Hey guys, I was wondering if anyone had any idea on running a Castlevania game in Pathfinder. For instance, how would you handle a shop in the game, or go about designing the castle? Let's assume that the interior of the castle exists within a sort of demiplane. I'm really sitting on a creative block here and do not know where to begin, so a little stimulation would be appreciated, O forum of awesomeness. Thanks.
This has been on my to-do list for the longest time. It's one of two options I'm going to present to my group when I finish Kingmaker: either "megadungeon that combines the best of Castlevania, La-Mulana, and Undermountain" or "winter campaign featuring some of my favorite ex-PCs as villains".
Yes, the entire castle would be a massive internal demiplane megadungeon, to the point where it might qualify for "it's bigger on the inside". Each "section" or "quarter" of the castle would be a differing type of region with its own theme, and depending on the nature of the area would possibly even differ in terrain. Heavily stocked by monsters, with a few of Big D's lieutenants running the show at various locations.
The story would pretty much have to be the standard "Belmonts hunting down Dracula during his cycle of regeneration" thing, so really doesn't ask for much. A few lackeys scattered through the castle to serve as checks against intruders, perhaps a few rival gangs of vamp hunters out for the glory for themselves, etc.
For the castle's layout, I personally would just use whatever maps I have available, laid out in a semi-logical fashion (Castlevania is known for being labyrinthine and sometimes incoherent in design, so non-perfection in this regard is perhaps even welcome). I would keep a GM map that gives at least a basic understanding of location connections and such, as it could quickly become out of hand once you get more than 10 or so maps. Basically you'd want to map it out, at least crudely, at some point in advance.
For shops, you could go two routes. One is the newer styles of the game, where you have an NPC or two who hangs out on Castlevania's fringes, getting supply from the outside in exchange for gold or relics from within the castle's depths. The other is the La-Mulana style, where you have NPCs trapped in the castle, usually ghosts or other undead, who will trade their own treasures for something they desire, and be able to "move on" in the process; this one's a little DM-fiat heavy though, I personally prefer the first.
If you go that route, I'd recommend setting up some kind of quick-transport system through the game, such as teleporting stones or something like that, that'll save the party a bunch of unnecessary wandering to get back to where they left off when they have to escape to sell stuff. Perhaps make activating them a quest - either one big quest to activate them all, maybe to get a Grail-type magic item to use them, or each stone needs an individual quest to meet its prerequisites for use. That way they have to at least visit a location, and in person rather than the normal "scry and port" technique, before they can just teleport there.
That's all I have time for for now, gotta run soon, but I'll be checking back on this thread =D
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Start with (Castle) Ravenloft and expand on it.
Shops can be done by travelling merchants being able to leave the demiplane the castle exists on...
Ruyan.
Perhaps specific clans of merchant families who have an arrangement with the castle's lord - a favor owed, an ancient agreement, an artifact that protects them from its grasp and from monsters, etc. - and thus can enter and exit freely. Perhaps through hidden passageways available only to them, as part of their bargain, that the PCs wouldn't be able to follow.
what about 2 way, 1 use magic tokens that open a portal to a pocket plane where the merchants sell their wares, with the merchants being able to come and go from it as they please?
Yeah that could work. Would also explain how they don't become monster chow somewhere along the way.
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Just to throw in a little suggestion for merchants sticking with a little more classic macabre with the Castlevania theme
Agreeing with you folks though. I as well have considered constructing a Castlevania themed campaign.
The Carrion Crown AP.
This is a very good adventure path for this theme if you want to go with something solidly marked out. Very fantastic actually; I had a lot of fun playing in this AP mostly due to the Catlevania feel it brought about (though I may have accidentally caught a few villagers on fire with a web spell...accidentally of course).
Start with (Castle) Ravenloft and expand on it.
Count Strahd Von Zarovich... so prolific that his name is enough.
With all of this stated though, I always personally thought the toughest detail would be role-play to battle balance once you have actually entered the castle (due to the lack of NPCs mostly). Though I suppose there are ways to flesh it out.
