CONTENT ADVISORY: The in-character fiction for this episode involves children being held hostage and threatened with harm. They escape completely unharmed, but please proceed with caution if images from current events are fresh in your mind. (We're so sorry! We wanted something that connected to D's back story and didn't make the connection.)

Welcome to Wonderful World of Darklords! In this episode, we're looking at a setting and a darklord so tailor-made for Ravenloft that we barely needed to do any work: Professor Ratigan. Combining Moriarty's criminal genius, Jekyll and Hyde's duality, and Vincent Price's golden pipes, Ratigan is the best of the worst around...and with London by gaslight as his domain, things just keep getting better. Topics discussed include:

• How to get Basil out of the picture so the PCs can be Ratigan's rivals instead, but without rehashing Robin Hood and Prince John;
• A curse for Ratigan that lets us play with his delicious stew of self-loathing, denial, obsession, and vanity;
• The underbaked 2e/3e domain and darklord that can find its themes more fully expressed in Londinium, and the fully-baked one that can be folded into it as well;
• Suggestions for running a big bad who outsmarts the PCs at every turn without losing friends;
• and more!

The full writeup for Londinium is available for free on DM's Guild: https://www.dmsguild.com/product/456011/Londinium-A-Ravenloft-Domain-of-Dread-11-13?affiliate_id=241770

You can find the Hour of the Knife adventure for sale on DM's Guild at https://www.dmsguild.com/product/17507/Hour-of-the-Knife-2e, and Shadow of the Knife for free at www.kargatane.com. (It's under "Adventures." We can't just link the darn thing or it'll start automatically downloading the zip file on you. Welcome to 2003.)

You can find the original "butt puppets" episode (which is actually pretty PG-13 rated) here: https://megadumbcast.podbean.com/e/pg-62-balloon-thief-week-11/

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

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

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

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

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

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

Dialog for Yensid was written by Azalin Rex himself: http://www.tumblr.com/darklordazalin

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

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