D&D 5E [Let's Read] DM's Guild Ravenloft Sourcebooks

Libertad

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I have to say, your attention to detail here is impressive.

And inspiring to be honest. I would love to try my hand at doing something like this.

Thank you for that! And I certainly can't say no to seeing more reviewers and Let's Readers out there!

If I had any advice to give, I'd suggest reviewing books or franchises you feel passionate about. That gives you extra energy in making it through otherwise large tomes. It doesn't have to be books you enjoy; I've been motivated to review bad products before, usually as a kind of "public service announcement" when other reviews don't really point out the product's flaws. I review Ravenloft stuff on the Guild because I love the setting and because I love highlighting creations by third party creators. Nothing beats having publishers sending you messages thanking you for reviewing their work. When you know that their PDF sold only 50, 100 units tops vs WotC or Paizo's hundreds of thousands, you feel like you're making a bigger impact on getting otherwise unknown or passed-over works into the public eye.

Use images from the book. Walls of text feel intimidating, and images help the eyes mentally pick up where they left off in case the reader looks away. There are some forums that don't allow images, even public domain ones, for reviewing books, which is pretty stringent. Different forums and communities have their own stances on Let's Reads; a lot of subreddits tend to look down on it as spammy advertisements and downvote them. GiantITP is the image-less forum I mentioned. Certain products may be considered "political" and thus you can't post about them on forums that restrict such discussions. Generally speaking, EN World and RPGnet are the friendlier Let's Read communities I know of online.

Also, only review books you read in full. When you have a better understanding of where everything is, you can better reference later stuff in the book you wouldn't think of when you're first reading it. I have a "casual" read, and then a more analytical "review" read.

I make drafts of everything I post, usually on Google Doc. Then once it's done I read it out loud to myself, which does a better job of catching grammatical errors than reading silently in your mind.

This is subjective on my part, but I don't accept review copies of products. If it feels like an obligation, then that can hurt my motivation. In keeping it as a hobby, I manage to work at my own pace.

On another subject, I have something interesting to share. If you go on the Guild and sort Ravenloft products by non-official works, there's 1,185 products as of today. Discounting products that are actually bundles (242), Fantasy Grounds conversions (around 58), and Roll20 and map assets (around 33), I'd say that there's around 852 third-party Ravenloft products up there which are unique sourcebooks.

Counting the two Tarokka-themed minigames I reviewed in another thread, I reviewed 31 products. Including She Is the Ancient, which I hope to have done tomorrow. I've reviewed approximately 3.6% of DM Guild Ravenloft products. A small number objectively speaking, but when you look at the sheer volume even breaking 2% feels like an achievement.
 
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Libertad

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Castle Ravenloft starts out by saying that the dungeon is bigger than it needs to be, although it doesn’t have any suggestions for making the castle crawl shorter or more concise. Most of the changes to the rooms involve backstory alterations, like the Vistani minions being general Barovian sympathizers of Strahd, or the Tatyana/Ireena portrait in K37’s Study portraying Tatyana and Sergei. The painting is turned backwards to face the wall by Strahd who cannot bear to destroy it, but cannot bear to look at it either. If Kasimir is freed from his banshee form, he will seek out Patrina to murder and drink her blood before hunting down the rest of the party. Should the PCs defeat Kasimir before that, he will rise as a full vampire. As for Strahd’s accountant, Lief Lipsiege can also offer to provide crude drawings of important castle locations if the party’s nice to her. The book doesn’t specify if this is in addition to or a replacement for revealing the Holy Symbol of Ravenkind’s location. Ciri is a genderswapped version of Cyrus Belview, part of a larger change to the Abbey of Saint Markovia’s inhabitants to be experimental victims of the Abbot rather than the unfortunate implications of the original monsters they’re based on.

Furthermore, one of the other larger changes is to the vampire spawn found in the crypt level. Originally old brides of Strahd kept in the crypts, they have proper living quarters in the castle and various suggestions are given for why they’d be down here. Such as draining kidnapped victims of blood in order to bottle, or providing security should Strahd retreat down to the crypts.

