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Enhancing "Curse of Strahd" (and DDAL adventures)
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<blockquote data-quote="Weeble1000" data-source="post: 7551698" data-attributes="member: 6983498"><p>My group played last night, but the characters did not make it to the Church in Berez. They got into it with Baba Lysaga, and that ate up the whole session.</p><p></p><p>While the characters were traveling back to the Winery from their fight with the Druids on Yester Hill, Strahd went ahead of them and charmed two of the Martikovs, Davian and his youngest grandchild.</p><p></p><p>Strahd composed a letter to the PCs and put it into a package along with 100 ep, one of which was enchanted with Nystul's Magic Aura to detect as divination magic. He had Davian place the package into the kitchen cupboard and come back, at which point he erased Davian's memory of the encounter. Strahd charmed Davian's granddaughter (Yolanda, who I put at 5 years old), instructing her to collect hair from one of the characters and a button from the clothing of another.</p><p></p><p>Davian had sent his sons to Krezk with a shipment of wine, and they were expected to be bringing back a sheep with which to make a modest feast for the characters. In the meantime, Davian offered to have his daughter and grandchildren wash the characters clothes and clean their armor. Not wishing to refuse such hospitality the characters agreed. Yolanda used this opportunity to pilfer her button (DC 10 Perception check to notice it missing, and the character failed <img src="data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7" class="smilie smilie--sprite smilie--sprite1" alt=":)" title="Smile :)" loading="lazy" data-shortname=":)" /> ). During dinner, Yolanda crawled into one of the character's laps, precipitating a discussion about children, personal history, etc. etc. Yolanda pulled the character's hair and ran away laughing. The characters, not yet being insanely paranoid, let the incident pass with a laugh at the precociousness of children. Strahd now has hair from one character, and a button from another's clothing.</p><p></p><p>When honey was fetched from the cupboard as a special treat to liven up desert, Davian's daughter noticed the plain, unmarked package. Davian did not recognize it, but I had him remember that it was definitely for the characters. The PCs took the package outside to open it, using Detect Magic and being careful. They discovered the enchanted coin (as Strahd assumed they would), and felt a false sense of security thinking that they had foiled an attempt to spy on them.</p><p></p><p>Strahd's Letter:</p><p></p><p>“To my honored guests:</p><p></p><p>It pains me that our interview was so brief.</p><p></p><p>A noble lord such as myself might be inclined to take umbrage at such brusque treatment from a band of armed strangers abroad in his dominion. I am, however, in a magnanimous disposition in light of your heroic actions.</p><p></p><p>The druids, it seems, were up to no good. I must therefore offer you thanks in lieu of rebuke, and forgive your impertinence. I trust that you will be comfortable among good Davian, his children, and his children’s children. A man as blessed as he has good cause to be generous, as do I.</p><p></p><p>Be welcome, therefore, to Barovia. You are free to travel my roads and mingle with the populace. I hope and trust that your actions on Yester Hill bespeak of good intentions. I cannot, nor will not, suffer vagabonds to molest my peoples.</p><p></p><p>May chance offer us a more genteel meeting in the future.</p><p></p><p>Yours very truly,</p><p></p><p>Strahd von Zarovich”</p><p></p><p></p><p>The characters stayed the night in the Winery, preparing to head to Berez at first light. Davian was given the enchanted coin, as well as the task of digging up the stump of the golthias tree on Yester Hill and burying the coin in the hole.</p><p></p><p>They party had one random encounter with four Dire Wolves along the way, and took a short rest at the crossroads. They used Water Walk to cross the river and meet Muriel in the ring of standing stones. After getting the DL on Lysaga and the rough layout of Berez they concocted a plan to aggro the witch by setting the goats free (not knowing the skulls would set off an alarm, but it is what they were aiming for in any case). They used water walk to make the marsh normal terrain snuck their way to the goat pen, evading a scarecrow or two on the way, and then smashed the fence setting off the alarm.</p><p></p><p>This would have put them in a TPK, because fighting the scarecrows, the hut, and a flying, skull-protected Lysaga all at once is a hideous fight even if the characters had been much higher level.</p><p></p><p>TPKs are BS, so here's how it went down. The characters made stealth checks to set up a little ambush. This worked for the closest scarecrows, who went to the empty goat pen. The characters cast locate object to track the gem while they were waiting, which was nifty. It pinged the hut which was advancing slowly toward them, directed by Lysaga, whose passive perception beat the characters' stealth check. They assumed the flying skull Muriel told them about was animated by the gem (wrong, but pretty close to the mark) and waited while it came toward them.</p><p></p><p>Lysaga swooped down from the obscuring storm clouds and mist and dropped a fireball to get their attention. She ate about 60 damage from the PCs before she got out of sight again (a couple of maximized fireballs and well-aimed arrows). Bloodied and unhappy, Lysaga left to let the hut do the work of killing the dangerous intruders.