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Darklords of the Amber Wastes
Pharaoh Anhktepot, Darklord of Har'Akir
Pharaoh Anhktepot, Darklord of Har'Akir
The soul seeker
Sometime ruler of a mighty empire, now a greater mummy after his desire to escape death led to the ruin of his kingdom and his person being mummified alive. His curse is the desire to live again as a great ruler and king, but to never be able to truly achieve it.His 5th edition incarnation is almost an inversion of the character. This iteration of Ankhtepot was a high priest who served three generations of pharaohs, but when the third pharaoh proved unpopular with the people and the priesthoods alike, he came to believe the gods were calling him to depose this incompetent and rule in his place. He swayed his faithful priests to his side, but when he murdered the young pharaoh, the outraged public rose up and killed him and his priests; in the afterlife, the gods berated him for his arrogance and then cast his soul back into his mummified body, where he languished until his name was forgotten by the living. Then the Dark Powers communed with him and offered him a chance to rule; when he accepted, he was revived in Har'Akir, which he conquered with armies of the undead and his revived mummy priests. Though he now sits atop the throne, centuries of rulership have left him bored and now he yearns to truly die.- Be Careful What You Wish For: Both iterations of the character are defined by having gotten what they asked for and finding out they didn't want it. The original Anhktepot wanted to live forever, and became a mummy haunting a forgotten tomb on the outskirts of a nameless village. The 5e Anhktepot wanted to rule, and now has found that ruling is tiring and tedious after centuries of unlife.
- Big Bad: Of the videogame Ravenloft: the Stone Prophet and the module Touch of Death.
- The Corrupter: An accidental case. A devout priestess of Osiris by the name of Isu Rehkotep happened to find a scroll which demonstrated how Anhktepot created his greater mummies. Although its evil power was too great for her to her to destroy it, she attempted to hide it so no one could ever use it again—but the damage was done. Over time, the dark sorceries she read about began to obsess her until she started studying the worship and magic of Set, at first in order to oppose it, but eventually she slid into worshippping the evil god as devoutly as she had Osiris, digging up the scroll and awakening Senmet.
- Create Your Own Villain: Well, arch-enemy. Anhktepot rather understandably thought he'd seen the last of the traitorous priest Senmet when he had him mummified and entombed alive. He never dreamed that someone else would stumble upon his method for making greater mummies and re-animate the guy.
- Damaged Soul: In his 5th edition incarnation, it's explained that Anhktepot is missing his "Ka", the vital spark that differentiates living souls from the dead. He desperately wants to find it, because he believes it will restore him to mortality and allow him to truly die.
- Death Seeker: The 5e version of Anhktepot wants to die and end his eternal unlife; he's happy to face the judgment of the gods, whether it brings him peace in the afterlife or spiritual annihilation because at this point anything is better than the ennui of continued existence.
- Entitled Bastard: The game notes that Ankhtepot, if he could become mortal again, would never be satisfied with "merely" being a commoner or tiny village headman. In his mind, he deserves the power and prestige of being again the mighty king of a mighty empire.
- Human Sacrifice: He can kill a sentient creature on one of the altars in his temple to drain their vitality and become human again for a day. However, while he is human, he loses all his powers and defenses, and if killed in this state he will only rise again as a mummy if he is mummified again. Furthermore, Har'Akir is tiny, and there is only a single mud-hut village nearby. If he kills too many, the village will die out and Anhktepot may never be able to become alive again at all.
- Lawful Evil: In-Universe, as an ex-tyrannical god-king.
- Maker of Monsters: He can create greater mummies, powerful creatures enslaved to him and capable of cleric spells.
- Mummy: A mixture of the Hollywood and Dungeons and Dragons versions.
- The Necrocracy: In the 5e iteration of Har'Akir, Anhktepot's direct subordinates are a cabal of powerful mummy priests known as the Children of Anhktepot, whom he has set up as the heralds and avatars of his fictitious pantheon.
- Necromancer: Ankhtepot controls many other mummies, some of whom are actually stronger than him, and he can make more by bringing back victims dying of his Touch of Death to be mummified alive.
- Nepharious Pharaoh: An undead tyrant and necromancer.
- Plague Master: Like all Ravenloft Greater Mummies, his touch causes the terrible disease mummy rot.
- Power of the Sun: He is still technically the priest of Ra, and, though Ra has abandoned him, the Dark Powers are the ones supplying clerics in the Demiplane of Dread.
- Rage Against the Heavens: When he was still pharaoh, he killed priests who could not make him immortal until he walked into the temple of Ra and raged that the gods had failed him. Ra, whose high priest he was, told him that he would live forever, but probably regret it, and gave him the Touch of Death that led to his ruin.
- Rags to Riches: In the 5e version, he went from an imprisoned undead languishing in a tomb whose name had been forgotten amongst the living to the all-powerful pharaoh of a mighty nation.
- Retcon: The 5e version is almost a complete inversion of who he was in the previous editions of the game.
- Riches to Rags: From the ruler of a vast empire to occupying a mostly-empty tomb on the edge of a tiny patch of desert and mud with a single small village nearby that he doesn't so much rule as occasionally wander out to terrify.
- Scam Religion: In 5th edition, to spite the gods he once worshipped, he destroyed their existing faiths in his domain and set up a new religion worshipping fake deities of his own invention. His living subjects have no idea that the gods they worship don't exist, not even the priests.