As for Strahd’s four consorts, they are given expanded backstories in addition to the typical genderswaps. Vilisevic is a wizard who hopes to find a means of harnessing Argynvost’s soul for greater arcane power. Ofsky (originally Volenta) is an alchemist who knows a thing or two about metallurgy and gunpowder, and is seeking to build an army of armored corpses by making a deal with the Dark Powers in the Amber Temple. Esther is falling out of favor with Strahd and can act as either a guide to the castle or leading a vampire spawn ambush, depending on whether she thinks the PCs are invited guests. Anastrasya is still a woman, but changed to be a Wachter and helped mastermind the theft of the Bones of Saint Andral. It even says that the party can see her leaving the Coffin Maker’s shop to plant the bones in the Baroness’ house as a means of framing Vallaki’s leader for the theft. She’ll even go so far as to bribe Ernesta (female Ernst Larnak) to tip the PCs off on this false lead. Hmmm, this would be an interesting twist to include…if this information was provided in the Vallaki section earlier rather than in the middle of the Castle Ravenloft entry!

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Ruins of Berez alters the backstory of the town by having Strahd courting Marina, but the Dark Powers intervened by showing Marina the truth of her original reincarnation and the vampire countess’ atrocities. When Marina confronted her with this, Strahd flew into a rage and killed Marina and her family, her screams of anguish summoning a flood of epic proportions to destroy the village. We get a very brief illustrated page talking about how each archfey of the Ladies Three released from imprisonment removes one of Strahd’s “land-based abilities,” while also letting sunlight through the clouds which can cause problems for the vampire spawn. A cool idea…if it had further development in this book.

Another change to Berez is one I’ve seen done in the CoS community: moving Argynvost’s skull from Castle Ravenloft to be in Baba Lysaga’s possession. Instead of flying around in a skull taken from a giant, she is using the silver dragon’s skull as an aerial vehicle. SitA mentions that Lysaga can be portrayed as either male or female, with the male version being inspired and looking like Pan the faun from Pan’s Labyrinth.

Mount Baratok focuses on a non-binary Mordenkainen, who is known instead as the “Angry Archmage of Baratok.” The major addition is that they’re struggling with anxiety and depression in addition to amnesia (only the latter can be cured by magic). Should the PCs help Mordenkainen, they’ll reveal vague information by saying that “something evil lives within the land even more potent than Lady Strahd.” Presumably this is a reference to the Dark Vestiges in the Amber Temple, but the book doesn’t outright say this or elaborate.

Argynvostholt doesn’t really have anything new besides genderswapped titles and artwork for the undead knights. Argynvost is also changed to be a woman silver dragon, but has no artwork.

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Krezk and the Abbey of St. Markovia are some of the longer entries given the number of NPCs, but it still doesn’t hold a candle to Vallaki. SitA gives suggestions for other means for the PCs to enter town besides securing a Wizard of Wines shipment, but is a vague “do something kind or beneficial for Krezk” rather than anything detailed.

As for the Abbey, the Belviews have been changed to not be mongrelfolk, as that monster has some unfortunate implications regarding children of mixed heritage. Instead, the people living in the Abbey are regular folk who have been experimented on by the Abbot with the promise of healing. SitA cautions away from using real-life illnesses and conditions, instead drawing upon impossible conditions for the body horror such as a now-headless person walking around with their head in a jar, a tall person with no face but a mouth in the back of their head, and Cloven still has an extra head that was sewn on and is barely alive, rotting away.

The Abbot’s backstory is still quite similar: a deva sent to Krezk to aid the Belviews, she was corrupted by Strahd in her alternate Vasalisa von Holtz disguise. In SitA, the Abbot researched the works of Viktra Mordenheim in Lamordia, which along with her corruption is responsible for many of the illnesses suffered by the Abbot’s patients who expected to be healed. The Abbot is still building a flesh golem, but it’s a gift intended for Vasalisa. The golem is missing a face, and the Abbot will either ask for a PC to donate one of their own, take a face from the party by force, or ask the party to take someone else’s face. The Abbot may also hire the party to break into the Vallakovich manor’s attic, knowing that Victoria is a talented mage sure to have lots of research material.

