D&D 5E Curse of Strahd - What am I missing? (Possible spoilers?)

[jayoungr]

The Dark Powers and their influence were completely absent. Magic worked just fine and we never had to roll a Dark Powers Check. Fear, horror or madness checks were completely absent, too.

Coincidentally, I was just looking over the Gothic Earth/Masque of the Red Death Player's Guide, which I recently picked up, and it has all this stuff. Your group might find that more to your taste?

Masque of the Red Death Player's Guide - Dungeon Masters Guild | Dungeon Masters Guild

Masque of the Red Death Player's Guide - Gothic Earth, first revealed in 1994 with the release of the Masque of the Red Death and Other Tales boxed set, allow

www.dmsguild.com

 

[Guest 6801328]

Yup, I think we’re on the same page. I actually do like to have him show up frequently, but it’s always meaningful when he does.

One example of how I use him is at Kolyan’s funeral. As-written some wolves menace the characters at the funeral as a mysterious shadowy figure watches from the mist. Yawn. I have him attend the funeral, as a mourner. Why the hell would he skulk around the outskirts like some kind of weirdo? He came to pay his respects to Kolyan and offer his sympathies to Ireena, and that’s exactly what he’ll do. Plus, having the bad guy just waltz up to the party, bold as brass, and introduce himself is infinitely more intimidating than hiding in the shadows because it shows that there’s nothing anyone can do to stop him and he knows it.

That’s the kind of appearance I like to have Strahd frequently make. Just casually showing up to flaunt the fact that the would-be heroes can’t do squat about it, not to engage in cartoonish pranks.

I still want to play in one of your games (or campaigns!) some day.

 

[Guest 6801328]

I think the writers assume DMs will throw in clues here and there that attentive players might pick up on. This is a useful technique and I use it all the time. The problem is, if the adventure doesn’t say to do it, a lot of DMs won’t. A related phenomenon is how many adventures have intentional loose ends for the DM to come up with their own solutions to, but then neglect to explain that the DM is meant to fill those blanks in themselves. Look at the third Wizard of Wines gem for an example.

I think the folks who write these adventures take for granted a certain degree of initiative on the part of the DMs to personalize their games, but then they’re never actually explicit about it in the adventures themselves. That’s why I recommenced DMs who want to run curse of Strahd watch Chris Perkins do it. Seeing how much he goes “off script” on an adventure he wrote is I think a really informative experience, to show DMs that they are expected to make changes to the adventures, even if they’re never actually told that it’s expected of them.

This is a nice articulation of the problem with WotC "demi-sandboxes" that I mentioned earlier.

 

[Charlaquin]

I still want to play in one of your games (or campaigns!) some day.

Thank you! I will definitely keep you in mind if I run a game online and have space for another player

(EDIT: or if by chance you happen to live in Colorado I’d be happy to meet you some time and discuss the possibility of joining an in-person game once that’s a safe option again.)

This is a nice articulation of the problem with WotC "demi-sandboxes" that I mentioned earlier.

I like your term “Demi-sandbox” a lot, and I definitely think it’s an apt description of a lot of published WotC adventures. What’s nice about the “Demi-sandbox” formula is that it gives DMs who are comfortable writing their own material but may not have the time or inclination to build an adventure from scratch a good starting point and plenty of room to flex their creative muscles. The problem with them is that they don’t give near enough guidance to DMs who are not comfortable writing their own material. Which is just 5e in a nutshell, isn’t it?

 

[Grogg of the North]

One example of how I use him is at Kolyan’s funeral. As-written some wolves menace the characters at the funeral as a mysterious shadowy figure watches from the mist. Yawn. I have him attend the funeral, as a mourner. Why the hell would he skulk around the outskirts like some kind of weirdo? He came to pay his respects to Kolyan and offer his sympathies to Ireena, and that’s exactly what he’ll do. Plus, having the bad guy just waltz up to the party, bold as brass, and introduce himself is infinitely more intimidating than hiding in the shadows because it shows that there’s nothing anyone can do to stop him and he knows it.

Should I ever be in a situation where I'm running something similar, I am going to shamelessly steal this idea.

 

[Raduin711]

Out of curiousity, how is the Tome of Strahd supposed to help the PC's? It's great that they found the truth behind Strahd's sordid past, but I don't know how that helps. Maybe I am being blinded by knowing too much and am failing to see the situation from the PC's perspective...

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Out of curiousity, how is the Tome of Strahd supposed to help the PC's?

They can throw the book at him.

 

[Guest 6948803]

Out of curiousity, how is the Tome of Strahd supposed to help the PC's? It's great that they found the truth behind Strahd's sordid past, but I don't know how that helps. Maybe I am being blinded by knowing too much and am failing to see the situation from the PC's perspective...

Its legacy item. In original version, players are entering the castle knowing nothing about its inhabitant, so, Tome was a perfect way to tell the story (because there were few npcs willing and able to).
In new version, DM has plentiful means to tell the story before players even think of facing Strahd, players will probably dig and scrutinise for every bit of info on the Devil (at least mine players did). So, Tome isn't important.
That said, many DMs decide to give it some supernatural value, just to avoid "meh" moment, especially if adventure makes it hard to find. Your call. If you are playing with random or semi-random tarokka reading, just cheese it to place Tome as probably earliest and easiest treasure to get (possibly switching it with Sunblade, you don't want Sunblade to be found too early).

 

[Azzy]

First off, this didn't feel like Ravenloft to me. If it didn't say Strahd on the tin it could have easily just as been Generic Spooky Setting. The Dark Powers and their influence were completely absent. Magic worked just fine and we never had to roll a Dark Powers Check. Fear, horror or madness checks were completely absent, too. Everyone seemed scared of Strahd but that was it. He was just this boogey man in a castle. There really wasn't any evidence of his influence and hold over the people other than their fear.

To be fair, CoS is based on the original Ravenloft module which preceded the Ravenloft setting by several years and didn't have those features of the setting. It pretty much was a Generic Spooky Module that you could throw into any setting.

 

[Grogg of the North]

To be fair, CoS is based on the original Ravenloft module which preceded the Ravenloft setting by several years and didn't have those features of the setting. It pretty much was a Generic Spooky Module that you could throw into any setting.

What this discussion has taught me was that my expectations for this module did not match for what was in the box.