- Shout-Out: Anhktepot is obviously meant to mimic the main character of The Mummy (1932).
- The Theocracy: In 5th edition, Har'Akir is ruled by the priests and the Children of Anhktepot, mummified priests masquerading as living avatars of the gods, who in turn report to Anhktepot, the eternal emissary of the gods.
- Who Wants to Live Forever?: Anhktepot's damnation came from his desire for immortal life. Now, as a mummy, he believes that he would be satisfied with mortality, if he could only have a few more years of life. (Reigning as a mighty god-king, of course, and not as a lowly peasant.) His 5e incarnation focuses more on this trope, to the fact he no longer wants a human life at all, but simply the peace of the grave.
Diamabel, Darklord of Pharazia
Diamabel, Darklord of Pharazia
Formerly a nomadic desert raider and religious fanatic, he was killed and seemingly rose up as an angel, and now rules the city of Phiraz. However, he found his transformation came with a cost; every night, he transforms into a horrifying skeletal angel of death.- Blessed with Suck: Both forms are incredibly powerful, but the transformation between them is agonizing, and a constant reminder of his distance from his god. Indeed, his deity seems even more distant than before.
- Chaotic Evil: His official In-Universe alignment.
- Cool Sword: Spiritburner, his +3 flame tongue sword.
- The Fundamentalist: Feels that the world is filthy and that his calling is to cleanse it, so that he may join his god in heaven.
- Involuntary Shapeshifting: By day he possesses an angelic appearance, by night he appears to be a horrific zombie.
- Nigh-Invulnerability: Regenerates two hit points a round, requires a +2 weapon to hit him, returns from the dead in a month if killed.
- Retcon: In the Quoth the Raven #21 netbook, which made Pharazia an Arabian Nights-themed domain, and Diamabel himself a more ambiguous figure. His dual forms are known to Pharazians, but his origin and nature are left open, turned into a Riddle for the Ages — even whether or not he's Pharazia's darklord — in an effort to move away from the unfortunate implications around his canon write-up as the sole Islamic-themed darklord.
- Villain with Good Publicity: The people of Pharazia love their divine protector, and fear the angel of death that stalks the night, never suspecting that they are one and the same.
Tiyet, Darklord of Sebua
Tiyet, Darklord of Sebua
Ruler of the wasteland realm of Sebua, Tiyet is a unique mummy with a sordid past, involving framing the wife of a pharoah's son so she could have him for herself, only to cheat on her husband with a priest of Set. With a prophetic vision, she had him make her into a unique mummy, allowing her to escape the execution she was supposed to receive when her adultery was discovered.- Beat Still, My Heart: How she feeds. Once she's paralyzed a victim, she sinks her hand into their chest and draws out their beating heart, then eats it.
- Death Glare: In a literal sense. Her glare can paralyze people and kill them via cardiac arrest—though since she can't eat stopped hearts, she's loath to do so.
- Dreaming of Things to Come: Haunted by a dream she had of her punishment in the afterlife, she pressured her lover to use the ritual that made her what she is today in order to avert it. So far.
- Driven to Suicide: After her adultery was discovered she begged for her lover to perform the immortality ritual upon her, but it could only be used on the recently deceased. When he refused to kill her, she grabbed a dagger and forced the matter.
- From a Single Cell: If reduced to zero hp, she turns to dust, and is defeated, but not destroyed. Her body reforms in a few days. The only way she can be slain permanently is by tricking her into eating her own heart, which is still in the temple where the mummification ritual was done. If it were ever offered to her, it would start to beat, and she would be unable to resist it, even though it would mean her doom.
- Hoist by Her Own Petard: The only way to kill her for good is to make her eat her own heart (taken out as part of the above-mentioned ritual).
- Horror Hunger: Uncontrollably driven to devour human hearts.
- Karmic Death: She was sentenced to death for adultery, the same crime she framed her husband's first wife for in order to marry him.
- Mortality Phobia: After suffering from recurring nightmares of a horrific punishment in the Hall of Judgment (her society's version of Hell) the idea of dying terrified her, and she sought immortality, gaining it in the worst way.
- Murder the Hypotenuse: Tiyet framed a woman for adultery (which got her thrown to jackals) in order to marry her husband, the pharaoh's son.
- Mummy: Although you wouldn't know it from looking at her.
- Necromancer: Controls undead within her domain, though she has to make mummies the slow way.
- Neutral Evil: In-Universe — it's the official Character Alignment given in her profile writeups.
- Picky People Eater: Hearts.
- Seductive Mummy: A mummy who has the appearance of an attractive woman.
- Summon Magic: Can summon a swarm of beetles.
- Terrible Ticking: The beating of human hearts is incredibly magnified for her, growing ever-louder depending on her hunger.
- Time Travel: She wasn't just sent far away from her home, she was also sent forward over a thousand years.
- Touch of Death: Her touch can inflict wounds, and her kiss can drain strength.
- Undead Barefooter: She doesn't wear shoes, as a way to show that she's undead.
- Voluntary Shapeshifting:
- Can turn into a monkey in order to blend in with Sebua's other monkeys.
- Her introductory supplement mentions that she can turn into an owl.
- Weather Manipulation: Can create sandstorms.
