyn in Forlorn.
• Unstuck in Time: Castle Tristenoira.
• Voluntary Shapeshifting: As a vampyre, Tristen can transform into a worg.
• Weaksauce Weakness: Tristen can't approach people or places with deer antlers, a consequence of his original death.
• Wicked Cultured: He was once, long ago. In Forlorn's current state, there's usually no-one for him to bother with.

Chakuna, Darklord of Valachan

Chakuna, Darklord of Valachan

Heartless Huntress

Originally a talented huntress of Valachan's Oselo people, the werepanther Chakuna became a Darklord by choice after killing Urik von Kharkov, her predecessor (See former Darklords), in order to protect her people from his Deadly Game, the trial of hearts. Now, she has to continue this bloody ritual in order to keep her people safe. And while her goal remains the same, she has come to enjoy her new role.

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• And Show It to You: She rips out her victims' hearts as part of her human sacrifices.
• Anti-Villain: Her main motivation is just to keep her people safe. The problem is just that Valachan contains more than one group of people.
• The Beastmaster: She is served by Yana, a Displacer Beast, who in turn leads vicious packs of her own kind.
• Beat Still, My Heart: Comes with being Valachan's Darklord. See Soul Jar.
• Blood Knight: Despite being initially disgusted by the trial of hearts, she has come to enjoy being the hunter.
• Bow and Sword in Accord: As a werepanther (a reflavored weretiger), she uses both a longbow and a Sinister Scimitar.
• Classical Hunter: The best hunter in Valachan, which is saying something in a domain that is just a huge jungle populated by Lycanthropes, blights and Lizard Folk.
• Corrupted Character Copy: A teenage girl, who is a talented huntress, volunteers to enter a Deadly Game in order to protect the people close to her. Hmmm...
• Earthy Barefoot Character: She is depicted barefoot, as part of her Jungle Princess / Mayincatec aesthetic .
• Fallen Hero: She initially just wanted to end the hunting of her people by the previous Darklord. In order to kill him for good, however,...
• Fisher Queen: Is implied to have a primordial control over the entire domain, from the trees to the blades of grass. The extent of this control is unknown and comes at a cost, as she must constantly sacrifice sentient beings to the land, otherwise the land itself could annihilate everyone in its borders.
• Human Sacrifice: She continuously needs to supply blood to the land itself in order to keep it from just killing everyone.
• Jungle Princess: A villainous example. Played With in that she wasn't Raised by Wolves and is also a native of the land.
• Mayincatec: She, and Valachan as a whole, are heavily inspired by Mesoamerican culture and rites of Human Sacrifice. This is a 5e Retcon as in previous editions Valachan was more of a Darkest Africa-lite mixed with Dark Ages tropes.
• Moral Event Horizon: Crossed it by becoming Darklord. In order to keep her people safe, she has to subjugate Valachan's other inhabitants (and unfortunate souls who got stranded there) to the same brutality she originally wanted to end.
• Older Than They Look: She stopped aging when she became a Darklord, retaining her teenage looks.
• Our Werebeasts Are Different: Like the rest of her people, the Oselo, she is a werepanther.
• Soul Jar: How becoming the Darklord of Valachan works: You need to find the current Darklord's beating heart in a hidden temple, rip out your own, eat the Darklord's and place your on the temple's altar. This is the only way to end a Darklord's Resurrective Immortality. Although in the case of her predecessor, not even this seems to work.
• Social Darwinist: Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft gives every Darklord quotes summing up their personality, ideals, bonds and flaws, like a player character. This is how the book sums up her ideal.
  Chakuna: If I’m cleverer than you, then I deserve to live, and you deserve to die.
• Teens Are Monsters: She outwardly retains the teenage looks she had when she became a Darklord.
• Tragic Villain: She entered the trial of hearts freely in order to save her people. After winning it and killing the Darklord, she learned that she has to continue the hunt in order to stop Valachan itself from just killing everybody else. But she has come to enjoy it...
• Trap Master: Heavily utilizes traps for hunting, as shown in her picture. A random encounter during the trial of hearts is even getting caught in one of her traps.
• You Kill It, You Bought It: How becoming Darklord in Valachan works. See Soul Jar for more.