More than anything, I want to play such a game in the "Sidescroller" technique.
The Pathfinder rules are surprisingly functional when you use them on the X-Z axis instead of the X-Y axis...
And I would totally be rolling an alchemist.
My current campaign takes some inspiration from Metroidvania games and megadungeons. I'll share some of my thoughts here, hope it helps. There are two main aspects that I wanted to capture, these are the different wings of the dungeon, and back tracking.
I've been told that this style of game doesn't work well in D&D because there it can be difficult to limit the party's progress (i.e. it can be contrived when the party finds a random tool to access a new area of an old region or, it is just impossible to limit them anyway.) For example, in Castlevania, a room may be blocked by a giant block of ice until the player discovers a fire spell to melt it. In D&D, this ice block would be melted right away by the first or second level spell caster. I've mostly cut out back-tracking segments like this, but still try to build on what they represent for the players, that is, utilizing old areas in new ways.
For the exploration portion of the game, I've got a big flow-chart / map of the whole megadungeon. This is broken down into each of the different wings, like the Graveyard or the Mine. Each one represents a dungeon with a different theme. This gives the players a sense of progress, especially as they start to see more impressive things, like an Arcane Laboratory. I also build each location with points of interest that are worth more to the party than just to hack and slash through. Things like NPCs that live in the dungeon and such often make their homes and lairs here and might be willing to barter with the party. This does admittedly make them valuable targets, so consider that.
Last, I think that backtracking is an important aspect of this style of game. It gives a sense of progress, that there are more things to be gleamed from areas that have already been explored, even extensively. In order to achieve this, I try to build things into the regions of the game. There is a circle of hags that visits one region once a month, they are designed to be a major boss fight, when the party is ready to fight them. Last, different wings are interconnected, an underwater reservoir flows out to the mill, and a certain room has a secret escape from the dungeon.
Hope it helps.
ALright, I've been looking at Castle Ravenloft, and I like it. It certianly looks...expandable. There are three other things I'm going to have to deal with. The presence of a Belmont, as i am sure at least one player wants to be a Belmont, Alucard secondly, and Subweapons. Add to that the presence of a PC Cleric and the effects of the demiplane on their connection to their god(dess). Since Castlevania has a primarily Christian "flavor" to it, how would I move away from that without destroying the feel of the game?
EDIT: I've been looking intently at the Liberis Mortis from 3.5 and would like a few suggestions on converting the Undead monster classes to PF. Your thoughts?
ALright, I've been looking at Castle Ravenloft, and I like it. It certianly looks...expandable. There are three other things I'm going to have to deal with. The presence of a Belmont, as i am sure at least one player wants to be a Belmont, Alucard secondly, and Subweapons. Add to that the presence of a PC Cleric and the effects of the demiplane on their connection to their god(dess). Since Castlevania has a primarily Christian "flavor" to it, how would I move away from that without destroying the feel of the game?
by not making it into a religious thing.
vampire needs slayin', family hunts vampires. the presence of crosses in the decor can simply be scrapped, and changing the diety in the setting to something pathfinder-relevant (doesn't iomedae HATE HATE HATE undead? or am i thinking of someone else) to make the situation less of "abonination against god" to "abomination against natural order of life/death" if you want you could fluff something like a paladin chapter/cavalier order for the "belmonts" to better mesh with it?
(doesn't iomedae HATE HATE HATE undead? or am i thinking of someone else) to make the situation less of "abonination against god" to "abomination against natural order of life/death"
Pharasma. Though Iomedae's not fond of them, it's less due to their unnaturalness and more due to them being evil.
I'd leave it up to your players, talk it over with them in advance. If they want to play it full Castlevania style, let them be Catholic clerics, that's probably not going to break things. If they want to be "Castlevania in Golarion" then just use the normal pantheon and advise them to pick appropriate (Read: Good or at least anti-undead and anti-fiend) patrons.