Darklords of the Frozen Reaches
Prince Ladislav Mircea, Darklord of Sanguinia
Prince Ladislav Mircea, Darklord of Sanguinia
Originally a handsome, vain, and selfish prince, who abandoned his subjects when a plague hit his lands, retreating to his castle with his friends. When the plague hit his castle, he had his infected friends thrown over the walls. When the plague got to him, he turned to alchemy in a desperate attempt to cure it, but eventually succumbed, rising as a vrykolaka. He now desperately seeks to cure his undeath through alchemy.- Beauty to Beast: Went from handsome prince to walking-corpse vampire.
- Mad Scientist: Alchemist variant. He studied alchemy to cure the plague he caught, and after turning into a vrykolaka, to become human again, and his experiments have become increasingly wild as he becomes more desperate.
- Our Vampires Are Different: Vrykolaka are plague-carrier vampires with shattered minds which look like walking corpses (being based on early Eastern European versions of vampires, where they were closer to zombies). Mircea is exceptional among his kind, in that he still retains his mind (and thus is aware of what he's become), and according to his 3e statblock
, feeds on the bodily humors of others, each humor affecting him in a different way. - Poisonous Person: His body carries three diseases, which he spreads through his attacks.
Gregor Zolnik, Darklord of Vorostokov
Gregor Zolnik, Darklord of Vorostokov
A mighty werewolf and hunter, and de facto ruler of the domain of Vorostokov.- Addictive Magic: The feeling of becoming a wolf and hunting is powerfully addictive. In Darklords, he manages to transform his son Mikhail against the latter's will and it's stated that Mikhail will be forced to resist the temptation to transform for the rest of his life, even if his father is defeated.
- Archnemesis Dad: Has become this to his youngest (and good-aligned) son Mikhail, who opposes his power.
- Blood Knight: Addicted to the thrill of hunting in his wolf form.
- Cain and Abel: His sisters, powerful witches who hate him for killing their mother, are plotting against him.
- Chaotic Evil: In-Universe — it's the official Character Alignment given in his profile writeups.
- Cool Sword: Ilyana, a +3 bastard sword that can heal its wielder once a day.
- Divine Parentage: Descended from Azrai, a deceased god of evil and shadow, which gives him high Charisma (15), and allows him to commune with snakes (and later, wolves).
- Endless Winter: Vorostokov has been stuck in one of these since it was taken into the mists, making prey extremely sparse. Recently there are vague signs that it might be lifting a bit, though knowing Ravenloft, that probably means something worse is about to happen.
- Fallen Hero: Years ago, before Vorostokov was taken into Ravenloft, his hunting prowess saved the village from starvation and he became a beloved hero. Now he'd give anything to have those days back, to the point of killing anyone else (outside his boyarsky) who tries to hunt or who attempts to escape.
- Hunting the Most Dangerous Game: Whatever pangs of conscience and self-justificatory lies he tells himself, this is the real reason for his killing his fellow humans.
- Ignored Epiphany: Struggled briefly with the realization that he was a murderer and that he was condemning his people to a life of unwitting cannibalism, but he got over it fairly quickly.
- Curious Qualms of Conscience: Now that winter is finally lifting and prey is slowly returning, though, he's starting to feel guilty again. So he's bullying local villages to stave it off.
- In the Blood: Both his sons were born nascent Loup du Noir. The elder, Alexei, has already been "brought into the boyarsky", and Gregor plans to bring Mikhail in as well, whether he wants it or not.
- Matricide: Killed his mother after she encouraged his second wife to spy on him (indirectly leading to her death).
- Mook Maker: His bite can infect people with lycanthropy.
- Our Werewolves Are Different: As a Loup du Noir, he requires his wolf pelt to shapeshift. He can also force werewolves he's infected to change forms, and control them when they're in wolf form.
- Resurrective Immortality: If killed in either form, his body will disappear and reappear in his secret cave with his sword and wolf skin intact. The only way to kill him off for good is to sprinkle his pelt with wolfsbane and salt, which will strip him of all his protections and leave him as vulnerable as any human.
- Retcon: His descent from Azrai is unmentioned until Domains of Dread.
- Speaks Fluent Animal: His heritage allows him to talk to snakes (if he can find one in a domain where the temperature rarely rises above -20 degrees Fahrenheit). After becoming a werewolf, this extended to wolves.
- Supernatural Elite: Has formed a boyarsky of loyal warriors and hunters who rule the village alongside him. All of them are werewolves that he's infected.
- To Serve Man: After Vorostokov was taken into Ravenloft, he was forced to hunt humans to feed his people, though he never told them the truth.
- Transplant: From Cerilia, the Birthright setting. (This, however, is a retcon introduced in the writeup of the domain in Domains of Dread; it is not mentioned in his first appearance, the book Darklords.)
- 0% Approval Rating: The people of Vorostokov have come to resent their dependence upon him (and are all but certain of the true nature of the meat he gives them), but fear him too much to rebel.