Wizard of Wines alters the importance of wine in Barovia. The three gems used to grow grapes helped prevent the evils of the land from seeping into the food. The wine, if drunk by soulless Barovians, helps stay their innately violent nature. Without such wine, many soulless Barovians would have started killing others, and hints that without this blessing Barovia would look akin to a “zombie apocalypse.” Due to this, the Martikovs distribute the wine for free, which in addition to ensuring Barovia to be a safer place also makes them a very popular and politically connected family. This also makes the retrieval of the wine gems take on an importance beyond saving their failing business. While the wine’s true nature isn’t exactly known, popular superstitions have arisen around it, and many Barovians believe drinking wine helps ward off evil influence. This section mentions that all three wine gems are missing, which contradicts the section with Yan’s severed head in Van Richten’s Tower. In that section, Yan mentioned that the druids were plotting to steal the last remaining gem from the winery. I presume that having been dead for a while, the information is out of date, but this could’ve been made clearer in the text.

Amber Temple is super-short and only covers Exethanter and Vilnius, both now female NPCs. The only things of note is that PCs traveling with Exethanter in the Temple will make it so that no creatures can track the party while the lich remains with them. To make up for this sparse content, we have a one-page submission from someone besides the author discussing how one can better foreshadow this late-game dungeon earlier in the campaign.

Yester Hill & Druid Faction is extremely short and besides full-page artwork only covers half a page worth of content. Much like in the original adventure, they worship Strahd in the belief that she is the will of the land itself. They also appear like humanoid-plant symbiotes, with bark-like skin, vine-like hair, and their eyes look like they’re filled with Mist. Every generation the druids increasingly forget their lineage and history, becoming even less human in mind and body.

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Werewolf Den & Faction makes it so that the werewolves have a reliable means of navigating the Mists so they can go to other domains to kidnap people rather than relying exclusively on Strahd’s leave. Instead of exclusively targeting children to infect with lycanthropy, it’s anyone they have an easy opportunity to kidnap.

Interview with the Vampire is our final section of the book, a humorous discussion with Countess Strahd Von Zarovich who is asked about her life and goals. I don’t have much to say on it besides that it plays up Strahd’s role as an arrogant vampire detached from others with almost no redeeming qualities. For example…

Interviewee: You’ve lived such a long time, longer than most. What do you miss the most from your days as a mortal?

Strahd: I miss the lavish gatherings of sycophantic parasites. I admittedly spent most of my time studying, training, and conquering. I prepared for battles to come, be they of the body or mind. So I never took to heart the festive occasions around me. Yet, now that everyone is as soulless as I feel, I find myself longing for the occasional night of debauchery.

Thoughts So Far: First off, I like the expansion on the differences between Strahd’s consorts in personalities and talents. Moving Argynvost’s skull outside of Castle Ravenloft is another good touch, as is changing around the Abbot’s patients. The latter two of which I plan to use in my current Curse of Strahd campaign. I’m not as fond of the rewrite of Berez; while it still places Strahd in a villainous role, the original backstory helped cement Strahd’s terrible wrath and possessiveness on anyone he deems is keeping him away from Tatyana. To show that he’s willing to punish the many for the crimes of the few. Having the flood happen as the byproduct of emotions sort of takes away Strahd’s moral culpability in it being unplanned. I also wasn’t ever fond of the existence of soulless people, so reworking them to be murder-machines kept at bay by magical wine feels doesn’t really grab me either. While I can understand if “helping save the vineyard business” isn’t a strong enough hook for do-gooder parties, gaining the aid of a wereraven spy network is reward enough in my opinion.

Final Thoughts: Personally speaking, I’m rather let down by She Is the Ancient. The book suffers from poor organization and the sequestering of important information in the wrong places. The three archfey subplot is surprisingly incomplete, and the use of Vodnici and Lake Zarovich as one of the archfey is a new element not present in either DragnaCarta or MandyMod’s handling of the Fanes. Due to this, you can’t just plug the content of either guide in SitA and expect it to be ready to go. While there were parts of the book I liked, those felt sparse in comparison to my disagreements with game design, unclear information, or entries that just felt too sparse.

I can only recommend She Is the Ancient for those who want a plethora of tokens and artwork for a Rule 63 Curse of Strahd, and handout-style pages for roleplaying NPCs and their relationships with others. But for a fuller guide on running Curse of Strahd, it falls short.

Now that I’ve reviewed one of the larger sourcebooks, I plan to start work on another ambitious product made for Curse of Strahd. This one is even longer than She Is the Ancient, but with roughly two weeks left before November begins I am confident that I can start it sometime before Halloween comes around.

