The title of Darklord may change hands through many means, such as inheritance or conquest, so many former Darklords remain unknown.
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Darklords of the Southern Core - Darklords of the Northern Core - Darklords of the Western Sea - Darklords of the Eastern Sea - Darklords of domains beyond the Core - Other Darklords - Former Darklords
Nathan Timothy (former Darklord of Arkandale)
Nathan Timothy (former Darklord of Arkandale)
Soth (below) was not the first darklord to escape their domain. Before him, there was Nathan Timothy, werewolf darklord of Arkandale. Possessed of a deep-seated wanderlust, Nathan's curse was that he could not leave the Musarde River, otherwise he would suffer agonizing pain that would render him immobile. When the Grand Conjunction hit, Nathan escaped his domain — but unlike other darklords who did so, he remained free even when the Conjunction had ended, having apparently slipped the Dark Powers' notice. Verbrek, ruled by Nathan's son Alfred, absorbed Arkandale.- Our Werewolves Are Different: A natural-born one.
- Tailor-Made Prison: His curse, which he still possesses even though he's no longer a darklord.
Camille Boritsi (née Dilisnya) (former Darklord of Borca)
Camille Boritsi (née Dilisnya) (former Darklord of Borca)
Borca's first darklord, who gained the domain after poisoning her first husband and his lover. She was able to create any poison she could imagine, even those with supernatural effects. However, she was cursed to always be betrayed by any man she trusted (ironically, because she was always suspicious of her brother Yakov, he was always loyal to her). Eventually killed by the machinations of her daughter Ivana, who inherited the domain.- Acquired Poison Immunity: Averted. Camille didn't gain any immunity to poison.
- Aristocrats Are Evil: First ruler of Borca.
- Black Widow: Killed three of her four husbands (the third made a break for it as soon as he could).
- Does Not Like Men: With her curse playing a not-inconsiderable part in this. Indeed, she was so suspicious of the men in her life, she never suspected her daughter might try anything.
- Master Poisoner: She could create any poison imaginable, including those with supernatural effects. However, she herself was not immune to poison.
- Posthumous Character: Ivana is darklord of Borca from the Black Box on.
Vecna, Lesser Deity (former Darklord of Cavitus)
Vecna, Lesser Deity (former Darklord of Cavitus)
Defied the Dark Powers and escaped back to Oerth.- The Ace: It's no exaggeration to call him the most powerful being in Ravenloft.
- The Archmage: Far more powerful than even Azalin. He can cast any wizard or priest spell instantly, ignoring casting time or the need for components.
- An Arm and a Leg: Kas the Bloody-Handed turned his eponymous sword upon him, severing his left hand and destroying his left eye.
- Arch-Enemy: Kas the Bloody-Handed, his traitorous former lieutenant, and now Darklord of the bordering domain of Tovag.
- Beyond the Impossible: The results of his plot to escape Ravenloft. He had lured Iuz into invading Cavitus with a small army of retainers (either not knowing or caring that he would himself be trapped there). Once there, Vecna enacted a ritual to absorb Iuz's essence into himself, in the process ascending from a demigod to a full deity. Escape from the demiplane at this point was a formality, but Vecna took advantage of his unique locale and used his new powers to warp Ravenloft's planar fabric straight at Sigil, the City of Doors, riding the wave to invade an outer planar city that the Lady of Pain has decreed that no god, regardless of power, can enter on pain of oblivion. Thus, he got away from a plane whose laws of existence dictate is impossible to escape and entered a plane whose own laws state is impossible to invade.
- Blackmail: Being the god of secrets, Vecna can tell when someone is hiding one, and need only exert his will to learn it. As such, he is a master blackmailer.
- Blinded by Rage: It's mentioned that his sheer fury at being trapped in Ravenloft and unable to overcome his greatest foe kept his brilliant mind from focusing on finding a way to get out of the demiplane.
- Ultimately averted when a backup plan saved him. Unspoken Plan Guarantee indeed.
- Brown Note: Vecna is cloaked in an aura of pure evil powerful enough to frighten those in his presence to the point of insanity.
- Death World: The skies of Cavitus are always gray, the ground drains your very life, the Burning Peaks feature constant spewing ash and flowing lava, acidic pools of water, constant tremors and avalanches, and the endless battle of Kas and Vecna's forces. And then there's the Citadel, a land of ten thousand broken and miserable people oppressed by the Fingers of Vecna who serve as the Darklord's enforcers and are little more than a band of cruel bullies. Worse still, Vecna himself un-lives there.
- Defeating the Undefeatable: His greatest claim to fame was escaping the Demiplane by force. As a greater god, he simply ripped his way out and the Dark Powers couldn't do anything to stop him.