Hazlik, Darklord of Hazlan

Hazlik, Darklord of Hazlan

The neglectful Darklord

A Red Wizard of Thay who had a bitter rivalry with a Red Wizardess named Thantosya, not helped by the fact Hazlik desired her lover, a man named Ordiab. Hazlik's downfall came when Thantosya and Ordiab engineered a plan to end the rivalry with Hazlik at last; during a night of courtly intrigue, Ordiab approached Hazlik, suggesting a tryst, but when Hazlik succumbed to passion, Thantosya stepped out with several of their superiors and accused Hazlik of assaulting Ordiab. The higher ranked Red Wizards tattooed arcane symbols of femininity over Hazlik's head and chest, burned his estate and cast him out of their ranks. Hazlik retreated to a bolthole, plotting revenge, and managed to chance upon his two enemies while out gathering reagents. He immediately attacked them, cutting out Ordiab's heart and forcing Thantosya to drink Ordiab's blood before he slashed her throat with a silver knife, for which the Mists claimed him.

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• Bald of Evil: With tattoos all over his head; baldness is actually common for the Red Wizards, but the tattoos are the type only women (or traitors, in 5e) have.
• Ban on Magic: Prior to the Grand Conjunction, Hazlik outlawed arcane magic in Hazlan. After the Conjunction temporarily returned him back home, and he saw how his enemies had advanced, he revoked the ban in the hopes of gaining revenge.
• Beard of Evil: Mustacheless goatee variant. Dropped in 5e, where he is utterly hairless.
• Big Brother Is Watching You: In 5e he can use the "eyes of Hazlik", symbols utilized by spellcasters to stabilize Hazlan's naturally occurring Wild Magic, to spy on people.
• Chaotic Evil: In-Universe — it's the official Character Alignment given in his profile writeups.
• Creative Sterility: Part of his Ironic Hell in 5e; he betrayed someone he loved in the belief that said lover stole his research, now he can only develop new magic by stealing it himself.
• Depraved Homosexual: Averted. He is a highly depraved individual, and he is homosexual, but the two factors have almost nothing in common. His Act of Ultimate Darkness wasn't because of his love of another man, it's because he betrayed said lover in a horrific fashion.
• Embarrassing Tattoo: Played for Drama. Hazlik's tattoos, inflicted on him by his enemies, mark him as effeminate. Literally; the tattoos he has all over him basically proclaim "I am a woman". As of 5e they mean "Traitor" instead.
• Evil Sorcerer: He's a member of the Red Wizards of Thay; it comes with the territory. 5e says that his torture of Indreficus was a bit far even for them, however.
• Evil Tower of Ominousness: The Red Tower in Venificus, Hazlik's personal estate.
• Foe Romance Subtext: Subverted in 5e, because that is the text; he came to have such a deep Friendly Rivalry with Indreficus that it blossomed into a passionate affair - part of why he inflicted a Fate Worse than Death on Indreficus was that he felt geniunely betrayed when the zulkirs faked Indreficus stealing Hazlik's research.
• Mistaken for Gay: Inverted, actually. Jealous gossips in Hazlan spread unsavory rumors concerning the nature of his relationship with his star pupil, a young woman named Elena, but it's quite impossible for them to be true given his homosexuality.
• Omnicidal Maniac: Is planning a genocidal ritual that will kill every Mulan (Hazlik's ethnic group) in existence — not just in the Demiplane, in existence. To put it in context: in the Forgotten Realms, the Mulan aren't just Thayans, they're also the main ethnic group of Mulhorand, the local Egyptian equivalent, and hinted to have actually been displaced ancient Egyptians.
• Retcon: A few minor ones in 5e.
  • His backstory was rewritten so that he instead was tricked by the Zulkirs to betray his lover, Indreficus, performing torturous experiments on him. Hazlik was claimed by the mist and gained Hazlan.
  • His tattoos now mean Traitor, not Woman.
  • He's no longer omnicidal, merely very careless with his magical experiments and not caring how he leaves Hazlan, as he is planning to escape.
  • In the first version of the Ravenloft setting (Realm of Terror) he was simply tattooed as humiliation by his enemies. In the second version of the setting (Ravenloft Campaign Setting aka the Red Box) the love-triangle element was added, but he murdered his female lover and fed her heart to her boyfriend (TSR at the time did not want homosexuality brought up in game settings). The lover was gender-flipped when White Wolf acquired the setting (at the very least, it gives a better reason why his punitive tattoos stigmatize him as a woman!).
• Revenge: Seeks revenge on his enemies back in his homeland.
• Soul Jar: His amulet acts as one. If he's killed his soul enters it, and takes over anyone who touches it and alters their body to match his original one.
• Straight Gay: It's subtle, but someone who reads his backstory will realise he is actually a homosexual. Less subtle in 5e, where Indreficus was explicitly his male lover.
• Ring of Fire: Accidentally omitted from Domains of Dread, this is how he closes his borders. Fire immunity doesn't help.
• Wrong Genre Savvy: Hazlik is aware that Hazlan is somehow unreal, but not quite sure how. Therefore, he encourages his students to see if they can strip away the illusion by destroying the world bit by bit, confident that he can escape Hazlan's potential destruction. If Hazlan was destroyed, he'd obviously dissolve with it, or the Dark Powers would drop him of in another domain or rebuild it around him.