Join us next time as we check out a campaign overhaul guide two years in the making: the Curse of Strahd Companion by Wyatt Trull!
 

Libertad

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Product Link

Product Type: GMing Tools

Cos-Required? Yes

When reviewing the Barovia Gazetteer Collected Edition and more recently She Is the Ancient, I mentioned what I now dub “overhaul guides” for Curse of Strahd. While most are free plus or minus a few Patreon-exclusive perks, the Curse of Strahd Companion is closer to the Gazetteer in being a paid-for product on the Dungeon Master’s Guild. Its author, Wyatt Trull, has not only been working on the Companion for about two years, he has an accredited record of making many popular products for Curse of Strahd on the Guild specializing in products designed to ease the burden of DMs. Castle Ravenloft Room Flowchart shows how all the rooms in that dungeon connect to each other, while Death House Script provides boxed text for that 1st-level dungeon, along with clear delineations between what is meant to be read out loud to the players and what is to be read only by the Dungeon Master.

But Trull’s most popular product by far is Curse of Strahd: the Wedding at Ravenloft. A mini-adventure designed to take place at the campaign’s climax, it posits a scenario where Ireena has fallen into Strahd Von Zarovich clutches. Assured of his inevitable victory, the vampire count gives out invitations to friends and foes alike (the PCs included) for a grand wedding where he’ll not only marry Ireena, but transform her into a vampire spawn after its conclusion. It turns Castle Ravenloft into both a social scene and high combat dungeon crawl, placing a good chunk of the surviving major NPCs as guests, conveniently allowing PCs to tie up loose ends with such figures by gaining their aid or fighting them as enemies. Rushing through the halls in search of Ireena and/or Strahd as fang, sword, and spell fall upon each other, it adds a nice sense of dramatic tension and background chaos. When first released five years ago, the Wedding at Ravenloft proved to be one of the most popular products on the DM’s Guild, now sitting as an Adamantine Best-Seller.

The Curse of Strahd Companion is a product of several goals: not only is it intended as a DM-friendly guide to make running the adventure easier with handy references and streamlining, it also incorporates several of Trull’s other CoS products into it. The Wedding at Ravenloft is designed to be its climax, and working backwards from that Trull intends for the Companion’s narrative to lead the campaign towards that epic conclusion.

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In order to make easy reference for the DM, the Companion’s chapters have the same name and order as that of the chapters in the default Curse of Strahd adventure. The only exceptions are that after the Werewolf Den, we have Death House and the Wedding at Ravenloft as the new 16th and 17th chapters. The appendices are different, too: Appendix A covers magic items, B the bestiary, C unique effects and non-magic items, and D presents an alphabetical list of NPCs and where they can be found in terms of chapters.

The first chapter covers revisions to the overall setting and adventure. Remember that Wedding I mentioned above? This last part is particularly vital: the Curse of Strahd Companion puts on some pretty big railroad tracks for the default adventure, which otherwise is pretty open-ended in how the PCs can go about the campaign. Said railroadiness extends beyond the “Ireena must be captured by Strahd” territory and affects other scenarios, such as mandating Vallaki be taken over by Lady Wachter, that Ireena is killed by Strahd’s lightning bolt in the pond at the Abbey of Saint Markovia and thus revived by the Abbot, or having the PCs visit Castle Ravenloft at least once on an unrelated mission before the endgame Wedding. I’ll say it ahead of time, but I’m not a fan of these changes. While I’d ordinarily reserve these thoughts for encountering them in their proper chapters, as the Companion spells them out on the first page of the first chapter I wanted to highlight this front and center.

Beyond that, the Companion presents a Campaign Structure, which more or less separates Curse of Strahd into four Acts: Act I involves the PCs arriving in Barovia and concludes with Strahd’s first appearance after the vampire spawn massacre at Saint Andral’s Feast; Act II involves the PCs gathering allies mostly around Western Barovia and taking Ireena to Krezk that ends with Strahd killing, reviving, and then kidnapping her; Act III covers the PCs tying up loose ends in the two weeks before the Wedding; and Act IV covers the assault on Castle Ravenloft as the PCs come up with a plan to halt the Wedding and Ireena’s impending undeath.

