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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lancelot" data-source="post: 6868024" data-attributes="member: 30022">I really like this approach as well. It couldn't work in my campaign, because my players witnessed Morganthe actually snatching a kid. They knew what she was up to. The party fighter is basically a paladin, the cleric is a devout fellow, the rest are all good-aligned. There could be no deals; nor could there really be much hesitation. They can't come back at higher levels, because kids will die in the meantime. The pressure was on. Hence, the carefully curated fight described above.But, in general, this is exactly the right approach for Ravenloft and I look forward to seeing it in other encounters. For example: my players quickly figured out what was going on at the church in Barovia, and decided not to intervene. They healed, blessed and fed the priest... and did not choose to interfere with his "son" in any way. Some of them legitimately didn't want to get into a fight with an unknown opponent, while others made the ethical argument that it was the "father's" choice. The greatest good they could do was to support the priest in an indirect fashion, and allow him to continue his course of action.I'm expecting similar tough decisions in future. I'm particularly looking forward to encounters like the Abbey, and the Wolf Cave. I honestly have no idea how my players will handle those....One other comment worth making: I'm using an alternate approach to leveling. The PCs gain no XP from killing monsters, at all. They only gain levels by achieving objectives. Specifically, they need 4 objectives to reach level 4, 5 objectives to reach level 5, and so forth.What is an objective? Anything I choose, really. But here's what they've done so far: help bury the burgomeister (1 objective), visit Madam Eva (1 objective), resolve the situation at Old Bonegrinder (1 objective). As soon as they get Ireena to a safe place in Vallaki or Krezk, they'll get their 4th objective and level up.Other objectives could include: clear out any of the various non-castle encounter areas, find one of the special items (Tome, Symbol, Sword, Ally), solve a major side-quest (e.g. the festival in Vallaki, the mad mage), etc. I think there are enough to get to 9th/10th level, even with the increasing number of objectives required to gain levels.The players are really enjoying this approach, because they realize that combats are only worthwhile if they directly help achieve an objective. This promotes non-hostile gambits, stealth avoidance, deception, etc. Of course, none of that was going to work with the hags. The party had strong opinions on what was going on at the windmill... <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":-)" title="Smile    :-)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":-)" /></blockquote>

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