Gabrielle Aderre, Darklord of Invidia

Gabrielle Aderre, Darklord of Invidia

Appears to be a 20-something attractive woman. Her mother prophesised that for her to have children would bring only tragedy. Abandoned her mother to a werewolf's claws, then murdered the werewolf lord of Invidia, becoming its new darklord. Her son Malocchio, one of the feared Dukkar, broke her and almost drove her mad. Her daughter Lucita has two possible fathers, one of whom is a wolfwere, and is coming up on the age where she'd be expected to change. On the one hand, she doesn't want her daughter to be a wolfwere; on the other, if she's not, then her wolfwere lover will find out she's been cheating. Neither is a good option.

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• Antagonistic Offspring: Malocchio's manipulations drove her insane, and only the love and care of Matton Blanchard helped her recover herself.
• Awful Truth: As a youth she'd spent years dreaming about who her father might be—only to be told that he was a sadistic rapist.
• But for Me, It Was Tuesday: Legitimately has no idea about her connection to the Midnight Slasher.
• But I Can't Be Pregnant!: Became pregnant twice, in spite of her magical and herbal precautions.
• Can't Kill You, Still Need You: Malocchio's goals have shifted from killing her to capturing her and keeping her alive (and tortured, natch), as her death would likely force him to inherit her position as Darklord.
• Child by Rape: Herself, and her son Malocchio. (Her night with the Gentleman Caller was not only hypnotically-induced, but also, er, unpleasant—to the extent that she went over the edge when her memories of it were restored.)
• Cool Sword: Wolfkiller, a +1 (+3 against lycanthropes) dagger, which can also activate a protection from evil spell vs. lycanthropes. It's also cursed to make lycanthropes fall hopelessly in love with the wielder, to a Yandere and If I Can't Have You… extent. Malocchio threw it out when he took Castle Loupet.
• Disappeared Dad: Due to her mother escaping from him. 3rd edition implies that she's one of Vlad Drakov's bastard children.
• Emotion Bomb: She seals her borders by creating a wall of terror around Invidia, which even affects those immune to fear or mind-altering spells.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: Loves Lucita and never lets her out of her sight.
• Evil Versus Evil: She and Malocchio, with Gabrielle being A Lighter Shade of Black.
• Famous Ancestor: Her bloodlines link her to Madame Eva, the first Vistana in Ravenloft.
• Fantastic Racism:
  • Toward Vistani, to the extent that when she divined that her son was a Dukkar, one of the beings destined to destroy them, she was thrilled. That changed fast.
  • She used to have this toward shapeshifters, as well, but after genuinely falling in love with Matton Blanchard, a wolfwere, she's mostly over it (she still has a few issues, as seen with her fears for Lucita).
• For the Evulz: In her youth, her jealousy led her to use her seductive wiles and mind-controlling abilities to destroy relationships and ruin people's lives for giggles. Following her ordeal at her son's hands and finding real happiness with Matton, she's much less inclined to toy with people.