Chapter 1 also provides some other changes to the default adventure: Argynvost’s 250 pound skull has been replaced with a much smaller heart in Castle Ravenloft, where the PCs must defeat an undead skeleton of the dragon to claim; Strahd and his vampire spawn cannot walk in sunlight without injury, but Strahd can summon storms to block out sunlight to get around this weakness but doing this makes him suffer a level of exhaustion; Barovia is 16 times bigger as the one-quarter mile hexes are ballooned up to 4 mile hexes, and a few wayside inns are placed along the road from Barovia to Vallaki in order to ease the travel burden; the Martikov’s third wine gem is powering the Heart of Sorrow; and saying Strahd’s true name is taboo even outside of Vallaki, as those who say his name three times summon his attention in some way.

There are two rather controversial changes, one of which is even acknowledged by the author: the first and the one acknowledged is that PCs with darkvision cannot rely on that trait until they acclimate to the Domains of Dread or the Shadowfell, which either won’t happen at all during the campaign or 1d3+1 weeks as a compromise. The other is that Sir Godfrey Gwilym, the undead Knight of the Silver Dragon in Argyonvostholt, is changed into being a recurring villain as a minion of Strahd who fights the party several times during the campaign and can keep coming back due to his revenant nature.

As for the Fortunes of Ravenoft, the Companion alters the Tome of Strahd to reveal its information piecemeal during hours of study rather than all at once. Additionally, it is one of Strahd’s spare spellbooks, and the spells can be individually deciphered and thus unlocked and learnable by Wizards with an Arcana check. The spells are a range of levels drawn from Strahd’s stat block, ranging from Fog Cloud and Sleep to the more powerful Polymorph and Animate Objects. A PC who openly carries the Holy Symbol of Ravenkind will cause Strahd to attempt to take it by force through using a hostage or a minion. If he should be successful, the PCs can visit Madam Eva for a Tarokka reading to determine its new location under guard by one of Strahd’s minions, such as in Wachterhaus or the Werewolf Den. While not a necessity for the railroad, the Companion is pretty adamant that this happens during the campaign, most likely involving Strahd holding hostage an NPC the party likes.

This book also adds a fourth unique item for the Tarokka reading: the Ba’al Verzi Dagger, a weapon wielded by Leo Dilisnya used by the traitorous soldier in a failed assassination attempt against Strahd. Leo Dilisnya is thus given a larger backstory role beyond his brief mention in the default adventure, being closer to that of the novel I, Strahd: Memoirs of a Vampire. In terms of stats the dagger is a legendary weapon which only an evil-aligned creature can attune. It deals +3d6 necrotic damage on a hit that ignores resistance to that damage type, and the wielder crits with it on a 19-20. Like the Sunsword it is a sentient item that communicates via emotion, but it has a lawful evil alignment. Its primary goal is to murder Strahd for good, whereupon it will lose its sentience and be freed from existence. Otherwise, the Companion has no major changes to the rest of the Fortunes besides recommending some Destined Allies over others, with a preference for fan-favorites such as the monster hunters Ezmerelda and Van Richten as well the wizards Kasimir Velikov and Victor Vallakovich.

The rest of this chapter has Narrator’s Toolbox options, such as limiting the amount of times Strahd appears in the campaign to prevent him from becoming “too familiar” to the players; incorporating the Lingering Injuries house rule from the Dungeon Masters Guide complete with the table in the book itself for easy reference; a sample list of recurring minions to spy on and inconvenience the party on Strahd’s behalf; keeping Strahd’s appearances rare and impactful with a suggested list of meeting points; picking out one PC in particular as the Doomed One* who will see recurring visions of their supposed death throughout the campaign; adding wolfsbane as a new unique item that deals bonus poison damage to a werewolf who ingests it and can be burned as an incense that nullifies their senses; using werewolves as an “invisible wall” to limit where the PCs go and to keep them from dawdling too long during overland travel; and some other smaller changes such as adding more magic items as loot during the adventure, and each chapter details said loot and where they can be found.

*This has no narrative effect beyond just being spooky.

