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General Tabletop Discussion
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Enhancing "Curse of Strahd" (and DDAL adventures)
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<blockquote data-quote="OGIHR" data-source="post: 7103745" data-attributes="member: 6879245"><p>Hooray; I made sense.</p><p></p><p>My thinking has been to put the Holy Symbol inside the castle (likely at K60 so that the heroes have to climb past what I think of as the single coolest creepy feature in the whole book), the Tome in either Vallaki or the Winery or maybe not until Kresk (haven't re-read those chapters yet to decide for certain), and then the Sunsword likely in either Berez or Tsolenka Pass (with the heroes being given a new reason to bother going there despite my decision to excise the Amber Temple). Unless I change my mind as I continue re-reading the book.</p><p></p><p>I've been figuring that my prologue would include "Strahd XI" would invite the heroes to dinner in the castle (thus obviously I won't be using the wedding cake gag), and then allow them to spend the night safely in K49-K51. With both Escher and the Witches in K54-K56 commanded not to show themselves to the Count's guests. And if the heroes have already been to Madam Eva under this scenario, it's a simple trip up the K48 stairs to the bridge over to K20, then further up to the prophesized location of the Tome. And when Strahd discovers that the heroes are carrying the treasure, he'll be secretly pleased that they've demonstrated that measure of worth as potential successors. And quite self-assured that he'll be recovering his property soon enough, one way or the other.</p><p></p><p>So the heroes could feasibly acquire the Holy Symbol first, if the players are so inclined. Assuming anyone wants to play a Cleric or Paladin, I'll make that character's "spooky bit" the dreams of the raven's eye view of the landscapes, so that I can give the players access to the overland map with minimal metagame thinking involved. In addition to the canon crossroads hallucination, and the various character-particular suggestions on the "Marks of Horror" page. And if nobody does, I'd still let the Holy Symbol itself have the Turn Undead feature, although I won't allow Turn Undead to work on Strahd himself, both because of the "you sent him to his room; we're standing in his room" factor and because of Darklord's privilege (in my mind, all of Barovia is Strahd's room, thus he is far less dependent on receiving an invitation in than any other vampire would be).</p><p></p><p>Wow. I had not considered that at all. Making the Winery into the first quest would probably necessitate raising the party's level at the start of the game; and it would mean drastically reduced focus for Ireena's storyline, unless I had her already smuggled out of the village and being sheltered by the wereravens until the heroes come along. And if I start the heroes on the opposite side of Barovia, it would make it more difficult to utilize my intended dichotomy between "Strahd the First And Only" as the master villain and "Strahd XI" as a quest-giver; but that notion might be a pipe-dream in the first place...</p><p></p><p>I shall continue to ponder, as I take advantage of my days off to re-read as much of the module as I can manage. And put together a more-complete picture of which pieces of Barovian civilization I wish to focus on in my campaign.</p><p></p><p>Thank you very much. I'll check that out once I've finished re-reading the module.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="OGIHR, post: 7103745, member: 6879245"] Hooray; I made sense. My thinking has been to put the Holy Symbol inside the castle (likely at K60 so that the heroes have to climb past what I think of as the single coolest creepy feature in the whole book), the Tome in either Vallaki or the Winery or maybe not until Kresk (haven't re-read those chapters yet to decide for certain), and then the Sunsword likely in either Berez or Tsolenka Pass (with the heroes being given a new reason to bother going there despite my decision to excise the Amber Temple). Unless I change my mind as I continue re-reading the book. I've been figuring that my prologue would include "Strahd XI" would invite the heroes to dinner in the castle (thus obviously I won't be using the wedding cake gag), and then allow them to spend the night safely in K49-K51. With both Escher and the Witches in K54-K56 commanded not to show themselves to the Count's guests. And if the heroes have already been to Madam Eva under this scenario, it's a simple trip up the K48 stairs to the bridge over to K20, then further up to the prophesized location of the Tome. And when Strahd discovers that the heroes are carrying the treasure, he'll be secretly pleased that they've demonstrated that measure of worth as potential successors. And quite self-assured that he'll be recovering his property soon enough, one way or the other. So the heroes could feasibly acquire the Holy Symbol first, if the players are so inclined. Assuming anyone wants to play a Cleric or Paladin, I'll make that character's "spooky bit" the dreams of the raven's eye view of the landscapes, so that I can give the players access to the overland map with minimal metagame thinking involved. In addition to the canon crossroads hallucination, and the various character-particular suggestions on the "Marks of Horror" page. And if nobody does, I'd still let the Holy Symbol itself have the Turn Undead feature, although I won't allow Turn Undead to work on Strahd himself, both because of the "you sent him to his room; we're standing in his room" factor and because of Darklord's privilege (in my mind, all of Barovia is Strahd's room, thus he is far less dependent on receiving an invitation in than any other vampire would be). Wow. I had not considered that at all. Making the Winery into the first quest would probably necessitate raising the party's level at the start of the game; and it would mean drastically reduced focus for Ireena's storyline, unless I had her already smuggled out of the village and being sheltered by the wereravens until the heroes come along. And if I start the heroes on the opposite side of Barovia, it would make it more difficult to utilize my intended dichotomy between "Strahd the First And Only" as the master villain and "Strahd XI" as a quest-giver; but that notion might be a pipe-dream in the first place... I shall continue to ponder, as I take advantage of my days off to re-read as much of the module as I can manage. And put together a more-complete picture of which pieces of Barovian civilization I wish to focus on in my campaign. Thank you very much. I'll check that out once I've finished re-reading the module. [/QUOTE]
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