Darklords of the Shadowlands
Morgoroth, Darklord of Avonleigh
Morgoroth, Darklord of Avonleigh
Morgoroth the Black was a plane-traveling wizard of great power, who came to the Great Kingdom of Avonleigh - the namesake for his domain, and the world from which all of the Shadowlands domains were drawn - seeking redemption for the sins he had committed on his own world. Lord Ferran Shadowborn, leader of a paladin order known as The Circle, offered Morgoroth the chance to atone through servitude. Morgoroth agreed, and was granted an isolated forest region to claim as his own; he used his magic to build his home of Tergeron Manor in a single night, and the literal ghosts of his past soon settled in to haunt the forest, causing it to be renamed the Phantasmal Forest. Still, Morgoroth served the Circle loyally for many years, and earned their trust - he also nursed a secret love for Aurora Shadowborn, Lord Ferran's sister, but never dared to act on it. Then, one day, a paladin named Lambert pursued Morgoroth from his former world, demanding he be given the wizard's head. When the Circle hesitated, Lambert went after Morgoroth himself; attacked on sight, Morgoroth slew his assailant and raised him as an undead slave. When Lord Shadowborn arrived soon afterwards, he was forced to destroy the undead paladin, and went on to confront Morgoroth, who impulsively slew his friend of many years. Overwrought with despair, Morgoroth snapped; he teleported to Aurora's temple, charmed her into a slumber, and then teleported away, placing her within a crystal sarcophagus so that she would never wake again. When the Circle came to save her, he destroyed them almost to the last, which caused him to be swallowed by the mists. In the Demiplane of Dread, he attempted to create a magic mirror that would enable him to escape — instead, it exploded, destroying his body and binding his spirit into Tergeron Manor, leaving him quite mad.
- The Atoner: Subverted. He first arrived in Avonleigh to leave behind a different world in which he committed unspecified evil. He spent several years working hard at atonement, serving an order of righteous paladins. Unfortunately, while he was trying to move on from his past, his past wasn't done with him and eventually Lambert showed up to deny Morgoroth his chance at redemption.
- Crazy Jealous Guy: Morgoroth will usually attempt to kill anyone who enters Tergeron Manor, because he's terrified of the notion that they may take Lady Aurora Shadowborn from him, although this is exacerbated by the mental damage done to him in his geist state. He also keeps her trapped in her glass coffin, incapable of ever waking, because he knows that she will reject him forever should she wake and learn that he slew her brother, accidentally or not... plus, he believes she never loved him back and would never return his feelings anyway.
- Even Evil Has Loved Ones: Morgoroth may demonstrate it in an insane way, but he does genuinely love Aurora.
- Evil Is Deathly Cold: Morgoroth's presence makes Tergeron Manor unnaturally cold, and the closer one gets to the belfry, the sharper the temperature drops.
- Genius Loci: Morgoroth is one with Tergeron Manor, allowing him to control everything within its walls.
- Heel–Face Door-Slam: Morgoroth spent years fighting for good alongside the Circle, genuinely repenting his former wickedness, and making great strides to redeem himself. Then along came Lambert, and everything went to hell as Morgoroth decided to go back to evil.
- Poor Communication Kills: Morgoroth was in love with Aurora, but never dared to tell her because he knew she would be expected to become High Priestess, a position requiring celibacy. She was also in love with him, but never told him because she didn't know how to reconcile her feelings with her faith. When Morgoroth finally broke down and told her that he had always loved her, years after she had taken her vows, she ran away because she was overcome with regret that she hadn't told him about feeling the same way before — but he mistook this as rejection from her, and was heartbroken, which may have set up his ultimate downfall.
- Puzzle Boss: In Morgoroth's sole appearance, the adventure "A Light in the Belfry", the party first has to give him a body back by finding the 13 shards of his magic mirror. But, if they fight him normally, either he magically feigns death to escape when they aren't looking or, if they forcibly "make sure" he's dead, he's just re-merged with the manor again, forcing the party to find the shards all over again... and, when he returns, he has all of his health and spells back. To defeat him, the party has to restore his body, and then smash the mirror, which truly kills him — at least in the sense of leaving him a powerless geist.
- Star-Crossed Lovers: Morgoroth and Lady Aurora Shadowborn both loved each other from afar, but were held apart by politics. Then things took a turn for the gothic when Morgoroth accidentally murdered Aurora's brother, kidnapped her, and placed her in an eternal slumber so he could at least take solace in her presence.
- Then Let Me Be Evil: Believing that the Circle had let his old enemy Lambert try to take his head, Morgoroth slew his former friend, Lord Shadowborn, when the latter came after him. When he realized that Lord Shadowborn had originally tried to defend him from Lambert, Morgoroth snapped and decided to return to the powers of Black Magic.
Elena Faith-hold, Darklord of Nidala
Elena Faith-hold, Darklord of Nidala
A one-time paladin and crusader of the Celtic god Belenus, Elena Faith-hold fell from grace when she tried to turn her crusade on innocent people who worshipped other gods in the pantheon. Consumed by her own self-righteousness, the mists swallowed her. The Dark Powers have made her the ruler of Nidala and seemingly restored her paladin powers, but in twisted forms that she is in denial about. Now, she runs her land as a joyless police state, finding "evils" to purge everywhere she goes.- Affably Evil: In her own mind, Elena is still a good and heroic person, and, with her high Charisma score, she is easily able to put a shiny gloss on what she does... for a while. Sooner or later, visitors will see what she's done to her land as the horror it is.
- Belief Makes You Stupid: Rather, Belief Makes You Evil; Elena's fanatical reverence for the sun god Belenus caused her to become convinced that he was the only true god, and drove her to unleash a bloody campaign of conversion upon her former people to convince them of this.
