D&D 5E Curse of Strahd Question

[Todd Roybark]

I've always felt Expedition to Castle Ravenloft, the 3.5E renovation was rather good, especially the castle maps.

Reading the description of Curse of Strahd, and
It sounds as if many of the same elements were ported over.

For those familiar with both, what would make CoS a worthy purchase?

For those only familiar w/ CoS what is so great about it?

 

[Hawk Diesel]

The 5e Curse of Strahd does a good job of giving you the tools you need to put the players in a game world. The campaign is able to be set up to be very sandbox rather than a linear adventure. It provides lots of npcs with clear relationships and motivations and areas that are all unique. There's no one way to go through the adventure.

That said, the weakest thing about the adventure, ironically, is Strahd. He is a very black and white villain and almost cartoonist in what is given. Which is very sad, considering the great lore that exists about him, and the interesting way he was characterized in I, Strahd. There is little nuance in how Strahd relates to the citizens of his domain. He is just presented as a monster to almost everyone.

 

[toucanbuzz]

5E Curse of Strahd, with modifications, is an amazing, unique adventure with an open map and one-of-a-kind encounters (from Tarokka reading to place artifacts to temptation from the Dark Powers in offering to raise one from the dead to the place where Strahd got his dark powers). It has fresh material, so we're not getting a simple recycle. The Ravenloft Castle map is phenomenal and true to its original form, though like before the map isn't really designed well for players to look at with all its secrets.

When I say modifications, that means scouring the forums for blogs, posts and notes (I view all modules as coloring books, meant to be filled in the way I think would best fit my game).

As Hawk Diesel says, Strahd is probably the weakest part, as written. As written, he is a jerk who taunts low-level PCs for no real reason and pops in from time to time to throw a fireball and run away. It makes absolutely no sense for anyone who has taken time to read the novels (e.g. "I, Strahd") or has run a villain. I would never run him like this, ever. In my game, he is obsessed with recreating events from the past to bring Tatyana to him. Nothing else matters to him. He may appear callous with regards to life, but he's well aware he's in a carbon copy of reality, and he can treat these shades however he sees fit. He's convinced he's right, he's convinced he's going to succeed eventually, and he needs things to go differently this time. The PCs become a means to an end once he realizes Ireena is attached to them. They can push her, convince her, make it turn out differently than all the other times he's lost her. And why shouldn't they? Eventually, he'll invite them to dinner and make it clear he's going to succeed, in this lifetime or another. He'll just wait for her to be reborn and try again, so why fight it? Why not convince her to give in, go to him willingly, and leave Barovia?

Despair wins. Once the party has given up, the Land becomes stronger, and it doesn't let go once it has tasted that despair. So yeah, when you fill in the blanks, make Strahd more like his novel character, the 5E version can get pretty epic.

 

[Nebulous]

When I say modifications, that means scouring the forums for blogs, posts and notes (I view all modules as coloring books, meant to be filled in the way I think would best fit my game).

As Hawk Diesel says, Strahd is probably the weakest part, as written. As written, he is a jerk who taunts low-level PCs for no real reason and pops in from time to time to throw a fireball and run away. It makes absolutely no sense for anyone who has taken time to read the novels (e.g. "I, Strahd") or has run a villain. I would never run him like this, ever. In my game, he is obsessed with recreating events from the past to bring Tatyana to him. Nothing else matters to him. He may appear callous with regards to life, but he's well aware he's in a carbon copy of reality, and he can treat these shades however he sees fit. He's convinced he's right, he's convinced he's going to succeed eventually, and he needs things to go differently this time. The PCs become a means to an end once he realizes Ireena is attached to them. They can push her, convince her, make it turn out differently than all the other times he's lost her. And why shouldn't they? Eventually, he'll invite them to dinner and make it clear he's going to succeed, in this lifetime or another. He'll just wait for her to be reborn and try again, so why fight it? Why not convince her to give in, go to him willingly, and leave Barovia?

Despair wins. Once the party has given up, the Land becomes stronger, and it doesn't let go once it has tasted that despair. So yeah, when you fill in the blanks, make Strahd more like his novel character, the 5E version can get pretty epic.

And this is why I love the effing internet and message boards and running modules long after they've come out so people have time to post enhancements. I'm not super familiar with Strahd but I want to run Curse and I would most definitely want to make him an interesting villain and not a generic monster of the day.

 

[Todd Roybark]

So most of what people have described as the great elements of CoS are in Expedition, it sounds to me. This is not a criticism, but given that converting modules to 5e is easy, what specifically is great and warrants purchase of CoS?

 

[toucanbuzz]

Rather than recreate the wheel, I'll link an answer that lays out the differences. We're getting enough fresh material, with creatures, loot, and storylines already laid out, that it would justify rewarding the staff who put so much creative effort into it by purchasing the 5E product.

 

[Todd Roybark]

Thank you!