I have to say that these changes are a mixed bag for me. On the positive side, I agree with limiting Strahd’s presence to a few narratively momentous encounters to preserve his mysterious and threatening nature, I think that turning the Tome of Strahd into a spellbook is a cool idea, and the recommended Destined Allies are pretty strong narrative choices save perhaps for Victor Vallakovich whose personality can be off putting to many gaming groups. Making Argyonvost’s body part more transportable to better light the beacon is a good change, and as a sojourn into the Castle is a mandatory quest before campaign’s end it is something that can be plausibly done before Curse of Strahd’s finale.

On the negative side, while I do agree that Barovia by default is positively tiny in the adventure, ballooning it up to such a huge size is overcompensating. With 4 mile hexes, the kingdom is roughly 320 miles east to west. Or roughly two-thirds the size of modern-day Germany which is around 450 miles east to west. While the Companion increases the population of Barovia’s towns a bit, the setting still feels downright barren given that even Vallaki is still a few thousand people. The inclusion of the Ba’al Verzi Dagger feels a bit much and being relegated only to evil PCs really limits its usability. While I can see how taking away Darkvision is intended to preserve the spooky atmosphere for a horror setting, as darkvision still applies penalties to ranged attacks and perception checks in dim light it is still a significant penalty for DMs who remember to use it.

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Like the default adventure, this chapter covers Barovia as a whole. The Companion suggests ways of enlivening overland travel, like sample scenery text such as the personification of the Old Svalich Road as a reliable and welcome partner waiting for the PCs whenever they hit the trail, Ireena talking about how the gallows at the River Ivlis Crossroads executed people so far away from town in order to remove the presence of death in the lives of villagers, or the Vistani camp at Tser Pool serving as a safe haven from an “invisible wall” of werewolves should the PCs take the other path. In this last case, the Vistani have burning wolfsbane set around the camp to keep the wolves at bay. There’s an optional encounter at Tser Inn, a rest point near Tser Falls for the PCs to shelter in the night, only to be attacked and burned down by werewolves, forcing the party to either fight or flee. Bluto’s attempted murder of Arabelle is given a twist as he’s sacrificing her to his dead wife, who is a rusalka water spirit using the statistics of a banshee. She will attempt to drown both Bluto and Arabelle, and they become specters hostile to the party should at least one of them die. The areas which would ordinarily trigger random encounters such as the Luna River Crossroads are given their own unique encounters: such as Arrigal and some Vistani bandits ambushing the party, or the Raven’s Roost Inn on the Raven River Crossroads which gets attacked by blights. In this last case the Companion mentions this could be a good first place for the party to cross paths with Ezmerelda.

But perhaps the biggest change of all involves the Mad Mage of Mount Baratok. In this case, Mordenkainen will not be violently hostile should the PCs run across him, and even when insane will invite them into his home but only if they’re at least 7th level. He’ll arrogantly remark on their lack of power otherwise. In this change, the PCs can cure his madness by defeating the sorrowsworn demons infesting his mansion. We get a full two-story map and dungeon crawl, complete with monsters and treasure both monetary and magical. Every Sorrowsworn type is represented here, with the most powerful type (the Angry) appearing once all the others have been taken care of, rampaging through the mansion from the fireplace. At this point, Mordenkainen participates in the battle as before he was too insane to be directly helpful to the party.

This Chapter ends with a Revised set of Random Encounters to replace the ones in the default adventure. They are designed to tie into the various characters and plots and are triggered only at certain times during the campaign, such as the party stumbling upon Muriel Vinshaw’s clothes in a package in the wilderness. She wraps them up while in wereraven form to be retrieved later, and they have a distinct perfume canny PCs can link to her should they meet her in human form later. One such encounter has the PCs come upon Vistani searching for Arabelle, which has some rather problematic text:

Content Warning: Child Abuse

Roleplaying Alexei. The teenager is a nervous wreck who can’t help but wring his hands in stress. Once he sees the adventurers, Alexei waves them over and all but shouts, “We are looking for a lost child—a little girl named Arabelle. Tell me you’ve seen her. Please, by the gods, tell me you’ve crossed paths with her. These woods… These woods are not safe for grown men, let alone children.”

Alexei promises a “ruby the size of your thumb” if the adventurers find Arabelle. If the party has Arabelle with them, Alexei shouts, “Girl! Why would you run off! Your father will whip you bloody! Hurry, hurry, for he grows drunker—angrier by the minute!”