- Didn't See That Coming:
- As long as he remained in the Outer Planes, the Dark Powers couldn't get a grip on him, but he wanted to reclaim the temporal power he had on Oerth and thus ascend into a greater god. Therefore he sent forth an avatar to conquer in his name. Unfortunately for him and fortunately for Oerth, the spells the avatar cast on the Prime Material Plane created a link to Vecna which the Dark Powers were able to exploit, bringing Citadel Cavitus and Vecna into Ravenloft.
- He created the Sword of Kas, granting his most loyal servitor a powerful artifact weapon, but the sword was so powerful that it turned out to be possessed of intellect, telepathic abilities and a burning hatred for undead in general and Vecna in particular. This lack of foresight on Vecna's part led to a lack of twosight, and he also ended up shorthanded.
- Disproportionate Retribution: Although he fears no mortal, he also won't take any chances—cast magic in Cavitus and you'll be executed, unless it's divine magic derived from Vecna. Oh, you think you can do it secretly? In the realm of the literal god of secrets? Really?
- The Dragon: Vecna's chief lieutenants are a pair of strange flesh golems known as The Eye and The Hand, highly intelligent creatures made of the eyes of traitors, spies and similar and the hands of thieves, charlatans and their like, respectively.
- Evil Has a Bad Sense of Humor: Vecna's heard of the Head of Vecna incident, and thinks it's hilarious.
- Faceless Eye: As mentioned, one of Vecna's chief lieutenants is a flesh golem made of eyes.
- Forever War: Cavitus and Tovag were locked into one, with Vecna seeking to destroy his most hated enemy, but stalemated by the only available entryway to Tovag being the paths through the Burning Peaks, which Kas was able to defend.
- Vecna has, at most, two allied gods — Orcus and the Serpent. He's at war with all other gods, and it's iffy that either of those two isn't plotting, too.
- God-Emperor: Vecna is literally a deity, so yes.
- Greater-Scope Villain: One of the ones of D&D as a whole. His actions during Die, Vecna, Die are canonically the reason for the changes leading into 3rd Edition.
- Gradual Regeneration: Regenerates one HP per turn, assuming you can harm him to begin with.
- Helping Hands:
- When Vecna wishes to close his borders, he summons a limitless swarm of Crawling Claws which overwhelm anyone trying to leave via the Ashen Wastes.
- One of Vecna's chief lieutenants is a flesh golem made entirely out of hands.
- I Have Many Names: (Deep breath) The Arch-Lich, the Chained God, the Maimed God, Master of the Spider Throne, the Whispered One, the Dying King, the Lord of the Rotted Tower, the Undying King...and more.
- Life Energy:
- The Ashen Wastes not only keep people in them from healing, but also drain their very life away (either via Level Drain or hit dice if they don't have levels). Only in Citadel Cavitus can people heal.
- Vecna's bare-handed strikes, already quite strong, also cause extra damage by draining this.
- The Necrocracy: Vecna is a lich, and his two highest lieutenants are flesh golems.
- The Night That Never Ends: Thanks to ash constantly spewed by the Burning Peaks, the sky's always gray in Cavitus, and day and night cannot be distinguished, and so both nocturnal and diurnal creatures may be encountered.
- No-Sell: Oh, boy. Nothing less than a weapon with +5 enchantment can harm Vecna, unless it's a holy avenger. He can't be turned by a cleric. He has a 70% resistance to magic cast by a mortal, 40% from a demigod and 20% from a full god. He's also immune to all spells from the enchantment/charm, illusion/phantasm, and necromancy spell schools, nor can cleric magic from the chaos, charm, or healing spheres affect him. He cannot be polymorphed or similar. He has a saving throw of 4 at all times, which cannot be lowered. Oh, and no mortal creature or demigod can kill him permanently, as he'll reassemble in several days. My advice, try tricking him into a clapping contest. He'll still kill you, but he'll be so pissed.
- Gods help you if you try to kill him with a fake Sword of Kas.
- Omniglot: Vecna may speak or read literally any physical form of language, including non-verbal ones and codes.
- Our Liches Are Different: Justified in how experienced and powerful he is; Vecna may be partially crippled, thanks to his missing hand and eye, but he's also achieved a grasp on divinity, making him even more uniquely deadly.
- The Paralyzer: Like all liches, Vecna's touch may paralyze his foes. Unlike a normal lich, Vecna's paralysis may only be dispelled with a dispel evil spell rather than a mere dispel magic.
- Physical God: A demigod at the time the Mists got him, becoming a lesser god after his escape.
- The Plan: A pretty good one in Die, Vecna, Die!.
- Secret Path: Vecna was unable to completely close his borders, leaving the border leading to Tovag vulnerable. However, this path leads through the Burning Peaks, where the Forever War of Vecna and Kas persisted, choking the place with dead and undead alike.
