new member; hoping to run Curse of Strahd for his friends
New member; first post; so on and so forth. And yes, I am aware that I talk too much...
Years ago, before I could really consider myself a grownup, I used to run a lot of RPGs, and I've been meaning to get back to running one again. When D&D 5th edition came out, I was quite enthused because it looked to be far more similar to what had worked well about 2nd edition than the grand messes which either 3rd or 4th had become at the points I'd lost interest in each of them.
Then Curse of Strahd was announced, and I was positively giddy. I bought it as soon as I could, read the whole book twice through, and lamented that I didn't have any players willing to engage the premise of it being a gothic horror story. Now, a little over a year later, I have a regular online group formed of my fellow Trekkies, who have done games of both LUG's Star Trek RPG and 5th ed Shadowrun. And I am sincerely hopeful that they'll be on board with me running Curse of Strahd for them.
However, in the interests of emphasizing the gothic horror, I am going to be using a few of the optional rules in the DMG, one replacement rule of my own creation, and quite a few story changes. Most of the latter came from reading this most brilliant thread, and I hope that my imitation of your ideas is taken as sincere flattery. At least, I'm pretty sure they were all mentioned in this thread; my apologies if I prove to be remembering incorrectly.
I actively seek the input of those who have walked this path before me, critiquing my ideas and telling me what problems they foresee.
First off, I want the tone to be horror rather than "find stuff to kill, then we get XP and maybe treasure too". Therefore, I won't be using XP at all; strictly using Milestone Rewards instead. My original plan for this was very simple (resolve a major storyline, get a level-up; either resolve a minor one or significantly advance a major one, earn a resource replenishment), but I'm now pondering the "X objective points to earn level X" mechanic mentioned here.
As a corollary, I will definitely be using the "gritty realism" setting for rest and recovery, so that a good night's sleep lets you spend Hit Dice to recover HP, and a week off in the safety of town lets you refresh your vast cosmic powers (and properly study any mysterious thingamabob you seek to understand). This way, every spell slot used on random encounters is actually depleting the resources available for dealing with the villains proper. And thus, I hope, a feeling of horror can be infused into the game.
Fortunately, I also plan to cut out a lot of the "XP filler" combats from the book, since I'm having combat itself contribute nothing toward leveling up (as opposed to tricking another monster into killing this monster for you, which resolves the storyline just the same without any of the damage rolls).
I also intend to use a custom Initiative mechanic I've been tinkering with, to remove the assumption that your movement happens nearly-instantly during your own turn, then you sit around bored and distracted until it's your turn again. Because I believe that boredom is the enemy of fun. But that's still in progress (for example, I haven't figured out how to fit Reactions or Bonus Actions into the architecture), and might need to be scrapped.
For story points, I knew from the start I didn't want to use any published campaign setting in any D&D game I run. In my own opinion (which I have no cause to push on anyone else's games), each canon heroic archmage scrying for plotlines to intercede in is an insult to the efforts and abilities of the PCs; so I want a generic world with none of them waiting in the wings. And while I didn't mind the original flavors of Greyhawk or Dragonlance back in the TSR days, the Forgotten Realms has always left me cold, because it seems to just be a license to regurgitate out of print material all shoved together whether it makes sense or not. That said, I can't help but feel that Greyhawk and Ravenloft are like chocolate pudding and lasagna; two great tastes that turn the stomach together. So I won't be using either the Mad Mage or the Amber Temple, instead having the (living) Barovian army split up to fight separate wars on both the northern and southern borders, which is why Strahd finds these mortal heroes to be useful catspaws against the rivals to his power.
So I shall have Strahd appearing in two different identities: the fictional "Strahd XI" living ruler of Barovia (who finds foreign travelers to be intriguingly exotic and provides the heroes with quests that are often benign or even virtuous), and the monstrous-looking "Strahd the First And Only" (who is stalking Ireena and openly contemptuous of his alleged heir). The heroes will meet Strahd XI on the road before they reach the village of Barovia, and be invited to a feast in their honor before they know anything about his family's reputation. I haven't decided yet which face will be an illusion, but obviously one of them will.
And bear in mind, with Strahd XI as a quest-giver, the heroes can come visit the castle repeatedly, with most of the castle's staff beginning to assume that the heroes' presence on any given occasion is by the Count's invitation. Unless they start "heroically" killing and looting.