</p><p></p><p>I tamped down the hut's stats, and played it gently. The characters used some magic missiles to knock down the raven cages and opened them up. The ravens kept the scarecrows at bay, who were starting to trickle into the fight. After getting the crap knocked out of them, a couple of characters climbed up into the hut, smashed up the floor, and after a few attempts (getting tossed out of the hut, bitten by the floorboards, etc.) managed to secure the gem.</p><p></p><p>Fight over, but they accidentally triggered the Glyph of Warding looting the hut, which slowed them down. Meanwhile, Lysaga, seeing her hut defeated, started working up a mirage arcane that would flood Berez and drive the characters toward the evil church, where she hope they would meet a horrible death.</p><p></p><p>The characters' time in the hut and race back to the river gave enough time for Lysaga to get through her ten minute casting time, and the characters found themselves in a bad way as the Luna River appeared to overflow its banks in a rush of icy flood waters (that their Water Walk spell did not work on, piling confusion on top of confusion). They panicked and split the party, with their Paladin booking it toward the standing stones and the other party members heading toward the higher ground of the Burgomaster's mansion. Lysaga seized her opportunity, swooped in on the Paladin, and dropped a geas on him to "Take the gem into the church of Berez." It took two tries to land the charm on the slippery paladin, and she had to eat a smite in the process, but with a little less than 40 HP remaining Lysaga polymorphed into a cloud of flies and made good her escape.</p><p></p><p>The Paladin, tapped, wounded, and now under a potentially deadly enchantment made his way back to the party to give them the bad news.</p><p></p><p>Now, the party couldn't handle the church without a long rest, which was a problem, and TPKs are BS. Luckily, Lazlo's ghost was Johnny on the spot to give the party the backstory of the church and the low down that it is a hella dangerous place. The characters now realized Lysaga's plan. </p><p></p><p>Which they foiled with a Dispel Magic because my wife's sorcerer <em>always</em> keeps spell slots in her back pocket.</p><p></p><p>But Lazlo's ghost managed to get the Paladin to swear an oath to cleanse the church, so that is where the party will be headed next week!</p><p></p><p>The characters have the second gem, the hut is deactivated, and the scarecrows have been destroyed, but Lysaga remains alive! She will surely return later to vex the characters, but she will be wary. She still believes her geas has gone home, and so she will lay low, hoping her accursed church will do the hard work of killing such savvy and potent heroes. </p><p></p><p>I very much like the idea of Lysaga being a going concern. It also gives me a very handy mechanism for punching up the difficulty of locations such as Vallaki, The Village of Barovia, the Werewolf Den, and Old Bonegrinder.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Weeble1000, post: 7551698, member: 6983498"] My group played last night, but the characters did not make it to the Church in Berez. They got into it with Baba Lysaga, and that ate up the whole session. While the characters were traveling back to the Winery from their fight with the Druids on Yester Hill, Strahd went ahead of them and charmed two of the Martikovs, Davian and his youngest grandchild. Strahd composed a letter to the PCs and put it into a package along with 100 ep, one of which was enchanted with Nystul's Magic Aura to detect as divination magic. He had Davian place the package into the kitchen cupboard and come back, at which point he erased Davian's memory of the encounter. Strahd charmed Davian's granddaughter (Yolanda, who I put at 5 years old), instructing her to collect hair from one of the characters and a button from the clothing of another. Davian had sent his sons to Krezk with a shipment of wine, and they were expected to be bringing back a sheep with which to make a modest feast for the characters. In the meantime, Davian offered to have his daughter and grandchildren wash the characters clothes and clean their armor. Not wishing to refuse such hospitality the characters agreed. Yolanda used this opportunity to pilfer her button (DC 10 Perception check to notice it missing, and the character failed :) ). During dinner, Yolanda crawled into one of the character's laps, precipitating a discussion about children, personal history, etc. etc. Yolanda pulled the character's hair and ran away laughing. The characters, not yet being insanely paranoid, let the incident pass with a laugh at the precociousness of children. Strahd now has hair from one character, and a button from another's clothing. When honey was fetched from the cupboard as a special treat to liven up desert, Davian's daughter noticed the plain, unmarked package. Davian did not recognize it, but I had him remember that it was definitely for the characters. The PCs took the package outside to open it, using Detect Magic and being careful. They discovered the enchanted coin (as Strahd assumed they would), and felt a false sense of security thinking that they had foiled an attempt to spy on them. Strahd's Letter: “To my honored guests: It pains me that our interview was so brief. A noble lord such as myself might be inclined to take umbrage at such brusque treatment from a band of armed strangers abroad in