- Stay on the Path: The roads out of Cavitus are the only spots in the Ashen wastes that don't drain life from the traveler. You can pick them out by their bright white coloration...which gets more and more reddish-brown the closer you get to the battlefields.
- Super-Speed: Vecna may take two actions directly after each other in the same turn, such as teleporting and striking.
- Surveillance as the Plot Demands: Vecna knows all that transpires within the walls of his Citadel and anything his followers do no matter where they are. Outside its walls his perception fades, so he simply uses his incredible level of magical power to cast divination spells when he needs to see beyond the Mists.
- Telepathy: Vecna may speak to his followers from anywhere, even beyond the borders of Ravenloft.
- Teleportation: Vecna may teleport to anyplace in Cavitus instantly. While in Ravenloft, he was unable to use his demigod ability to travel the planes.
- Time Travel: Per the Vecna Dossier, Vecna could time travel with some effort, even before becoming a demigod. Notably, the Vecna Dossier contains stats for this pre-deity Vecna, who is still too powerful for most top level parties.
- Transplant: From Greyhawk, to which he eventually returned.
Duke Nharov Gundar (former Darklord of Gundarak)
Duke Nharov Gundar (former Darklord of Gundarak)
Vampiric lord of Gundarak, who was betrayed and usurped by Daclaud Heinfroth. His domain was swallowed up by Invidia and Barovia during the Grand Conjunction, with Heinfroth getting his own domain, but his ultimate fate would prove much stranger.- Amnesiac Dissonance:
Word of God says that after so long as a skeleton, when his stake was pulled out, he was reduced to a near-bestial state, with hazy memories of the past and the knowledge that someone named "Dominiani"note had betrayed him. - Dead Guy on Display:
- When an angry mob futilely stormed his castle, he had their leaders' corpses suspended from trees in the orchard.
- After he was deposed, his staked remains found their way into Professor Arcanus's traveling road show...and then some yokel went and yanked the stake out.
- Evil Debt Collector: Taxed everything he possibly could, levying a particularly heavy tax on the birth of girls.
- Handicapped Badass: More mentally challenged than physically though: He may not be thinking straight anymore, but he's still a powerful vampire.
- Intimidating Revenue Service: His came with bastard swords and maces.
- Neutral Evil: In-universe, according to Word of God.
- Our Vampires Are Different
- Revenge Before Reason: Right now it's revenge instead of reason.
Bakholis (former Darklord of Invidia)
Bakholis (former Darklord of Invidia)
A tyrant king whose latest victim cursed him to become the beast he was inside and never be free of the blood of his loved ones on his jaws. The Mists rose to claim Invidia, with Bakholis as its darklord, but he didn't pay any attention until the next full moon, when he transformed into a werewolf and killed everyone in his castle. Unlike most darklords, Bakholis apparently came to embrace his curse, descending to ever-greater depths of savagery until he was killed by Gabrielle Aderre, who inherited the domain.- Our Werewolves Are Different: Transformed by a curse, and able to infect others with lycanthropy.
- Pater Familicide: Killed his wife, son, and daughter — along with the rest of the castle — when he first transformed into a werewolf.
- Posthumous Character: Serving as backstory for how Gabrielle got Invidia.
- Rape Is a Special Kind of Evil: Regularly kidnapped women for his amusement, and when he became infatuated with a lady by the name of Marta, only to be spurned, he had her lover maimed and eaten before her eyes while his soldiers violated her. Marta's Dying Curse is what turned him into a werewolf.
- Then Let Me Be Evil: Oh, he was already damn evil, but once he got over the horror of killing his own family, he somehow became even worse.
Vlad Drakov (former Darklord of Falkovnia)
Vlad Drakov (former Darklord of Falkovnia)
Big, tall, muscled, covered in scars, and looks to be in his 50s. Led his mercenary band to conquer Darkon, but fled when the helpless villagers they killed rose as zombies. Settled for the nearby realm of Falkovnia, but doesn't like it. Attempts to conquer other domains have all failed.As of 5th edition, Vlad has been rewritten into Vladeska.
- Badass Normal: Unlike most Darklords, he is fully human, having nearly no supernatural abilities at all, not even the ability to seal the borders of his domain like almost every other Darklord does. His aging is slowed, but that's it. Despite this, he is a very dangerous man... theoretically.
- Droit du Seigneur: Further emphasizing that he is complete scum, he has this right by Falkovnia law.
- Dude, Where's My Respect?: His sole motivation before his damnation, and the key factor in making Falkovnia an Ironic Hell. See General Failure.
- Expy: His favorite method of execution is straight from Vlad III Dracula, but he's pretty much a fantasy version of Adolf Hitler, with possibly some Josef Stalin and Ivan the Terrible thrown in as well.