• Fortune Teller: Can read the future as well as a full Vistani using her personal deck, passed down through her family, although using it causes her great pain.
• Green-Eyed Monster: Well, what did you expect from the ruler of a land called "Invidia?" As a youth, she was jealous of the happiness of others and sought to ruin it. Things are better for her now... at the moment.
• Half-Human Hybrid: Half-Vistana. (Retconned to only one-quarter in 3rd edition.)
• Hypnotic Gaze: As a part-Vistani, she has access to the "evil eye", which allows her to cast any enchantment/charm spells she's memorized without forgetting them.
• Mama's Baby, Papa's Maybe: Her daughter Lucita.
• Manipulative Bitch: A master manipulator, though now her efforts are dedicated to chipping away at Malocchio's power and keeping her rebellion together.
• Matricide: After learning the truth of her parentage, she decided that her mother was lying and left her to werewolves. True to Ravenloft form, this was her Act of Ultimate Darkness.
• The Mirror Shows Your True Self: She's actually in her mid-fifties, and she (but not others) sees her true age in reflections. Despite still being very attractive, she considers her true appearance hideous.
• Missing Time: The Gentleman Caller, who sired Malocchio, blocked her memories of their night together.
• Neutral Evil: Her official In-Universe alignment.
• No-Sell: Full-blooded Vistani are immune to any of her powers or spells, part-Vistani less so.
• The Remnant: Presently leading one against Malocchio. She's gaining ground, but as her army consists mostly of wolfweres led by her lover Matton Blanchard and Gundarakite rebels led by her other lover Ardonk Szerieza, the day may well come when she loses at least half of her forces.
• Restraining Bolt: She despises the Vistani, and would love to destroy them, but part of her curse is that she can't directly harm them. Even part-Vistani like her son are somewhat protected, though she can at least act to foil his plans.
• Shoot the Builder: Had the Vistana who made Wolfkiller murdered. He cursed the blade as a result, but Gabrielle wasn't particularly impressed. After all, she'd been cursed before, by her own mother.
• Unknown Rival: The Midnight Slasher wants to kill her for manipulating her parents into killing each other, but Gabrielle has no idea.
• Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: Spent most of her life terrified of shapeshifters. Now she shares a bed with one.
• You Kill It, You Bought It: She became both temporal leader and Darklord of Invidia by slitting Bakholis's throat with a silver dagger.

Harkon Lukas, Darklord of Kartakass

Harkon Lukas, Darklord of Kartakass

A real beast with the fiddle

A wolfwere, a wolf who can take human form; his favorite form is that of a tall human man. Was unusual for his kind in preferring to socialise, and found other wolfweres shunned him for it. Humans were much more amenable, but he still felt a measure of dissatisfaction, dreaming of conquest and power. Went mad after being taken by the Mists and started killing wolves in the Barovian forests. After nearly getting killed by Strahd (who was probably wondering what all the noise was), he escaped into the Mists to find his own domain... only to find it was a rustic place with only a few villages to control, thwarting his dreams of power and influence.