Well, the game will take place within my homebrew world, and I've just found out it'll be a solo campaign. The person rolled AWESOME stats.
STR:17
DEX:18
CON:18
INT:16
WIS:16
CHA:14
I watched it happen, and that's BEFORE she added her Racial Modifiers. She's running a Changeling Ranger with Archery Combat style. 1st Favored Enemy: Outsider (Evil)
The deity thing isn't a problem. I'm just worried about keeping her alive. I am a rather unbiased GM, and usually don't sway the dice in either direction unless it is to move the story along, or the player is about to cry. Any thoughts on Subweapons?
Well, you don't get much more Castlevania than taking on the entire campaign singlehandedly as a semi-superhuman. Archery is a pretty odd choice, but could work out quite well, though she should probably have melee weapons for when things get too close.
Nearly all the sub-weapons are ranged weapons. Thrown daggers, thrown axes, and thrown holy water bottles are all built into the game, as a Ranger she'll already be proficient in the first two and the third doesn't require it. Might need to up the damage on the Holy Water though, maybe make the splash damage do more than 1 damage as well.
Bump Boomerang down from Exotic to Martial, and make it so it DOES return (despite the weapon's description), and perhaps up its damage from the piddly current 1d6 to reskin it as the Crucifix.
Rather than hearts, she'll just have to keep track of how much ammunition of each she has.
Stopwatch is a rare magic item that casts Haste or Time Stop, then collapses into useless dust once activated. If you want it to have multiple uses, remove that last bit and have her need to provide it charges somehow, treat it like a wand.
As an Archery ranger though all these save the Holy Water and Stopwatch seem pretty superficial. If she wants to fight stuff at range she'll just shoot it with her bow. Maybe replace the subweapons with melee weapons with special effects?
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I ran a game like this years ago by getting a copy of the original Castlevania map and running the whole thing as a one-shot, side-scrolly kind of thing. I just converted the monsters to their closest D&D analog and had a small party of four level 4 PCs go from one "screen" to the next. There was no going back to town. Just like the original NES game, once they breached the castle gates they were in it for the long haul.
Characters leveled up whenever they passed a "stage" by beating the boss monster, and everyone could earn "extra lives" (i.e. free resurrections) by accruing XP. It was far less like regular D&D and more like a video game, but it was really fun.
I'm digging all the ideas here. They're wonderful. I have a bit of a task for you guys though. Capping the campaign at lvl 15, What build do you think Dracula, Alucard, and Belmont, should be? I'm thinking I may break away from the traditional somewhat sexeist views of the Castlevania creators and make the Belmont a Female. Are we looking at a typical Pally, or something different. Magus comes to mind...
I actually thought about something similar, using one main demiplane with seperate demiplanes for the offshoot areas to represent some of the weirdness/keep players on their toes better.
I'd honestly call the Belmonts Inquisitors myself. If the spell casting is a bit much for you, take a look at super genius games arch types, one of the packages to exchange is the spells(but not the domain).For a really hunter style like the Belmonts, I'd just sub in the rangers package that gives favored enemy etc.
There's been one female Belmont, Sonja. Though Castlevania Adventure was made non-canon, which irritates me as I enjoyed it. I agree with either Ranger or Inquisitor for the Belmonts. Remember that those descended from Trevor Belmont and Sypha Belnades inherited some of the Belnades family's magical abilities; casters among the Belmonts are far from unheard of.
Alucard would be a Dhampir Magus, between his combat ability and some of his magical effects.
I'd make Dracula a Wizard or possibly Magus as well, but with a special template - he's more than just a vampire, he has a lot more HP than your standard d6 mage, and he has a tendency to transform into bigger, meaner things when killed. Said transformation would be into a unique Undead or Outsider, probably enormous in size (Huge or larger). He also can't be permanently killed, only destroyed for a little while until the cycle of reincarnation kicks in again.
I'm thinking Dracula would be a Sorcerer with like the Infernal bloodline and the Evolved undead template from the Liberis Mortis. Go look at it Orthos and let me know what you think.