- Fantastic Racism: Vlad is a blatant human supremacist, and Falkovnia enslaves or executes any non-humans that enter its borders at his direction.
- General Failure: In his own world, he was nothing less than a military genius. However, Vlad is fixated on the "old ways" of doing war — masses of infantry and cavalry slugging it out until somebody falls — and will have nothing to do with combat spellcasters or gunpowder weaponry. As the nations he most frequently goes to war against are all Renaissance-level, culturally (so their soldiers are all outfitted with pistols and rifles), or have powerful spellcasters/magical monsters in the ranks, his armies are universally slaughtered, further and further cementing his reputation as a laughable upstart.
- Hard Work Hardly Works: His curse means that no matter how hard he tries, he'll always fail in his conquests. His prejudices against gunpowder, battlefield magic, and female soldiers don't help either.
- Hired Guns: Ex-soldier of fortune.
- Humans Are the Real Monsters: Easily one of the least supernaturally-endowed of all Darklords... and one of the most transparently monstrous.
- Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: Like Vlad the Impaler (who he seems to be at least partially based on) this is his preferred method of execution, and he uses it very often, demanding at least one a night, often dozens at once, using it as a macabre form of entertainment. (One rulebook actually editorialized when mentioning the fact, something it didn't otherwise do when profiling the darklords, saying, "If Ravenloft is a prison for the damned, few deserve it more than Drakov".)
- Murder, Inc.: Has a large, well trained military force under his command.
- Neutral Evil: His official In-Universe alignment.
- Older Than They Look: Is actually in his nineties, his aging slowed by his curse.
- Pet the Dog: Just about the sole non-evil trait he has is that he cares for his hunting hawks, and won't even use them them in "real" combat for fear of them getting hurt. The book sarcastically points out that this doesn't actually make him a better person, considering how little he cares for his fellow man.Drakov's other primary joy is hawking. He practices this sport regularly. The hawks are trained to attack on his command, but he rarely directs their attacks against people. He cherishes the hawks and prefers not to subject them to potentially deadly counterattacks. Vlad has little regard for human life, but he loves his birds.
- Politically Incorrect Villain: Vlad is of the official stance that women cannot be of any use besides breeding more men to work and fight for Falkovnia. He also forcibly claims the right to have sex with any Falkovnian woman on her wedding night instead of her husband, something he has no qualms about taking advantage of and which means there are dozens of bastard Drakovs floating around. Toned down heavily in 5e.
- Retcon: He was removed in 5e, since the developers felt he was redundant. The new Darklord of Falkovnia is Vladeska Drakov, and the domain has a more zombie apocalypse vibe.
- Serial Rapist: Drakov claims the right of 'first night' with every woman he wants and takes slaves for the purpose of this. Gabrielle Adarre's mother darkly reflects death would have been a better fate than what Vlad had for her as his bed-slave.
- Transplant: Originally from Krynn.
Claude Renier (former Darklord of Richemulot)
Claude Renier (former Darklord of Richemulot)
First darklord of Richemulot, a wererat from an outlander world who led his family through a misty portal to escape hunters, and came out in Falkovnia. Eventually gained his own domain after his family escaped another hunt by fleeing into the Mists. Noted for being a hateful and sadistic monster, he was eventually killed by his granddaughter Jaqueline, who'd had enough of the psychological games he played with his family, gaining Richemulot in the process. 5e removed all mention of him from his granddaughter's story, changing her Act of Ultiamte Darkness to be becoming a wererat in order to increase her social standing.- Our Werebeasts Are Different: Natural-born wererat.
- Posthumous Character: Jacqueline has always been Richemulot's darklord in the setting's present.
- Rasputinian Death: Poisoned with lye in his brandy, stabbed in the heart with a silver dagger, then pushed out of a tower window.
Lord Soth, Krynnish Death Knight (former Darklord of Sithicus)
Lord Soth, Krynnish Death Knight (former Darklord of Sithicus)
Snatched by the Mists whilst angrily tormenting the ghost of his seneschal, Caradoc, who he had sent to steal away Kitiara's soul from the Abyss and who had demanded Soth's promised payment of being restored to life first. Eventually found himself entrapped in the center of an Elf-populated land that was a distorted echo of Daargard Keep back on Krynn. His disillusionment with his new domain meant he was eventually returned to Krynn for being too dull for the Dark Powers' liking.- The Atoner: Sort of. Eventually, he came to realize that what he had done was wrong, that he deserved what he got, and stopped fighting it. Paradoxically, the Dark Powers then set him free, since his despair made him not worth torturing any longer.
- Black Knight: As befits a Death Knight.
- Classic Villain: In the final issue of Dragon (the official D & D magazine), he was named as one of the greatest villains of all time (sixth greatest, in fact), and he is widely considered by fans to be the archetypal Death Knight.