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• Adaptation Species Change: From wolfwere to loup garou in 5e, with a Race Lift to boot.
• Affably Evil: He enjoys indulging his human side and acting courteous and polite, but he is still a murderous bastard who kills without thought to the consequence when he doesn't get his way.
• The Ageless: He's been kicking around Kartakass for two hundred years with no sign of aging.
• All of the Other Reindeer: Unlike other (chaotic) wolfweres, he was capable of long-term plans and longed for company. He even tried forming a tribe, but the solitary creatures rebuffed and shunned him.
• The Bard: It's his character class, after all, and he's really good at it. He became mayor of the biggest settlement in Kartakass by the power of his singing voice, after all.
• The Beastmaster: He can command any animal in his realm, but naturally prefers wolves.
• The Dandy: Part of his obsession with human culture involves always dressing very fashionably, though with loose-fitting garb just in case he needs to wolf-out and eat someone.
• Demonic Possession: If killed, his spirit will possess the nearest dire wolf and transform it into himself.
• Enemy Summoner: By playing certain songs of his own composition on his special harp, he can summon 3d4 dire wolves. He also composed a song which summons every dire wolf in earshot without granting the player control over them on its own, which he likes to teach unwitting innocents as a cruel prank.
• Forced Sleep: When he wants to close his borders, those who try to leave hear a sweet song that lulls them to sleep. When they awaken, any further attempts to leave have the same result. By the way, Kartakass is full of nasty things, especially wolf-based ones.
• Glory Seeker: Harkon is obsessed with fame and wants to be the world's most famous performer (with legions of adoring fans to do his bidding, of course). Unfortunately for him, Kartakass is tailormade to prevent that kind of fame from ever taking root. Any fame he musters up is doomed to be a passing fad that the villagers will grow tired of within a month. In 5e this was changed to him always being fondly, but only vaguely remembered by the people.
• High-Class Glass: He's really fond of his monocle.
• Monster Progenitor: Thanks to all the mating he does/did with female lesser wolfweres, he's responsible for spawning the race of greater wolfweres—beings who've inherited a small amount of his power and even bardic abilities. Played With in 5e, where he has two normal adult, human children, Akriel and Casimir. The two are called his "eldest children", however...
• Mood-Swinger: Although he generally maintains a jovial attitude, being thwarted can send him into a towering rage, after which he's eerily calm and reclusive.
• Neutral Evil: In-Universe, and part of his estrangement from normal wolfweres, who are so chaotic that his enjoyment of human culture and plan-making is anathema to them.
• Our Werewolves Are Different: A wolfwere is essentially a reversed werewolf; a sapient wolf with the ability to assume a humanoid form. Lukas is unusual for preferring his human shape and human culture to his "natural" wolf form. 5e made him a loup garou instead, which is basically a super-werewolf.
• Quirky Bard: Averted. Leaving out how he's a giant sentient wolf who can easily go back to his true form if it comes to melee, he's extremely skilled at the Magic Music too.
• Race Lift: 5th edition made him a black guy, in an effort to diversify the setting.
• Sex Shifter: Wolfweres are capable of choosing which gender their human form takes. Either gender is highly attractive (it's one of their hunting methods).
• Sibling Yin-Yang: Between his to eldest human children in 5e. Akriel strifes to be a great performer, greatly emulating her farther, whereas Casimir dreads Kartakass and desperately tries to leave it.
• Shadow Dictator: To the layman, Kartakass has no sovereign ruler, governed by meritocratic lords of individual city states. Lukas appears to be one of many. Few know his influence, as many of the other lords are werewolves that he infected.
• Superior Successor: In 5e, due to his curse of constantly being forgotten as a performer, he was quickly surpassed in fame by his daughter Akriel, who greatly emulates his style.
• Transplant: From the Forgotten Realms.
• Voluntary Shapeshifting: The Dark Powers have enhanced his natural lycanthropy, so that he can look like any race or gender of human or wolf, including a dire wolf. However, his human forms always have to resemble his baseline.

Lord Wilfred Godefroy, Darklord of Mordent

Lord Wilfred Godefroy, Darklord of Mordent

An ancient looking aristocratic ghost. He murdered his 50+ years younger bride Estelle Weathermay after years of disappointment of having only one child, their daughter Lilia, then murdered Lilia after she tried to stop him. Their ghosts then haunted him until he committed suicide. It wasn't until Azalin and Strahd opened a portal to Mordentshire that the Dark Powers chose the ghost of Godefroy as the Darklord of Mordent. The ghosts of his wife and daughter followed soon after.

