“Under raging storm clouds, a lone figure stands silhouetted against the ancient walls of Castle Ravenloft. The vampire Count Strahd von Zarovich stares down a sheer cliff at the village below. A cold, bitter wind spins dead leaves about him, billowing his cape in the darkness.

Lightning splits the clouds overhead, casting stark white light across him. Strahd turns to the sky, revealing the angular muscles of his face and hands. He has a look of power — and of madness. His once handsome face is contorted by a tragedy darker than the night itself.

Rumbling thunder pounds the castle spires. The wind’s howling increases as Strahd turns his gaze back to the village. Far below, yet not beyond his ken, a party of adventurers has just entered his domain. Strahd’s face forms a twisted smile as his dark plan unfolds. He knew they were coming, and he knows why they have come — all according to his plan. He, the master of Ravenloft, will attend to them.

Another lightning flash rips through the darkness, its thunder echoing through the castle’s towers. But Strahd is gone. Only the howling of the wind — or perhaps a lone wolf — fills the midnight air. The master of Ravenloft is having guests for dinner. And you are invited.” –Curse of Strahd, Chapter 1, “Introduction”

So begins Wizard of the Coast’s Ravenloft adventure. Curse of Strahd and its predecessors are popular adventures for a number of reasons. One of them, I think, is the dark, gothic atmosphere.

By “atmosphere,” I’m referring to what English classes call “mood.” Mood is how creators establish a certain feeling and aesthetic in their stories. As You Like It, Hamlet, and Julius Caesar have different atmospheres, even though Shakespeare wrote all of them. Audiences of shows like One Tree Hill experience feelings different from watching The Office.

And you can use this tool in your campaigns, too! I’m going to go a bit English-major to talk about it, so let’s throw some definitions in here.

Mood: refers to a set of emotions or feelings an author invokes in their audience through setting, description, and other tools.

Motif: a symbol or object that appears several times throughout a text, that usually contributes to the establishment of mood or theme.

Theme: an idea either stated directly or implicitly in a text. In stories with a moral to them, the moral is the theme (e.g. “the truth will set you free”), but themes aren’t always ethical in nature.

These terms all relate to the identity of a work. Even unintentionally, your campaign has an atmosphere to it. It probably already has recurring symbols (motifs) or ideas about the world (themes). By being more intentional about these things, you can have more control over the tone of your game.

One of Curse of Strahd’s more blatant motifs is darkness. Let’s look back at the quote above—every paragraph refers to darkness. We got Strahd’s cape billowing in the darkness. We got a tragedy “darker than the night itself.” We got Strahd’s “dark plan.” And last but not least, lightning “rips through the darkness.” I didn’t notice that the quotation repeated that so much at first. But, it’s certainly effective, right? Those word choices really hammer in that gloomy feeling.

Motifs usually stand for something. The darkness here is associated with secrets, fear, evil, the unknown. Some of CoS’s read-aloud text emphasize the flickering of shadows in torchlight and the like. You can incorporate this kind of stuff in your descriptions, too. Clocks point to the passage of time, the color purple usually symbolizes nobility (either of character or of lineage), et cetera. This is definitely the time to be creative, though simple motifs can work just as well. Don’t be afraid to be dramatic!

A given text can have a couple of themes, and one theme of CoS is that everyone has secrets, everyone has darkness inside them. NPCs who appear good can turn out to be an enemy, and even genuinely benevolent characters have something to hide. PCs can take certain actions that could switch their alignment to evil. Things aren’t always as they seem. The emphasis on darkness certainly brings this to light (hehe), whether there’s a monster hiding in the shadows or something subtler and more sinister.

Themes are a bit harder to incorporate intentionally without being heavy-handed, but you can look at your own worldview and how that comes out in the stories you run. If you’ve played D&D with someone for a while, you might notice certain themes in the characters they tend to play. D&D is collaborative, so your players also contribute to the development of theme.

How do your NPCs typically react to the adventurers? What are the consequences of the adventurers doing something good? What about when they do something harmful? How do higher powers influence the setting? What are the PCs’ relationships to each other, to important NPCs, to unimportant NPCs? What are the PCs’ problems, their flaws, and what are their strengths? What is the party dynamic? What must they do to succeed?

These questions can help you think about the thematic makeup of your campaign, and help you make it what you want it to be. Stories are complex things, so you can have multiple answers to these questions, but try to pick out some trends.

By creating an intentional atmosphere, by using mood, motifs, and theme, you can help your players imagine the setting as a world with its own individual identity. Atmosphere is like personality. What personality does your campaign have, and what is it developing towards?