- Continuity Snarl: Over whether or not he actually was trapped in Ravenloft, due to the authors of Dragonlance hating his having been taken and trigging an Armed with Canon war between Dragonlance and Ravenloft authors. It should be noted that the game itself tends to side with "he was, and Timey-Wimey Ball explains how he returned to Krynn so soon".
- Enemy to All Living Things: Via his powers as a Death Knight.
- Fallen Hero: Big time. He could have stopped the Cataclysm that ultimately devastated Krynn, killing millions, if he hadn't decided that abandoning his quest to accuse his wife of cheating on him was more important.
- Godzilla Threshold: Was this for Strahd and Duke Gundar when he first appeared, almost effortlessly crushing whatever forces they could muster against him and making them fear for their unlives, to such a degree that both, who otherwise disliked the other intensely, had an Enemy Mine to try and just get rid of him.
- Heel–Face Door-Slam: Was given the chance to avoid becoming the Darklord of Sithicus, but refused to take it.
- Ignored Epiphany: Like most other Darklords; unlike them, however, after centuries of brooding and failures (both his own and those engineered by the Dark Powers to needle him on), he eventually subverted this and came to accept that yes, he was the main architect of his own downfall and he deserved his punishment, ironically eventually freeing him from the Demiplane.
- It's All About Me: A nuanced example. For centuries after being cursed following the Cataclysm, a host of banshee spirits tied to his castle would nightly sing a ballad of the story of Soth's damnation. Soth would listen to this song and had accepted that the Cataclysm was caused because of him, taking responsibility even if he did not feel regret. After becoming Darklord of Sithicus, his new castle came complete with a new set of spirits, but every night the song would be different; details would be off, events that never happened were included, those that did were left out, and so on. Soth cannot stand this, as he believe that however despicable they were, his actions were his, and to his way of thinking it's more important that others remember his past story correctly than it is to do anything to change the next chapter.Also, the constant minor slip-ups drive him bananas.
- Lawful Evil: In-Universe, and an important part of his characterization. If he weren't accustomed to rigid military order and precision, having everything being just a little bit off wouldn't bug him as much.
- Our Liches Are Different: He's a Death Knight, which is essentially a Magic Knight version of a lich.
- Pride: His principal sin. Even as a mortal, he could not abide anything that interfered with his image as the consummate paladin, the perfect knight. His deeds were laudable, even heroic, but he spent much effort hiding things that would show him in any kind of negative light. He killed his wife when she gave birth to a monstrosity* because he feared the stories that would follow. When the gods gave him a last chance to redeem himself by saving the world from the Cataclysm, he turned his back on his quest because he was fed stories that his new wife, an elven priestess, was cuckolding him while he was on his journey, and millions of lives in the balance meant nothing to him next to the thought of being tricked and mocked.
- The Punishment: Even before being turned into a Darklord, Soth's undead state was this. Afterwards, he is condemned to suffer the imperfect reflection of his state; Nedragaard Keep is always "off" in some way and his banshees can never perfectly tell his story of damnation. Doesn't sound like much, but it drove Soth completely bonkers.
- Screw This, I'm Outta Here: In a sense. A Darklord of course cannot escape his domain, but Soth did the next best thing. At one point he had had constructed magic mirrors to let himself relive past memories. After a time those mirrors were destroyed, but he fell into a reverie in his own head for months or years at a time. He was no temporal ruler, he had no duties or responsibilities in his domain that needed his attention, and his cursed castle and spirits were like needles in his eyes and ears, so he simply fell into himself and never bothered climbing back out... until ghosts fuelled by his original divine curse called tag backs on the Dark Powers and dragged him back to Krynn.
- Skewed Priorities: Part of what led to his damnation. A good chunk of the continent is about to be destroyed if he doesn't stop it? Much less important than investigating totally baseless rumors of his wife cheating on him.
- Speak of the Devil: Has become this in Sithicus after his release, being referred to by his former subjects only as "the dark knight" or "the blackguard" for fear of summoning him back. Of course the Doylist explanation is that they can't really call him by name anymore unless they wanna get sued.
- That Man Is Dead: Was presented with the chance to escape becoming the Darklord of Sithicus before the domain fully formed, shown a world in which he was human again, but he refused to take it, as he was no longer that man.
- Too Dumb to Live: Almost literally; he turned from his quest because he believed the slander of three elven priestesses — the same ones who revealed his infidelity and murder in the first place. There was literally no reason he should have trusted them.
- Too Spicy for Yog-Sothoth: Inverted; Soth's falling into sullen stoicism (and increasingly immersing himself in a dream-world of his own invention via magic mirrors) meant he was content to just sit there and do nothing. He was so boring that the Dark Powers sent him back to Krynn rather than keep him in Ravenloft, especially after the more-promising Inza showed up as a new candidate for Darklordship.