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• Achilles' Heel: For all his power, Wilfred can do nothing to prevent the ghosts of his family from tearing him apart each night.
• Aristocrats Are Evil: The evil Lord of the Gryphon Hill estate.
• Ascended Extra: He started out as a minor fight in House on Gryphon Hill, with no notable backstory aside from being a Godefroy ancestor who killed his wife and child. Once the setting got rolling, he was expanded upon.
• Bad Boss: Relentlessly beats up his ghostly servants for the slightest mistakes, imagined or not.
• Cane Fu: He wields a cane that literally beats its victims into submission (manifesting as Charisma drain in-game).
• Chaotic Evil: In-Universe — it's the official Character Alignment given in his profile writeups.
• The Dog Bites Back: His punishment: every evening the spirits of his wife and daughter rise up and tear his incorporeal form to bits, cursing him for his murderous inhumanity. Rather than learning the potential inherent lesson here, Godefroy prefers to vent his rage on his servants instead.
• Faux Affably Evil: Very rarely and usually for very short periods of time, but he can be charming if he wants to.
• Ghostly Goals: A strange aversion. He simply became a ghost because members of his bloodline always do.
• Hair-Trigger Temper: A conceited snob who cannot bear to even think someone might have insulted him without "getting even."
• Haunted House: Gryphon Manor is packed by lesser spirits, all of them serving and cowering before Lord Godefroy.
• Heir Club for Men: Killed his wife in a rage when she failed to give him a son.
• I Have Your Wife: Daniel Foxgrove's wife, anyway (she's a ghost tied to Gryphon Manor, and will be horribly beaten if he doesn't do as Godefroy says).
• Offing the Offspring: Killed his daughter in the same fury that drove him to kill his wife.
• Our Ghosts Are Different: A ghostly Darklord.
• Pater Familicide: Killed his wife and daughter.

Sir Tristen Hiregaard/Malken / Myar Hiregaard/Malkan, Darklord of Nova Vaasa

Sir Tristen Hiregaard / Malken, Darklord of Nova Vaasa

Looks to be in his late 60s. Inherited his father's curse to "kill any woman he loved and any man who crossed him". Found out the hard way during a tryst with a peasant girl. Killed nine more women before attempting suicide, but the Mists gave him a new realm instead. As of 5e, he's been replaced by Myar Hiregaard. For tropes regarding her, see below.

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• Arranged Marriage: Part of Tristen's curse is that Malken will always murder any woman he loves. His extended family of beloved children were born from a loveless arranged marriage.
• Chaotic Evil: Malken's official In-Universe alignment.
• Diabolical Mastermind: Malken. Indeed, Tristen's life is based around fouling up Malken's network to blunt the impact he makes when active.
• Dirty Coward: Most of Malken's victims are much weaker than he is, and he tends to flee if confronted with someone who can fight back.
• Early-Installment Weirdness: In earlier editions, he was more clearly a Dr. Jekyll Expy, being a scientist and doctor who brought his transformation upon himself with his experiments.
• Heroic Willpower: Heroic might be a bit of a stretch (Tristen is Lawful Neutral in his official writeups, and whether he's a benign ruler or not really depends on who you ask), but the reason Malken isn't as powerful as most Darklords is that Tristen constantly struggles against him.
• Jekyll & Hyde: The Ravenloft version. More-noticeable in the early versions, when Malken was much less intelligent and much more bestial.
• Lawful Neutral: Tristen's official In-Universe alignment.
• Malevolent Masked Men: Malken uses animal masks when dealing with underlings.
• Monster Misogyny: Most of Malken's victims are much weaker than he is, and almost all are female. He tends to flee if confronted by someone who can fight back.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Malken is more curse than man. Trying to stab Tristen's transformed body will only kill him, and Malken will go on to possess Tristen's eldest son, whose first act will be to murder his beloved wife. Killing him will only pass the curse on to the next son, and it goes all the way down to an eight year old. And if he's killed, the curse will befall the son of Tristen's eldest son. The only way to finish off Malken for good is for a woman who loves his host to be the one who does him in.
• Reality Warper: Malken has a Blessed with Suck version — he's a Control Freak, so his powers constantly edit the world around him as his curse.
• Retcon: One of the biggest in-setting examples before Fifth Edition; Tristen and Malken have always been the setting's Jekyll & Hyde equivalents but everything else about them is reworked and redone so extensively over the years that virtually everything in this entry was incorrect at one point or another. For example, at one point Tristen was some kind of alchemist and Malken was the result of an experiment gone horribly wrong, and at one point Malken was a diabolical mastermind rather than a glorified serial killer. His name wasn't even always Tristen; he used to be named Edmund!
• Shadow Dictator: Not even Tristan himself knew that Malken was the Darklord for a long time, and certainly nobody else does.
• Silver Fox: Tristen is getting on in years, and the books go out of their way to note that he's still pretty good-looking. Of course, given the reputation his situation has caused, there are very few women in Nova Vassa who are terribly interested.
• Superpowered Evil Side: Malken, not Tristen, is the actual darklord of Nova Vassa, and has the vast majority of the powers. On the flip side, it is very difficult for Malken to actually use most of them, even when he is in control. (For example, he has no power to seal the borders of his domain, unlike most darklords.)
• White Hair, Black Heart: Tristen's hair turns white when Malken's in control. This extends to anyone else Malken "passes on" to.