While in the default Luvash was portrayed as a drunken lout who the PCs first meet whipping Alexei, he was not portrayed as having an abusive relationship towards his daughter Arabelle. The text in the spoiler block throws a wrench to this encounter and may cause the PCs to have strong reservations against returning her home.

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The Village of Barovia gets a pretty big narrative overhaul in the Companion. In fact, I can sum it up as a dungeon crawl but with more Commoners!

In short, the chapter has the same overall feel and setup as the default adventure: PCs enter a gloomy village that was recently attacked by Strahd’s minions, Ismark and Ireena ask the party for help in burying their father at the cemetery, Father Donavich’s son is a vampire spawn beneath the church, and possibly ends with Ireena joining the party on the way to Vallaki. Where it changes in a major way is casting Ismark and the former burgomaster in a less positive light while also setting up the common folk of the Village as a threat. During Kolyan and Ismark’s reign, the town held lotteries where a single villager was sent to “dine with Strahd” at Castle Ravenloft in order to fulfill the Barovian blood tax. Kolyan Indirovich never put the names of his children into the lottery, ensuring their survival, and this was an open secret. Although the lottery was seen as a necessary evil, many Barovians lost friends and family to this lottery, and combined with Strahd’s obsession with Ireena many have started to blame the late burgomaster and his family as responsible for the village’s woes. A conspiracy is hatched among the townsfolk to kill Ismark, and kidnap Ireena to dump at the town’s edge to be taken by Strahd after saying his name three times.

These chaotic turns of events start innocuously enough; instead of being in a coffin, Ismark and Ireena have their father’s corpse…lying on their dinner table. They commissioned a carpenter to build them a coffin, but he went insane after losing a loved one to the lottery and he now lives in a cabin in the Svalich Woods. Should the PCs head out, they will find the cabin, a fully-functional coffin, his corpse, and an infestation of overgrowth in which vine and needle blights are hiding. Should the PCs be unable to return with the coffin, Ireena and Ismark will have to make a clearly inferior quality one that visibly disheartens them. The second major combat encounter involves the PCs serving as Ismark, the PCs, and three of his pallbearers* transport the coffin to the church. En route, an angry mob of people who have lost loved ones to the lottery gather, demanding violent street justice. The mob are mostly Commoners who use rules for mobs from the Dungeon Master’s Guide summarized in the Companion, plus three Guards, two mastiff dogs, and Ivan Garvinski who has Thug stats and is the leader of them.

*Who use guard statistics and have unique names.

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The third encounter can occur whenever Ireena leaves the safety of her manor. Bildrath, Mad Mary, and some unimportant Barovian Commoners have arranged a kidnapping, using a lookout at a window and a signal to shake a nearby laundry line when Ireena leaves the manor. Two villagers using Thug statistics will attempt to manacle and kidnap Ireena; Parriwimple is also part of this, having been manipulated by his uncle. This saddens Ireena due to his betrayal, having known him since he was a boy. Parrimple only fights with unarmed strikes that deal 2d4+4 damage, and will flee once reduced to 90 or less hit points. PCs can interrogate/follow villagers and learn that Bildrath is the mastermind of the plot. Should Ireena be kidnapped (which happens automatically if she’s not with one or more PCs), she will be brought to the northeastern edge of the Village. There, her kidnappers beseech Strahd by saying his name multiple times, summoning a black fog which will reach Ireena in 3 turns. This gives the party one last chance to rescue her. If the fog claims her, she will be found later soon enough, such as running from the undead horde on the way to Old Bonegrinder or at the Tser Pool Encampment. The Dark Powers won’t let Strahd have her that easily, and she won’t recall what happened. In such a dire scenario, Ismark will say that he can feel that his sister is alive (“I know it in my bones”) and accompany the PCs in leaving town to find her once his father is buried.