- Charm Person: In addition to her paladin powers, Elena can attempt to "convert" enemies to her side, securing their fanatical devotion... for a while.
- Church Militant: Before she ruled Nidala, she was a benevolent version. Now she represents many of the worst aspects of such perversions of religious faith as the Inquisition or the Puritan witch hunts.
- Cool Sword: Elena fights with a +2 bastard sword named Caitlin.
- Detect Evil: While Elena believes that she, alone among all spellcasters in Ravenloft, where the spell doesn't usually work, has regained the use of this power as a sign of her great piety, she actually senses strong emotions of any kind directed at her. Thus, her subjects have learned to feel as indifferent in her presence as possible.
- Fallen Hero: There was a time in Elena's life when she was a genuine hero. Inside her own head, she still is.
- The Fundamentalist: Elena's problems and sorrows are almost all the direct result of her utter refusal to admit that she might possibly ever be wrong or capable of making mistakes. And that refusal has led to her damnation. Even her patron deity's outrage resulting in him stripping her of her divine powers for this offence failed to make her realize the wrongness of her beliefs.
- The Heretic: She makes sure to correct any heretics to Belenus in her domain... including people who follow the true dogma of Belenus, because Elena herself is a heretic. Belenus is a
Neutral Good deity who is merely the sun god of his pantheon, not the harsh monotheistic deity that Elena promotes. Elena's heretical ideas caused her to Fall long before she became Darklord of Nidala, and her absolute refusal to admit fault has caused her to enforce said heresy as the state religion. - I Reject Your Reality: If there is one great theme to Elena, besides the tragedy of her self-righteousness leading her down into damnation, it is denial. Elena simply refuses to notice or admit the warped and changed nature of her paladin gifts, the gloomy police-state Nidala has become under her stewardship, or that she might ever have made some mistakes she could learn from and become a better person.
- Knight Templar: Obsessed with stamping out evil in her land... no matter the cost.
- Lawful Evil: Her official In-Universe alignment, as a former Paladin dedicated to harsh enforcement of laws and 'moral standards'.
- Moral Guardians: The subtler side of her policing involves outlawing "sinful" practices like jewelry, theaters, and excess drink.
- Old Maid: Elena, while still very good-looking, is in her forties and thinking about marriage. Unfortunately, as the text notes, thanks to her twisted version of the Detect Evil power, she would only ever be able to marry a suitor who feels nothing for her and is only using her for his own ends. If they loved her back, she'd ping them as evil and murder them.
- The Paladin: She firmly believes she is a straight example. In practice, all of her powers have more in common with anti-paladin or blackguard powers than the genuine article. Her 3rd Edition write-up even gives her straight-up blackguard levels.
- The Purge: Elena regularly sifts the populace for individuals in need of "rehabilitation," and when a town has gotten too "corrupt" for her liking, it gets "fed to the dragon."
- "Scooby-Doo" Hoax: Played for Drama. Elena keeps up the legend of a dragon on an impassable local mountain that occasionally flies out and burns down villages... to hide that she and her followers are secretly responsible, purging places that they believe are too corrupt to be allowed to live.
- Torture Technician: Her "rehabilitation" programs involve the vast network of torture engines in the dungeons beneath Faith-hold. In fact, those attempting to flee while she's sealed the borders will find themselves drawn inside of them.
- Unicorns Are Sacred: Elena used to have a unicorn mount as a gift from her god, lost when she fell from grace. When she became a Darklord, one of the Dark Powers' gifts was an evil version.
Ebonbane, Darklord of Shadowborn Manor
Ebonbane, Darklord of Shadowborn Manor
A sword forged from metal from an alternate dimension and imbued with an evil presence specifically to slay the paladin Keteri Shadowborn. It succeeded, only to find it trapped in the late Paladin's family manor in Ravenloft. Now Keteri's spirit lives on as a geist, seeking to draw in adventurers to help her destroy the evil blade.
- Killed Off for Real: Is actually one of the few Dark Lords defeated for real in Shadowborn.
Darklords of Zherisia
Sodo, Darklord of Paridon
Sodo, Darklord of Paridon
A formerly low-ranked dread doppelganger who resented that his clan's status meant he would always be sentenced to low-level and labor-intensive positions, instead of being allowed to ascend on his own merits. Acquiring a magical hat of disguise, he was able to impersonate the elders who ruled the doppelganger clans, starting a clan war that ended with the old order dead and him as the new Grandmaster. This treachery drew Paridon into the Mists, where he was cursed with the complete inability to control his shapeshifting... a curse that would only drive him to ever more self-destructive extremes.- Blessed with Suck: Who wouldn't kill for a touch that can heal all wounds and even raise the dead? A sadist addicted to pain, that's who.
- Blood Magic: Sodo keeps himself immortal by killing six people once every 13 years with a magical dagger, and using their blood in a dark ritual. It's also made him a pain-addicted sadist while exacerbating the issues he's picked up from his other curses.
- Chaotic Evil: In-Universe — it's the official Character Alignment given in his profile writeups.
- Chronic Backstabbing Disorder: Rose to power by engineering the death of his superiors, like so many other Darklords.
- Even more so, he's treacherous even by dread doppleganger standards — betrayal of one's brethren is about the only crime they find truly abhorrent.
- Cold-Blooded Torture: Loves it, but can't enjoy it anymore. Torture devices? He transforms too fast to use them effectively. His bare hands? That's where the "healing touch" part comes in.