his dominion. I am, however, in a magnanimous disposition in light of your heroic actions. The druids, it seems, were up to no good. I must therefore offer you thanks in lieu of rebuke, and forgive your impertinence. I trust that you will be comfortable among good Davian, his children, and his children’s children. A man as blessed as he has good cause to be generous, as do I. Be welcome, therefore, to Barovia. You are free to travel my roads and mingle with the populace. I hope and trust that your actions on Yester Hill bespeak of good intentions. I cannot, nor will not, suffer vagabonds to molest my peoples. May chance offer us a more genteel meeting in the future. Yours very truly, Strahd von Zarovich” The characters stayed the night in the Winery, preparing to head to Berez at first light. Davian was given the enchanted coin, as well as the task of digging up the stump of the golthias tree on Yester Hill and burying the coin in the hole. They party had one random encounter with four Dire Wolves along the way, and took a short rest at the crossroads. They used Water Walk to cross the river and meet Muriel in the ring of standing stones. After getting the DL on Lysaga and the rough layout of Berez they concocted a plan to aggro the witch by setting the goats free (not knowing the skulls would set off an alarm, but it is what they were aiming for in any case). They used water walk to make the marsh normal terrain snuck their way to the goat pen, evading a scarecrow or two on the way, and then smashed the fence setting off the alarm. This would have put them in a TPK, because fighting the scarecrows, the hut, and a flying, skull-protected Lysaga all at once is a hideous fight even if the characters had been much higher level. TPKs are BS, so here's how it went down. The characters made stealth checks to set up a little ambush. This worked for the closest scarecrows, who went to the empty goat pen. The characters cast locate object to track the gem while they were waiting, which was nifty. It pinged the hut which was advancing slowly toward them, directed by Lysaga, whose passive perception beat the characters' stealth check. They assumed the flying skull Muriel told them about was animated by the gem (wrong, but pretty close to the mark) and waited while it came toward them. Lysaga swooped down from the obscuring storm clouds and mist and dropped a fireball to get their attention. She ate about 60 damage from the PCs before she got out of sight again (a couple of maximized fireballs and well-aimed arrows). Bloodied and unhappy, Lysaga left to let the hut do the work of killing the dangerous intruders. I tamped down the hut's stats, and played it gently. The characters used some magic missiles to knock down the raven cages and opened them up. The ravens kept the scarecrows at bay, who were starting to trickle into the fight. After getting the crap knocked out of them, a couple of characters climbed up into the hut, smashed up the floor, and after a few attempts (getting tossed out of the hut, bitten by the floorboards, etc.) managed to secure the gem. Fight over, but they accidentally triggered the Glyph of Warding looting the hut, which slowed them down. Meanwhile, Lysaga, seeing her hut defeated, started working up a mirage arcane that would flood Berez and drive the characters toward the evil church, where she hope they would meet a horrible death. The characters' time in the hut and race back to the river gave enough time for Lysaga to get through her ten minute casting time, and the characters found themselves in a bad way as the Luna River appeared to overflow its banks in a rush of icy flood waters (that their Water Walk spell did not work on, piling confusion on top of confusion). They panicked and split the party, with their Paladin booking it toward the standing stones and the other party members heading toward the higher ground of the Burgomaster's mansion. Lysaga seized her opportunity, swooped in on the Paladin, and dropped a geas on him to "Take the gem into the church of Berez." It took two tries to land the charm on the slippery paladin, and she had to eat a smite in the process, but with a little less than 40 HP remaining Lysaga polymorphed into a cloud of flies and made good her escape. The Paladin, tapped, wounded, and now under a potentially deadly enchantment made his way back to the party to give them the bad news. Now, the party couldn't handle the church without a long rest, which was a problem, and TPKs are BS. Luckily, Lazlo's ghost was Johnny on the spot to give the party the backstory of the church and the low down that it is a hella dangerous place. The characters now realized Lysaga's plan. Which they foiled with a Dispel Magic because my wife's sorcerer [I]always[/I] keeps spell slots in her back pocket. But Lazlo's ghost managed to get the Paladin to swear an oath to cleanse the church, so that is where the party will be headed next week! The characters have the second gem, the hut is deactivated, and the scarecrows have been destroyed, but Lysaga remains alive! She will surely return later to vex the characters, but she will be wary. She still believes her geas has gone home, and so she will lay low, hoping her accursed church will do the hard work of killing such savvy and potent heroes. I very much like the idea of Lysaga being a going concern. It also gives me a very handy mechanism for punching up the difficulty of locations such as Vallaki, The Village of Barovia, the Werewolf Den, and Old Bonegrinder. [/QUOTE]
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