- Transplant: From Krynn, as mentioned, and a rather controversial one at that (for his creators, anyway).
- The Undead: As a Death Knight.
- Was Once a Man: Like all Death Knights, he was once an honest and noble mortal, in his case a Solamnic Knight of the Rose who earned his damnation through arrogance and shortsightedness.
Dominic d'Honaire, (former Darklord of Dementlieu)
Dominic d'Honaire, Darklord of Dementlieu
Looks to be mid-50s and somewhat overweight. At age 7 led his nanny to suicide, then manipulated his father to move to Dementlieu (avoiding the Mordentshire police). By adulthood, he had most of Dementlieu under his control.Retconed in 5th edition and replaced with Sairda d'Honaire. He is mentioned as still existing and claiming the throne, but given that it's Dementleiu and everyone lies, this doesn't really mean much.
- Abhorrent Admirer: Though d'Honaire is usually seen as a Silver Fox, his punishment is that women he feels attracted to find him disgusting. In fact, the more attracted to them he is, the more hideous they find him. This curse is why he murdered his first love.
- The Cameo: Gets a microscopic one in 5th edition's Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft in a sentence that mentions a Phlegethan Hospital patient with the preternatural ability to bend others to his will who claims to be the rightful Duke d'Honaire.
- The Chessmaster: He doesn't directly rule Dementlieu, but everyone knows he's the real power behind the throne.
- Enfant Terrible: The only canon darklord to have gained the position as a child.
- Manchurian Agent: Dementlieu is seeded with Obedients, ordinary citizens who are completely unaware that they've been brainwashed into serving D'Honaire until he or something else triggers them. Should one of them be freed from his control, D'Honaire is immediately aware of it.
- Mind Manipulation: His gaze grants him Dominate as a Supernatural Ability.
- More than Mind Control: Can also make suggestions with his voice as well, and can adjust his charisma score between seven and fourteen.
- Neutral Evil: His official In-Universe alignment.
- Shadow Dictator: Dementlieu is ruled by lord-governor Marcel Guignol, who unbeknownst to everyone, is d'Honaire's mind controlled puppet. d'Honaire himself poses as an advisor.
- Unknown Rival: He knows he's fighting someone with Mind Control abilities equal to his own. What he doesn't know is that "The Brain" really is one.
Adam, (former Darklord of Lamordia)
Adam, Former Darklord of Lamordia
A highly intelligent Flesh Golem created by Dr. Victor Mordenheim. He earned his domain after one particular night, which saw his creator's adopted daughter disappear, and Mordenheim's wife beaten almost to death at Adam's hands — the precise details are ambiguous, neither Adam or Mordenheim being the most reliable of narrators on this subject. Mordenheim placed his wife in a complicated apparatus that keeps her trapped in perpetual agony, suspended on the verge of death while he tries — and fails — to devise a method to restore her to life.5th edition retconed him out of existence, replacing him as darklord with Viktra Mordenheim and as Mordenheim's Creature with Elise.
- Affably Evil: He can be very civil if care is taken not to offend or upset him. It is just that he gets upset very easily and so it is hard to have a long conversation with him.
- Always Chaotic Evil: Interestingly, many people think this is why he should not be a Darklord, but Mordenheim's Darklord curse — most of his actions are things flesh golems do, unlike his vain, selfish creator. Viktra was created taking these critiques in mind; she is Darklord of Lamordia, and her 'Adam' (Elise) is part of her curse- though in Viktra's case, her curse isn't that Elise exists and hates her (Elise isn't evil, which is also why she's not a Darklord candidate), but that while she knows Elise is out there, she will never find her, and thus can never prove the existence of her magnum opus, the Unbreakable Heart she used to revive Elise.
- Become a Real Boy: Wants to be accepted as a man, not a monster. His curse is that he'll never achieve this.
- Captain Ersatz: Of Frankenstein's Monster; even his name comes from what Shelley called the monster outside the book.
- Chaotic Evil: In-Universe. It's the Character Alignment on his write-ups.
- Frankenstein's Monster: Even moreso than most flesh golems, which are usually mindless.
- Hair-Trigger Temper: Like his inspiration, he is easily provoked into furious outbursts, which trigger violence from him.
- It Can Think: The ultimate reason for his damnation. Most flesh golems are near-mindless creatures animated by unstable elemental spirits, but Adam is an extremely intelligent and capable being. This means that, unlike them, he's morally aware enough to understand that his rage and wanton destruction are wrong, and so giving into them anyway against two of the only people who ever cared for him was enough to destroy him.
- Mix-and-Match Man: As with the traditional perception of his inspiration.
- Odd Friendship: With Merilee Markuza, a child-like vampire from the supplement Darklords. It's noted they found comfort in each other, since both are outcasts who despise their physical forms.