- Curse: He's picked up no fewer than three curses. His original curse as darklord makes it impossible for him to control his shapeshifting. Overuse of the Fang of Nosferatu for its Blood Magic fuelled immortality ritual has made him a sadist who heals anyone he harms or personally kills. And in the Zherisia Survey splatbook, he is explained as suffering from a curse of heightened paranoia, which only exacerbates his initial curse.
- Involuntary Shapeshifting: Inverted. He can take any form he likes, but is unable to hold them for more than a minute, less when agitated (read: All the time, as the Dark Powers have given him a curse of paranoia).
- Sadist: He's addicted to the emotions of pain and suffering he inflicts on others, to the point that being deprived of such feelings is physically painful for him.
- Telepathy: Sodo has the empathic powers all dopplegangers do.
The Hive Queen, Darklord of Timor
The Hive Queen, Darklord of Timor
The ruler of the sewer domain beneath Paridon, she was once a spoiled princess who decided to scare her mother to death with the illusion of transforming into a half-human/half-marikith monster. Things didn't go as she expected.- Beware My Stinger Tail: And it gets more toxic with every egg she lays.
- Chaotic Evil: In-Universe — it's the official Character Alignment given in her profile writeups.
- Expy: Of the Alien Queen. Marikiths are effectively Xenomorphs with a dash of Predator.
- Forced Transformation: The wizard she seduced into creating the above-mentioned illusion decided to take things a bit further when he saw her with her real lover; rather than use illusion to disguise her as a marikith, he turned her into a real one. Her sting can also turn people into marikiths.
- God Save Us from the Queen!: Her mother had been blowing all of Timor's money in order to make it a permanent testimony to her greatness.
- Half-Human Hybrid: Human/Marikith. By transformation and not breeding.
- Matricide: Her new form scared her mother to death, as planned.
- Mook Maker: Regularly lays marikith eggs.
- Offing the Offspring: Fears that a queen marikith might kill her as she killed her mother, so she kills them as soon as they hatch.
- Spider People: Her half-marikith body looks something vaguely like a gargantuan hybrid of ant queen and drider; a beautiful woman's upper torso giving way to a monstrous invertebrate body dominated by an immensely swollen egg-laden abdomen.
- Xenomorph Xerox: Although she's a magical creature instead of an alien.
Darklords of the Verduous Lands
Draga Salt-Biter, Darklord of Saragoss
Draga Salt-Biter, Darklord of Saragoss
Saragoss, a swampy five-mile wide mass of seaweed, shipwrecks, and assorted flotsam, is a realm of constant conflict above and below the sea, ruled by the wereshark Draga Salt-Biter.- Abusive Parents: Born to two abusive sailors, he escaped to the sea to get away from them. And then he was captured and raised by evil pirates.
- The Aloner: The nature of his realm and his hatred for sharks mean that he's denied any form of companionship.
- Artificial Gill: Inverted. He uses a ring of air-breathing which allows him to stay above water for a couple of hours at a time. Without it he would have gone completely insane by now.
- Asskicking Leads to Leadership: Although he cannot stop them from squabbling amongst themselves, the sheer number of sharks and undead he can bring to bear force the beings of his domain to obey his edicts.
- Badass Cape: The attire of a priest of Umberlee consists of a blue or green body stocking and one of these, trimmed with white fur and with a white collar to represent breaking waves. Draga seems to have lost his, however.
- Badass Preacher: Quite apart from the "wereshark pirate" thing, he's a devoted worshipper of Umberlee, the Sailor's Bane, goddess of the sea's savagery.
- The Beastmaster: Can summon and control all sharks within his domain. As this requires him to come into mental contact with them, he hates doing it.
- Blessed with Suck: He'd very much enjoy the power of his other forms... if it didn't mean becoming a shark. He'd enjoy having a powerful army at his command... if they weren't sharks. He'd enjoy being able to breathe underwater if it didn't mean not being able to breathe on land... thus having to be in the sea with sharks all the time.
- Death World: Saragoss is chock full of dangerous creatures, desperate raiders, and weather that ranges from "searing heat that makes you waste your fresh water" to "bitterly cold fogs that hide monsters and raiders and make your ship rot faster" to "ungodly ship-destroying tempests". Even the ground beneath your feet cannot be trusted, as it's packed seaweed, which could let you through at any time.
- Derelict Graveyard: Saragoss.
- Even Evil Has Loved Ones: He was a harsh captain, but he still cared about his crew enough to be upset when he killed them and destroyed the Vengeance in a frenzied rage.
- Fake Weakness: During a fight he'll pretend that any non-silver and non-magical weapons he's hit with are hurting him, just to lure attackers into a sense of false security.
- The Farmer and the Viper:
- During his Mistreatment-Induced Betrayal, he even killed crewmembers who had treated him kindly, though at least he made it quick.
- There are many kelpies in Saragoss who do things like pretend to be drowning victims, only to drag their would-be saviors under and feast upon them.
- Forever War: Because Draga made his career off contention and strife, the Dark Powers have made Saragoss this:
- Above the water, crews of wrecked ships constantly wage vicious battles for the meager resources of the realm, particularly wood, which can be used for warmth or to rebuild their ships and escape. New visitors are either recruited, Press-Ganged, or raided (successfully or not). Any alliances between different crews are born of desperation, temporary, and likely fake.
