Editing Darklord (section)

==Vlad Drakov==
Darklord of Falkovnia. He was originally the leader of a mercenary band called the Talons of the Hawk in [[Dragonlance|Krynn]]. For their wanton brutality and bloodlust, they were taken into Ravenloft and claimed Falkovia for themselves (after a failed invasion of Darkon that was repulsed by Azalin's undead). [[Berserk|If this seems familiar]] then good, you're paying attention.

This rivalry with Azalin has since become part of Drakov's curse, though he seems unaware of it. While four other countries (that have themselves agreed to an alliance should Falkovnia ever attack one of them) surround him, Drakov considers them "women and fops" not worth the effort of invasion, obsesses over an enemy he has no way of defeating, and is forever unable to gain the approval and respect of the great military leaders that he has sought all his life. And even if he did somehow conquer Darkon, [[fail|no Darklord can ever leave his own realm]] so he would never actually get to conquer it himself. Another factor in his defeats is that his way of doing war is distinctly and doggedly medieval (no gunpowder, no magic), so on the rare occasions he decides to try his luck at conquering other neighbouring domains than Darkon (all of which are at a higher technological level than Falkovnia) his forces almost always get shot to pieces by firearms or, more rarely, blown to pieces with magic. Oddly enough, his realm may in fact be, on the whole, a net ''benefit'' to the other domains of the Core, as his penchant for overworking his peasantry/slaves (when he's not busy having them impaled for his entertainment, of course) means that his realm produces large amounts of grain and foodstuffs which he sells for funds to equip and train his forces, unintentionally making Falkovnia "the breadbasket of the Core." 

In addition, Drakov may be unique as the one of the most "conventional" Darklords in Ravenloft in the sense that he is statted like a run-of-the-mill fighter-class BBEG, and much like this archetype he has no magical abilities aside from a few magical weapons and armour at his disposal, coupled with no ability to cheat death, and no supernatural ability to close his domain's borders (all of which are in line with his disdain for magic and the supernatural), except for a good amount of inherent magic resistance that will also work against beneficial spells (so if he's ever in a tight enough bind to require magical healing, he's screwed). However, PCs and DMs shouldn't mistake his one-dimensional combat abilities as a sign that Falkovnia would be easy to liberate from his iron-fisted rule via a [[Raven Guard|simple decapitation raid]]; the totalitarian and thoroughly abusive nature of his rule means that those he trusts enough to carry out his orders are all likely evil enough and think enough like him to instantly assume his mantle of Darklord should Drakov ever be killed, just like similar totalitarian regimes in real life can survive the deaths of multiple successive leaders. Truly liberating Falkovnia in a thematically appropriate way would require the PCs to either engineer a full-scale revolution, or otherwise ensure the complete destruction of his regime, much like truly destroying a cancerous tumour in real life requires removing or destroying every last cancer cell. And all of this says nothing about which neighbouring realm would end up absorbing Falkovnia on the off-chance it ever gets truly liberated, though at this point even Azalin would be a better ruler than Drakov given that the lich dispenses harsh but fair justice and otherwise leaves his subjects alone to continue his arcane pursuits.
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===5e===
In a nameless world, in a land torn between myriad bitterly feuding royal families, the woman named '''Vladeska Drakov''' was a skilled fighter and general, a mercenary who came to be known as the Crimson Falcon, the leader of a well-regarded mercenary army called the Falcon's Talons. Business was profitable, and Vladeska was raking in the loot, with dreams of retiring young, cashing in her wealth and reputation to buy land and a title. Then came the sacking of Veivere, where the Talons accidentally killed a very important figure. So important that the entirety of the aristocracy took up arms against the Talons, determined to kill them all for it. Well, Vladeska had no intention of just rolling over and dying, and she launched a bloody counter-attack that soon turned into a crushing campaign of conquest; her forces swept through the land, replenishing themselves with conscripted peasants and wiping out everyone stupid enough to stand against them. Vladeska made a point of impaling ''everybody'' with even the slightest drop of aristocratic blood that she caught alive. Through years of bloody effort, she became the ruler of an empire that stretched over the former patchwork nation, but as she crushed the last defiant village, the smoke engulfed Vladeska and her most elite warriors.

They found themselves in a new realm, and after swiftly conquering its capital city, Vladeska declared herself Empress of Falkovnia. Which was when she found the downside of her rule... namely, the armies of [[zombie]]s that would attack her new kingdom every month with the rising of the new moon.

Vladeska's curse, obviously, is the zombie attacks, which press her to her limit as she struggles to throw back the dead and preserve what she has, but it goes deeper than that. Firstly, she suffers a horrible sensation of recognition; every zombie, to her, seems to be the animate corpse of one of her victims or her fallen soldiers, filling her with the gnawing belief that the dead are coming for ''her'' specifically. Secondly, no matter what scheme or ploy she tries, the result is always Phyrric; her people haven't been wiped out yet, but there's a big difference between 'survival' and 'winning'. Finally, she '''knows''' that her efforts are doomed - there is ''no way'' to hold Falkovnia against the dead, not with the forces that she has, and the only chance she has for survival is to take her people and flee during the peaceful period after the dead are repulsed for the month. But she's too stubborn of a bitch to run, and so she keeps fighting her bloody, futile war.
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