Myar Hiregaard / Malkan, Darklord of Nova Vaasa

A skilled general and unparalleled warrior, Myar Hiregraad managed to unify the warring nomadic tribes of Nova Vaaasa's plains. Yet, while a skilled leader in war, peace was not for her. So when brutal games failed to excite her, she manipulated two vassal tribes into going to war, all in order to crush them both. After repeating this process over and over culminated in her greatest massacre, she was enclosed by the mists. Now she rules strictly but fairly, but when falling into her old bloodlust, she transforms into the Blood Knight Split Personality Malkan, inciting strife among her subjects.

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• Blood Knight: Her love of battle drove her sow discord among her vassals. This part seems to have formed Malkan when the Mists spirited her away.
• Gollum Made Me Do It: While she sowed discord during her time before Ravenloft, now it is all Malkan's doing.
• Hordes from the East: The description of Nova Vaasa's people as warlike, plain-roaming nomads brings to mind Hunnic or Mongolian horse archers.
• Jekyll & Hyde: Kept on as her main aspect. As opposed to her former iterations Superpowered Evil Side, Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft says nothing about Malkan being more powerful than her or the actual Darklord, referring to them as a Split Personalties .
• Split Personality: As opposed to Malken, who was the embodiment of a Hereditary Curse, Malkan is more of a Anthropomorphic Personification of Myars lust for war and battle.
• Split-Personality Switch Trigger: Her bloodlust.
• Victory Is Boring: What drove her to fabricate war between her vassals. Her torment seems to be to only ever experience peacetime, for when she her bloodlust is piqued, Malkan takes over.

Jacqueline Renier, Darklord of Richemulot

Jacqueline Renier, Darklord of Richemulot

The Rat Queen

A beautiful female... wererat. Murdered the previous lord, her grandfather, for Richemulot. 5e retconned her background considerably, making her a noblewoman who accepted becoming a wererat as part of membership in a secret society in order to regain control over her land's burgeoning middle class, becoming a Darklord when she murdered most of its people via a plague she and the other wererats concocted. Her curse is also changed in that her situation will forever prevent her from being able to enjoy any of the perks of nobility that she killed for, as she is forced to spend all her time preventing the people of Richemulot from revolting- and even if she did, the plague-ridden land of Richemulot is not very well placed to support a luxurious lifestyle.