- Below the water, all manner of sea creatures, intelligent beings (Reavers, Sahuagins, etc), and underwater undead fight endlessly for dominance and survival.
- Genre Savvy: He's been an adventuring cleric for most of his life, and so is extremely familiar with which spells to use in which situation. He'll also quickly re-memorize any spells he uses.
- Hope Spot: Very fond of these back in Faerûn. He'd board a ship, demand sacrifice to Umberlee, and then leave once he got it...for a few hours. Also see Fake Weakness.
- Jerkass: A moody and melancholy individual, who (unlike many darklords) won't even pretend to be nice. Intruders to his realm are usually either ignored or killed outright.
- Loss of Identity: He's becoming more and more shark-like as time passes, and fears that one day he'll lose his human identity entirely.
- Mistreatment-Induced Betrayal: Once Draga had the trust of the pirates who'd raised him, he killed them all, leaving the most torturous deaths for the ones who'd had a direct hand in the Shark Pool incident.
- Monster Adventurers: In his pirate captain days, he was both an adventuring cleric and a wereshark.
- Necromancer: Can animate all the corpses in Saragoss, and control undead who have originated within. Without any specific purpose, they'll set to fighting amongst themselves just like everyone else.
- Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot: Ex-pirate wereshark priest darklord.
- Our Werebeasts Are Different: An infected wereshark who got control over his transformations. Yes, he is fully aware of the irony of hating sharks while in some sense being one: he got his selachanthropy and his galeophobia in the same incident.
- Pirate: Back in Faerûn.
- Resurrective Immortality: If he should be killed with sharks in his domain, his spirit will divide itself among the sharks, who will fight to the death with each winner gaining a piece of his soul until the whole thing is united and he is reborn. If there aren't any sharks in his domain, he's kaput. So he has to keep sharks near him at all times.
- Shark Man: Being a wereshark, he can assume this as a form.
- Shark Pool: Shortly after being captured, the pirates stuck a hook through one of his calves, and dangled him on a rope over a group of sharks, dunking him in and pulling him out when things got too rough. It gave him three things: a selachanthropy infection, a lifelong fear of sharks, and a fondness for doing the same to others. Which the pirates found out firsthand.
- Summon Magic: Draga has dictated that when someone escapes Saragoss, someone else must enter. So when someone manages to escape, a ghost ship appears to lure someone else into Saragoss, even from outside the Mists.
- Super Not-Drowning Skills: Can breathe underwater in human form, but can no longer breathe on land.
- Telepathy: He can telepathically contact and control sharks within his domain, though he hates doing it because he has a couple of issues with sharks.
- Threatening Shark: Can call them up, and happens to be one himself.
- Transplant: From Faerûn.
- Weather Manipulation: Can summon and manipulate storms.
- Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: After being exposed to the Shark Pool, he had a deep-seated fear and hatred of sharks. Now that he's been forced to live with them all the time and lost himself, it's gotten even worse.
- You Are What You Hate: Abhors sharks, and will only assume his wereshark form if his life is in mortal danger.
- 0% Approval Rating: No one likes Draga (no one likes anyone in Saragoss), but they know better than to oppose him.
Arijani, Darklord of Sri Raji
Arijani, Darklord of Sri Raji
The rakshasa son of Ravana, the rakshasa god, and Mahiji, human high priestess of Kali. Despised by the rakshasa of his home city for his lowly mortal blood, Arijani came to despise them in turn. Secretly, he arranged for the rakshasa to be hunted down by humans, which drove the rakshasa to retaliate by massacring the humans, many of their own number being slain in the process. Ravana, naturally enough, couldn't stand for this, and sent an avatar to kill Arijani, only for his son to trick him into a vulnerable position. Ravana's avatar bargained for his life — in return for freeing him and abandoning his crusade against rakshasa, he would make Arijani invulnerable to attacks from rakshasa, including Ravana himself, for all time. Arijani accepted, and then promptly broke his oath by killing Ravana's avatar. For his many betrayals, he was claimed by the Mists of Ravenloft.5e retcons him quite a bit; he's still a Rakshasa (though in this case, he was a human transformed into one after his death), but he is instead a major driver of the Start of Darkness of the new Domain of Kalakeri's Darklord- his sister Ramya. For tropes pertaining to that incarnation, see Reema and Arijani Vasavadan on the main character page.
- Beast Man: Like all AD&D rakshasa, he looks like a towering tiger-man in his default form.
- Chaotic Evil: His official in-universe alignment.
- Chronic Backstabbing Disorder: As his backstory shows, he'll betray anybody if it suits his purposes.
- Demoted to Extra: Subverted in 5th edition; he goes from being the sole darklord to part of a Big Bad Triumvirate in Kalakeri - it still isn't likely you'll be able to avoid him or his schemes.
- Divine Parentage: His father, Ravana, is the god of the Rakshasa.
- Fighting a Shadow: Killed his father's avatar. Might also count as patricide at one remove.
- Half-Human Hybrid: Rakshasa god father, human mother.
- I'm a Humanitarian: Needs to eat one human a day.
- Man of Wealth and Taste: Whatever form Arijani takes, he always wears the finest clothes and appears as a member of the highest caste; he never sees any reason to appear as someone of a lower social class.
- Master of Illusion: On top of his innate illusion abilities as a rakshasa, he's also a 13th level illusionist.