- Shadow Dictator: The nominal ruler of Lamordia is Baron von Aubrecker, a nobleman perceived as a light ruler. Few citizens even know Adam exists, let alone the control he has over the place.
- Shaped Like Itself: A meta example. Flesh golems are based on Frankenstein's Monster, of whom Adam is a Captain Ersatz. He's also an in-universe flesh golem himself, and while Frankenstein's Monster crosses a Moral Event Horizon, for flesh golems, it's par for the course to behave in such a manner. This has led fans to feel like Adam's not done anything nasty enough to earn Darklord status over Mordenheim; had flesh golems not long predated Adam in the setting, this might have been less an issue.
- Synchronization: While Adam is the true Darklord of Lamordia, Dr. Mordenheim is cursed to share the Ironic Hell with his creation, and cannot die unless Adam dies. So long as Adam lives, Mordenheim is immortal and will regenerate From a Single Cell. Even if his body is somehow completely obliterated, his soul will inhabit a freshly-dead corpse, which will be restored to life and assume the appearance of his old body.
Victor Mordenheim, (creator of Adam)
A Mad Scientist, and Adam's "father". Damned with his creation, he toils constantly to try to "fix" his wife, but has thus far only succeeded in prolonging her agony.
5th edition gave him a Gender Flip and made her Darklord of Lamordia. Tropes for this version of the character, Viktra Mordenheim, can be found on the Northern Core Darklords page.
- Affably Evil: Mordenheim is not a cruel man. He despises death, and would save everyone's lives if he could. But he is also largely unbound by the strictures of morality, and when he can't get enough dead bodies to keep his wife's going, he arranges painless deaths with anesthetic chemicals.
- The Ageless: It's been centuries. Mordenheim doesn't age beyond his mid-thirties, and no one finds this strange.
- And I Must Scream: His wife's current condition is one of constant misery and suffering, such that she is ready to die... but Victor's pride and hatred of death will prevent him from ever shutting down the torturous machines keeping her alive.
- Anti-Magic: Not Mordenheim himself, but, an option presented in the 3rd edition version of the setting is that Mordenheim's sheer dismissal of magic has led to a phenomenon in Lamordia that mages dub "The Smothering of Reason", making the entire domain a place where magic is at some risk of spontaneously failing to work.
- Arbitrary Skepticism: Mordenheim staunchly believes magic is inferior to science and dismisses it. The tie-in novel "Mordenheim" attempts to justify this by detailing an event where Mordenheim tried to switch his wife's mind using necromantic magic, but it backfired on him, leading to him denouncing magic as treacherous and unworthy. Although he has genuinely achieved some spectacular scientific feats, what his science can do still pales in many ways compared to the power of arcane magic.
- Curse: Even before the mists swallowed Lamordia, the gods had cursed Mordenheim for his arrogance by allowing him to re-animate Adam in the first place. Many fans feel he, not his creation, is better understood as the true Darklord of Lamordia.
- Dr. Fakenstein: A transparent Frankenstein pastiche, though much darker and less-sympathetic than the original.
- Even Evil Has Loved Ones: For all his many flaws, Victor did love his wife and daughter, two of the only real emotional connections he ever formed. To the extent to which his vanity allows him to do so, he regrets ignoring their pleas for him to rein in Adam before it was too late, and he works constantly to keep one of them alive. However, because of his vain, selfish nature, he refuses to accept that he is only prolonging her suffering, meaning that his love for her is still abusive and twisted by it.
- Flat-Earth Atheist: Downplayed, but Mordenheim is a Mad Scientist who "neither worship[s] nor believe[s] in any power higher than man," and disdains arcane magic as a "diversion" from "real science." Despite coming from a world where, at the least, arcane magic is very real and its power is very demonstrable.
- Foregone Conclusion: Without the intervention of the gods that have spurned him, his quest to save his wife is hopeless. On some level, he is aware of this... but he keeps doing what he's doing anyway, because to do otherwise would be to admit to himself that he is as much at fault as Adam.
- Frame-Up: Mordenheim, for all his faults, is usually rather harmless. But the superstitious people of Lamordia are afraid of him, crediting him with powers he does not possess, and they blame him not merely for the grave-robbing he actually engages in but with his creation's murders.
- Good Scars, Evil Scars: Has a big one right over his left eye.
- Healing Factor: An extremely powerful one. He will regenerate From a Single Cell if necessary. Even the complete physical destruction or disintegration of his being will only ensure that his undying soul possesses a fresh male corpse, which, over the course of a week, comes to resemble him and takes up his work.