Also, I won't be modeling Strahd as a wizard, because according to his backstory he was a fighter until he made his pact with "Death" to acquire arcane mojo. Thus my version of Strahd will be a Fighter/Warlock (with a unique Pact), and I'll have to build his spell list from scratch to suit (using monster-traits to fill in the gaps, of course).
Contrasting Strahd XI's opinion of outsiders, the common people of Barovia are openly fearful, because it's well known that people from distant lands attract all sorts of attention from things that no good honest Barovians want to be noticed by. And things are even that rosy only for the human PCs; the Barovians are 100% human (goodbye dusk elves; Rahadin becomes a High Elf former adventurer who betrayed his cohorts to serve Strahd) and view any demihuman PCs with severe suspicion at best. Any races with innate spellcasting abilities, or an outwardly monstrous appearance (drow, dragonborn, half-orc, tiefling) are much more likely to find a lynch mob than any room available at the inn.
I do like the notion of re-incorporating the three mystic fanes from the 3rd ed version, but rather than have them each add a new layer of bookkeeping for Strahd's statblock, I want them to frame the campaign's narrative. This, coupled with my need to replace the dropped Amber Temple with something else indicative of Strahd's origins, led me to decide that Strahd's descent into damnation began well before the wedding day massacre; instead beginning with his conquest of Barovia in the first place.
In my version, Barovia was the homeland of the Tergs, whose society was dominated by berserkers and evil druids (thus my Dark Powers being much more primal/elemental in the manifestation of their gifts, and locations Y+Z fitting better into the overall narrative). When Strahd's army laid siege to the primitive town which served as their capitol, he ordered his men to encircle it and then burn it to the ground, with the inhabitants trapped inside. It was this act of evil which drew the Dark Powers' attention, and yielded Strahd his first gift of supernatural power (details to be determined). The site of this slaughter is still marked by the standing stones near Old Bonegrinder, and the hag's oven draws on the residual magic of that fiery night to bake her dream pastries.
Afterward, he captured a Terg druid and forced the man to help him gain more powers; in the last stand of the Tergs the traitorous druid set up a ritual sacrifice to have the earth rise up to kill Strahd's forces. But Strahd slit the druid's throat on the altar, and so both armies were buried alive, leaving a twice-empowered Strahd the only survivor to climb out of the newly formed Yester Hill.
With the last of his current enemies slain, Strahd declared Barovia conquered, and brought his family there to enjoy their new holdings. But during the tour of the realm, young Sergei met a beautiful young (formerly Terg, now Barovian) woman named Tatyana in the village of Berez (Tatyana herself, rather than Marina the first reincarnation), and in his jealousy at his brother "stealing" the prize he'd done all the work to earn, Strahd called out to the Dark Powers directly this time. They listened, Berez was flooded, Tatyana's entire family was drowned, and Strahd received the gift for his third elemental sacrifice. By which point he'd definitely aquired the ability to steal a person's life-soul-strength by drinking their blood.
Three down; one to go. The last set of standing stones I have retroactively placed in the wall of the overlook at K6; the idea being that Strahd had his artisans build his castle atop and inward from that existing place of power at the cliff's edge. So on the wedding day, Strahd had expected the masacre to serve as a fourth sacrifice completing his acquisition of magical powers of the land. But he failed to understand that the sacrifice of winds needed to be more than his blades cutting down the wedding guests during a storm. And the power did not come to him until Tatyana threw herself over the ledge to escape him, and the winds took her.
Only then did the fourth gift come to Strahd, cementing his power over the land and permanently binding him to it, tormented by the fact that he had needlessly sacrificed everything else in order to lose the only thing he truly wished for.
In this interpretation, Strahd's goal of reclaiming some version of Tatyana is not just a matter of being a possessive jerk, but rather the theory that if he turns her into a vampire, throws her off the overlook, and forces her to turn into a bat, her survival this time will disrupt the magical-resonance of the original sacrifice and allow him to escape his prison with most if not all of his powers intact. But he may well be deluding himself.
