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<blockquote data-quote="Mercule" data-source="post: 7279137" data-attributes="member: 5100">Depends on whether you want it to be a factor. I used to run the original I6 every year around Halloween. I'd say the PCs only worried about Ireena about a quarter of the time. That's not to say they didn't care. They just generally figured she'd kind found someplace halfway safe -- safer than she'd be assaulting the castle with them -- and her best hope was for them to draw Strahd's fire, so to speak. I'm not sure it was always quite that well thought out, but sometimes it was and the behavior was pretty consistent with that concept. When I ran CoS, this year, the PCs often left Ismark to guard Ireena in some sort of &quot;safe place&quot; while they forayed out. It's a pretty valid strategy, especially considering that Ismark is something like a 9th level Fighter, which is much better than any of the PCs are, for about the first half of the adventure.What are Strahd's goals? Is he playing cat-and-mouse with the party, per some of the plot ideas? Is he laser-focused on Ireena? He knows Ireena can't go anywhere, so there's a good argument for the former as a diversion, while the meat is still fresh. You could also play it that he's too hungry for Ireena to be bothered by the interlopers.I don't know that Vallaki is a great place for Strahd to go after Ireena, anyway. There are too many &quot;good guys&quot; there. If you want to either fire a warning shot or give them an ally, have Strahd make a play for her but one of the other players in the area intervenes with a well-timed ritual or even just startles him.When you get down to brass tacks, I've always taken the way the party deals with Ireena as an indicator of how interested they are in dealing with the &quot;damsel in distress&quot; motif. Sometimes, they just want to deal with the vampire. No sense in forcing Ireena on them.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Mercule, post: 7279137, member: 5100"] Depends on whether you want it to be a factor. I used to run the original I6 every year around Halloween. I'd say the PCs only worried about Ireena about a quarter of the time. That's not to say they didn't care. They just generally figured she'd kind found someplace halfway safe -- safer than she'd be assaulting the castle with them -- and her best hope was for them to draw Strahd's fire, so to speak. I'm not sure it was always quite that well thought out, but sometimes it was and the behavior was pretty consistent with that concept. When I ran CoS, this year, the PCs often left Ismark to guard Ireena in some sort of "safe place" while they forayed out. It's a pretty valid strategy, especially considering that Ismark is something like a 9th level Fighter, which is much better than any of the PCs are, for about the first half of the adventure. What are Strahd's goals? Is he playing cat-and-mouse with the party, per some of the plot ideas? Is he laser-focused on Ireena? He knows Ireena can't go anywhere, so there's a good argument for the former as a diversion, while the meat is still fresh. You could also play it that he's too hungry for Ireena to be bothered by the interlopers. I don't know that Vallaki is a great place for Strahd to go after Ireena, anyway. There are too many "good guys" there. If you want to either fire a warning shot or give them an ally, have Strahd make a play for her but one of the other players in the area intervenes with a well-timed ritual or even just startles him. When you get down to brass tacks, I've always taken the way the party deals with Ireena as an indicator of how interested they are in dealing with the "damsel in distress" motif. Sometimes, they just want to deal with the vampire. No sense in forcing Ireena on them. [/QUOTE]

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