- Nigh-Invulnerability: He cannot be hurt by a native of his domain or another rakshasa. Immune to many spells thanks to his high Wisdom, and to all illusions of 1st-3rd level. Can be harmed only by +3 or better magical weapons, with +3 and +4 weapons only doing half-damage.
- The Oath-Breaker: Which he swore to his father, a god.
- Super-Intelligence: He has an Intelligence score of 21 and a Wisdom of 20.
- Weaksauce Weakness: Crossbows, especially if blessed, a common weakness of all rakshasa.
King Crocodile, Darklord of the Wildlands
King Crocodile, Darklord of the Wildlands
Once, there was a crocodile so large, so wicked, so evil, that all the other animals in the jungle decided to ask the hairless apes to come and kill him. They came, alright, but devastated the jungle instead, killing the animals and felling the trees. So the animals turned to the wicked crocodile to drive them away. He agreed, but only if the animals would give him their powers. Of all the creatures of the jungle, only the python refused to give the crocodile his powers, and only the fly was refused when he offered, for the crocodile saw the fly as beneath him. The crocodile then killed all the hairless apes, as he had promised, but when the other animals asked him to return their powers, he turned on them. Then the python came to the crocodile, giving him a gift of prophecy, that he would be killed either by a hairless ape or something he had thought beneath him, and then the python and his kin left the jungle, to see it swallowed by the mists.King Crocodile has ruled the Wildlands for a long time now, but he has a secret he keeps from the other animals: he is dying of the sleeping sickness the flies spread. Slowly, to be sure, for the sickness will take centuries to kill him, but still, he is dying, and would promise anything, do anything, to prevent it... not that he wouldn't try and devour his would-be saviors afterwards.
- Absurdly Sharp Claws: His teeth are effectively tiny magical swords of sharpness, with an excellent chance of severing limbs on contact.
- Area of Effect: He can literally manifest an "aura of evil" a few times a day, sucking the life-force out of anything in a huge radius around himself.
- Attack Its Weak Point: Subverted. He does have the traditional reptilian "soft underbelly"... but he fights cleverly enough that the only realistic way of hitting it is to get in the water with him. You do not want to get in the water with him.
- Chaotic Evil: His official In-Universe alignment. He is entirely driven by his hunger, and cannot even pretend to cooperate with others- he just eats anyone who gets close, and has never kept a bargain. There are demons out there who are more trustworthy than he is.
- Eternal Recurrence: If an adventuring party somehow beats the huge heavily-armored crocodile, the jungle creatures will turn on them, refusing to honor any bargain made with Man. And all the young crocodiles will fight to the death for his throne, for "it is part of the curse of the land that there will always be a King Crocodile."
- Evil Is Burning Hot: The Wildlands are a swamp of steamy jungle heat and buzzing flies.
- Expy: Of Gustave, a legendary crocodile of similar size and temperament, which inspired the film Primeval. Also, of Shere Khan, given that the domain is an homage to The Jungle Book: like Khan, he despises humans, manipulates others, and doesn't get along with the prophetic python.
- Glowing Eyes of Doom: If the insatiably hungry forty-foot-long crocodile somehow seems safe to you, his eyes helpfully glow bright red.
- Hit-and-Run Tactics: King Crocodile is, after all, an ambush predator. He can easily slip away into the waters of his lair, only to suddenly lash out at the party at any moment. Victims actually take penalties to their reaction time when he does so.
- Horror Hunger: It motivates everything he does. He demands huge tributes of food, and even of other animals' young, and even then it's not always enough to keep him from devouring them.
- Lightning Bruiser: Not just superhumanly strong with lots of hitpoints and natural armor, but has a very high dexterity score too, and uses ambush tactics and misdirection to great effect if directly confronted.
- Never Smile at a Crocodile: The Wildlands recall the universe of The Jungle Book or the Just So Stories, and King Crocodile represents the dangerous, hungry croc.
- Reptiles Are Abhorrent: Played with. King Crocodile is an abomination, bloated with evil, but the mammals of the Wildlands aren't all that great either, even before being twisted by the evil of the Demiplane of Dread. Plus, the python was, in the past, the wisest of all the jungle creatures, and he and his snake brethen were the only ones smart enough to not give their powers to King Crocodile and pull a Screw This, I'm Outta Here before the Wildlands were taken by the mists.
- Secretly Dying: Bitten by a fly, he has contracted a deadly sleeping-sickness that is wasting him away. This is not something he wants known.
- Talking Animal: Able to speak any human language, like most of the animals in the Wildlands, aside from the flies. He actually prefers it in some ways, to feed his ego and fancies about being "above" them, and is apparently quite eloquent.
- Too Dumb to Live: The beasts, giving the evil crocodile their powers without suspecting he wouldn't give them back.
- Ungrateful Bastard: The reason he cannot rule the Wildlands as effectively as he would like is that he cannot resist devouring anyone who tries to bargain with him, with the end result that no one does. This includes any adventurers who might heal his sickness. The animals of the Wildlands will also reveal themselves to be this if an adventuring party actually manages to kill the King Crocodile, driving them away and refusing to honor any bargains they might've struck. "Gratitude is not a quality well-known in the jungle."
- Wraparound Background: When he seals the borders, any attempt to escape the Wildlands will only draw victims into the heart of his lair.