Thus, when the heroes overcome the threats at the respective "mystic standing stones" locations, it won't be a matter of them gaining a magical power or Strahd losing one, but rather a matter of the "prophetic dream monkey" gaining insight into the makings of the monster that Strahd became (possibly just by visiting the location, without needing to fight the villain). And while the final battle against Strahd will take place at the Overlook (K6), the card of the Executioner won't come up in any readings, because I won't allow the final confrontation to occur without the players understanding the story of that spot. The mists shall obscure all, even from Madam Eva's gaze.
To that end, I plan to write a replacement text for the Tome of Strahd, wherein Strahd recounts his realization of just how it all went wrong, and resolves that as soon as the opportunity presents itself, he shall do whatever is necessary to correct the circumstances of Tatyana's death. And thus the Tome actually becomes a useful tool in this edition, by unlocking access to the final confrontation after one of them spends a week (a long rest in the "gritty realism" optional rule) studying the text.
I know that Ireena's death (by anything other than Strahd's fangs) would derail my campaign pretty thoroughly, so I'm planning her to be a capable swordswoman, with an added supernatural effect that Strahd's wrath befalls any creature (living or otherwise) that damages her: all attacks against the transgressor have Advantage, and the transgressor has Disadvantage on all saving throws or ability checks. Permanently. None of the intelligent monsters / villains will dare to bring Strahd's wrath down on themselves that way, but animals / mindless undead / poor stupid unlucky bandits won't know any better.
I plan to use the werewolf-hunter plot hook, to better focus on the primal vibe of my Dark Powers, and to have the PCs focused on fur rather than fang when the black carriage with excessive silver trim pulls up behind them on the road. Plus I can then use the werewolves in random wilderness encounters to give the players clues that they're more likely to follow up on, since that's their primary mission.
Regarding the soulless inhabitants of Barovia, I had explained that to myself as being a direct result of Strahd's ages of predation. The souls of those he drinks to death get devoured by him, and thus he actually has only one chance to enact his escape plan using the real Tatyana. Which is also why he's rehearsed it so many times on so many other beautiful women (and some men). Many of whom have then been led up onto the castle roof and mesmerized not to move from that spot or to make any noise, and then left for the sun. Only his favorite pets get a place in the crypts when they first fail to amuse this proper monster of a main villain.
A few other random points that jumped out at me from reading over this thread:
For the Tarokka reading, I'm quite certain that I'll want to stack the deck for maximizing the story impact the first (and likely only) time I run this campaign for these players. To maximize the players' investment in interacting with the whole setting, I figure the three treasures should be split up between the castle itself, a wilderness location, and one of the four enclaves of the (non-monstrous) living. But I need to figure out what order I want them found in, to get more specific than that. I definitely don't want the heroes' ally to be so powerful as to overshadow their own capabilities (so Van Richten will be modeled as a Rogue because he's Van Richten, and the other super-duper spellmonkeys either don't appear or get unceremoniously executed for sneaking around invisibly in the lair of a monster who can tell exactly how many heartbeats they hear in the room), but I haven't settled in on any of the options yet. And I've already stated that Strahd's climactic location is obscured from the Tarokka, but revealed by study of the Tome.
I love the idea of the longest-missing gem from the winery having been used to power the flesh golem. And I can just see the heroes getting the wedding dress, the abbot sending the bride to the castle, and then the heroes finding her in either K67 or K76, laid out on a table, her chest cavity splayed open, and the gem lying in a basin of water next to the body. It could have been taken up to the castle treasury, but I imagine that the vibrant-health magic of the gems is of little value to Strahd. Besides, I like the idea of Rahadin coming over to the heroes and asking them to return the gem to the winery on the Count's behalf. It should be a delicious juxtaposition of monstrosity and beneficence.
Regarding the hags at Old Bonegrinder, I'm sorely tempted to have Morgantha as the only proper hag (of whichever subtype), making the other two into just Barovian witches studying under her. So that the Coven rules for triple lightning bolts on round one are a non-factor.
The notion of the Vallaki weekly festivals actually having the potential to serve a purpose (with or without the "points of light" campaign arc) is a nice one, but it doesn't mesh well with the "souls and shells" element for me (which is the basis for the heroes largely being on their own, rather than calling in the LG authorities for backup). Then again, lighting the beacon at Argynvostholt might well tip the scales in this notion's favor. I shall have to ponder this point further, and decide what sort of ending I want my campaign to have if the heroes are victorious.
So, that's what I have in mind. What do you all think?