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• Adaptational Villainy: While she was a Tragic Villain in her original incarnation, 5e dropped any pretense of her being sympathetic and makes her a Rich Bitch who thinks her birth makes her inherently superior.
• Aristocrats Are Evil: Jacqueline only wants to live the highlife of being a noble, and cares nothing for the peasants she tramples underfoot. In fact, her act of ultimate evil in 5e is that she engineered a plague to prevent the emerging middle class from rising above their station.
• The Caligula: Jacqueline in 5e doesn't actually care about ruling Richemulot, but as the most powerful noble in the country it is expected of her, especially since she refuses to let the commonfolk rule themselves. She therefore only makes decrees that serve her interests.
• Chaotic Evil: Her official In-Universe alignment.
• Curse: Depending on what edition you play.
  • Pre-5e, her curse was to transform into her hybrid rat form whenever she was in the room of any man she fancies, leading to her killing him out of fear that no-one could love a monster like her.
  • 5e dropped that, instead making her curse that she can never again live the luxurious lifestyle of a noble that she committed atrocities to maintain, since she has to spend every waking moment preventing rebellions. Not to mention that her own scheming has made Richemulot ill-suited for that kind of lifestyle.
• Identical Twin ID Tag: Can be distinguished from her twin sister Louise by Louise's torn right ear.
• Kill the Poor: Jacqueline wishes to maintain power over the common folk, which she does by unleashing devastating plagues (which only her and her cadre of wererats are immune to) to keep martial law.
• Our Werebeasts Are Different: Alternate forms include normal-sized rat, giant rat, rat-woman, and gas cloud.
• Plague Master: Her 5e incarnation creates virulent plagues that her rats release on the populace to keep them under control.
• Tragic Monster: Pre-5e.
  • All she wants is somebody who can love her, but her curse is that she invariably shapeshifts into her animal form whenever she's alone in a room with somebody she really loves — and she falls in genuine love quite easily. Almost invariably, she then kills him because she's convinced he would never love her back after seeing her true nature as a wererat. (Knowing this full well, when it came to the man she loved above all others, she tried to infect him with lycanthropy before being alone with him — but the attempt botched and he disappeared, leaving her heartbroken.)
  • Also, she suffers a crippling phobia of being alone, but all her family despise her, meaning she can either be alone and terrified or force herself to tolerate the company of monsters who hate her and whom she hates right back.
• Weaksauce Weakness: All the Reniers, whether human or wererat, suffer deadly allergic reactions to a random substance specific to each individual Renier, with 3rd edition even likening the effects to an allergen^note a monster weakness; think the iconic reaction of a werewolf to silver. Jacqueline is certainly no exception, though she's not discovered her allergy yet in-universe — it's dove feathers, if you were curious.
• You Kill It, You Bought It: Inherited the title of darklord by murdering her grandfather, the former darklord.

Inza Magdova Kulchevich, Darklord of Sithicus

Inza Magdova Kulchevich, Darklord of Sithicus

Appears to be a young Vistana woman in her late teens. Betrayed her mother and her caravan for power and safety, only to have the surviving members of the caravan hunt her down for vengeance. In seeking to escape, found herself cursed with the mantle of dark lord.

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• The Chessmaster: How she prefers to operate after becoming darklord, using minions and unwitting pawns to do her will.
• The Corrupter: Fond of this, corrupting the weak and those who proclaim themselves noble.
• Disappeared Dad: Killed by Duke Gundar's men.
• Famous Ancestor: Traces her bloodline back to Kulchek the Wanderer, one of the Vistani's most storied heroes.
• Good Hurts Evil: The presence of a true innocent causes her pain.
• Living Shadow: What she is now. Indeed, an amorphous blot of living shadow is what her true form has become, and she struggles to hold a human form.
• Matricide: Sabotaged her mother's weapon so that it would fail her, then arranged to have the caravan attacked by monsters, resulting in her mother's death.
• Neutral Evil: Her official In-Universe alignment.
• Wandering Jew: As a full-blooded Vistani — and the descendant of one of their greatest heroes — she must sleep in a different place every night, and never in the same place twice, or face dire consequences.

Alfred Timothy, Darklord of Verbrek

Alfred Timothy, Darklord of Verbrek

A werewolf with a slender, pale human form. Tortured many clerics in an attempt to become one to a "Wolf God" but ultimately failed. He was eventually caught after a rampage and freed by some Vistani, whom he betrayed, and was shortly after swallowed by the Mists. Strong passion forces him into human form, which he despises.

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• Black Sheep: His father, Nathan Timothy, desired for werewolves to peaceably (for the most part) deal with humanity. Alfred believed that humanity was nothing more than livestock to his kind, and fully embraced the Cult of the Wolf God and became its leader.
• Dramatic Irony: A werewolf who preaches the strongest must rule and lead while being a puny wolf whose power comes from magic.
• Fantastic Racism: His loathing of humans is greater than any normal werewolf, who mostly just view them as prey naturally but don't make a religion out of it.
• The Farmer and the Viper: Alfred Timothy was being burnt at the stake for his murderous rampages as a werewolf but was saved by a Vistani crone. Due to his hatred of all humanity he promptly murdered the crone afterwards.
• Our Werewolves Are Different: Subverted in that he's a bog standard werewolf in a setting with many variants.
• Social Darwinist: Alfed Timothy's Wolf religion teaches that humans weren't meant to be prey for werewolves.
• You Are What You Hate: Invoked; Alfred despises all humans, but his curse makes him forcibly assume human form whenever he acts like a beast.

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