- In the Blood: Mordenheim has no direct children, but his family legacy does continue on through myriad cousins and their progeny, and optionally through the bloodline of his adopted daughter. Those who bear the blood of Mordenheim invariably are brilliant, love knowledge (especially scientific knowledge) and are prone to Arbitrary Skepticism, in the form of a disdain for religion and/or arcane magic. The antipathy towards religion is particularly justified because all Mordenheims have inherited Victor's Curse of Godlessness, which in 3e prevents them from ever taking levels in any class that learns divine magic.
- Lawful Evil: His In-Universe alignment, representing his detached, pragmatic mindset and his selfish, proud nature.
- Mad Scientist: Obviously, but a strangely calm one, who does not suffer from Science-Related Memetic Disorder.
- Magic Versus Science: He comes down quite firmly on the side of Science, doing his best to ignore that many of the things his science can do, magic can do cheaper and more easily.
- Non-Action Guy: He can't fight at all, but there are certain catches embedded in there...
- Pride: His tremendous, overbearing arrogance has damned him just as surely as if he had actually been a Darklord.
- Stone Wall: Can't fight, but he has the hit points of a flesh golem, can regenerate from just about anything short of disintegration, and there's even a timer involved, in that hurting him will quickly see Adam intervening to spare himself the pain.
- Synchronization: He's technically more a feature of Adam's curse than a Darklord in his own right, and neither can die while the other survives. Trying to kill Mordenheim will get Adam involved in short order, since they feel one another's physical injuries.
Baron Urik von Kharkov (former Darklord of Valachan)
Baron Urik von Kharkov, Darklord of Valachan
A panther who was transformed into a human by the Red Wizard Morphayus, to be used as a sleeper agent against Morphayus's rival Selena. Once Selena had fallen for Urik, Morphayus removed the enchantment and Urik tore her to shreds. Once he was turned back into a human, he was horrified by what he'd done. Fleeing into the Mists to escape Morphayus's power, he wound up in Darkon and joined the Kargat in order to be transformed into a vampire, only to be enslaved once more.
Trapped in the Nosferatu's thrall for two decades, he was released upon the vampire's death. His sanity severely frayed as a result of his experiences, Kharkov wandered the Mists, killing anyone he came across, and may have successfully killed Morphayus, or an illusion thereof. After this action, he was rewarded with his own domain.
His curse plays into his insecurity over not being truly human; he marries frequently, hoping that this time it will work out, but descends quickly into paranoia that his bride knows his true bestial nature, and eventually kills her.
As of 5e, he has been killed by a woman named Chakuna, who has taken over as Darklord.
- Abduction Is Love: Averted. Once a year he has a bride kidnapped for him. It never works out.
- A Wizard Did It: His very existence; a panther turned into a human who eventually became a vampire.
- The Bluebeard: Marries frequently, but ends up killing his brides out of paranoia that they know his true nature.
- Cool Sword: Created the Fang of the Nosferatu, a +3 dagger that heals the wielder, allows shapeshifting into a bat or wolf, and can grant immortality via a certain ritual.
- The Dragon: His is the brutal and sadistic Elven Vampire named Lady Adeline.
- Faking the Dead: Used Felkovic's attack upon him to publicly "die" and succeed himself.
- Forced Transformation: Being returned to a panther and tearing up his lover after fully believing himself to be a normal human was quite traumatizing.
- Kryptonite Factor: Fears the Cat of Felkovic, a figurine of wondrous power, which was specifically designed to destroy him and nearly did so once. It's one of the few things that can kill him outright.
- Laser-Guided Amnesia: After being transformed into a human, he was made to forget that he'd been a panther in order to be more useful as a sleeper agent.
- Lawful Evil: In-Universe — it's the official Character Alignment given in his profile writeups.
- Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot: Panther turned human turned vampire. Plus, despite being a vampire, he has a lycanthropic infection he can spread with his panther form's bite attack, causing people who escape with their lives to turn into werepanthers loyal to him.
- Number Two: Lady Adeline, as he prefers to be a more distant ruler. The two of the have a very strong working relationship.
- Our Vampires Are Different: He's a unique form of nosferatu strain, and used to be a panther. As a result, he has clawed, furry, paw-like hands and can shapeshift into panther form rather than the traditional bat, wolf or rat. He also has traits of Our Werebeasts Are Different: he has a Healing Factor that activates in moonlight, and he can infect people with the werepanther strain of lycanthropy.
- Resist the Beast: He's got three Beasts to resist, his natural patherine instincts, his vampiric urges, and his all-too-human desires.
- Secret Police: A member of Darkon's for a bit, and has one made up of werepanthers in Valachan called the Black Leopards.
- Spirit Advisor: Invoked in 5e, where his remains still can communicate. He is also one of just three being to know the location of Chakuna's Soul Jar.
- Tall Darkand Handsome: Mentioned as tall, broad-shouldered and dark-skinned.
- Token Minority: One of the few black Darklords to receive any focus in the gameline.