The fourth and final combat encounter occurs at the funeral of Kolyan Indirovich. Strahd has sent either Rahadin or Sir Godfrey Gwilym (DM’s choice) to interfere. If Ireena was abducted, the minion plans on taking Kolyan’s corpse to turn into a wight back at Castle Ravenloft. If Ireena wasn’t abducted, she will be at the funeral, and the minions seek to kidnap her. Both Rahadin and Gwiliym have their own unique boxed text, villainous speeches, and mid-combat quips to trade with the party. Ismark’s pallbearers will be present as cannon fodder to demonstrate the power of Strahd’s agent. Both of the minions have BS rule-breaking features: if Rahadin manages to grapple Ireena, he teleports away with her as an action. There’s no updated statblock or unique item to reflect this new ability. Should Godfrey be used instead, he automatically kills two town guards during the initiative with no roll required. Godfrey will fight the PCs to the “death,” and should he best everyone present he will drag Ireena to the Svalich Woods, and Father Donavich will save PCs from dying with healing spells.

For those Resident Evil 4 fans reading, remember that early-game scene where Leon stumbles into the town square and sees the parasite-infected villagers burning a policeman at the funeral pyre? And this quickly devolves into Leon knifing and gunning his way through Spaniards cosplaying as medieval peasants, plus a strong dude with a chainsaw who just shows up mid-fight? This is the feel that I’m getting from this Chapter.

Now, you may be thinking? What’s up with this? In comparison to other overhaul guides, I haven’t seen any changes to the Village of Barovia quite like this. Well, Wyatt Trull has a sidebar talking about his design decisions in the Chapter Overview section:

Having run the Village of Barovia four times now, it's my belief that Curse of Strahd doesn't provide enough direction for the DM. Everything is sprawled out and it traps the DM into an awkward position: railroad the players or let them roam aimlessly? I know from experience that players tend to ignore Ismark, humor the Vistani, and get bogged down trying to kill either Morgantha or Bildrath, if not both.

The importance of this chapter is also vastly understated. This chapter isn't a fun little breather from Death House, it's the plot's foundation. Curse of Strahd is built around Ireena and the Fortunes of Ravenloft. Both quests begin in this chapter, but players can easily skip them. It's for this reason I recommend taking a stern hand with your players. Have events happen to them. They find themselves at the Blood of the Vine Tavern. Ismark waves them over. The Vistani later invite someone to their table and casually mention that Madam Eva has foreseen their arrival into the country and they must seek her out.

In short, you must put your players on a rail—and although "railroading" is a slur in the D&D community, you will thank me for it later when your campaign is running at full speed. The players will have their time to mess around later; you need to lay a strong foundation for the campaign now.

This bolded part highlights what I see as a reason Trull took this route. While attacking Morgantha is understandable as in the default adventure she is witnessed trying to kidnap a child, PCs who make the decision to kill Bildrath are strongly on the murderhobo side of things. Sure he’s a miser, but that doesn’t necessarily merit a death sentence! Trull removed the Morgantha encounter in the village, and for good reason. He isn’t the only overhaul guide writer who’s done this. But I feel that his decision in turning the Village into a multi-encounter extended fight scene is appealing to his gaming groups that thirst for peasant blood. Which isn’t wrong, in and of itself, for changing campaign elements to better fit your player base is a good thing. But this particular playstyle isn’t something that really works for Curse of Strahd, and I feel that Trull is overcorrecting for a rather niche audience.

Beyond these combat-heavy encounters, this Chapter has smaller revisions to the Village of Barovia. For example, the three Vistani owners of the Blood of the Vine tavern aren’t minions of Strahd, but helpfully point the PCs to Madam Eva at the Tser Pool Encampment. Bildrath unknowingly sells some magic items among his otherwise unremarkable stock, such as a Hat of Wizardry, Cloak of Protection, and six pieces of Walloping ammunition. Gertruda and Victor Vallakovich were secret lovers, and the latter used a flawed teleportation circle to visit her in the Village of Barovia. This is how Gertruda ended up in Castle Ravenloft, where flaws in its design sent her there instead of the attic in Vallaki. PCs can find clues of this while investigating Mad Mary’s House. Ismark and Ireena have an elderly butler named Mister Falkon at their home, who only speaks when spoken to and is described in the Companion as “effectively, living furniture.” Which to be honest doesn’t paint a very good picture of Ireena and her family. It gives them the impression that they’re removed from the feelings of the common folk.

Thoughts So Far: Oh man, where do I begin? I am not getting good vibes from Curse of Strahd Companion in reading the first few initial chapters. While I like several of the suggestions and changes such as making curing Mordenkainen a more involved sidequest, trying to add a more confined railroad onto Curse of Strahd just feels…wrong. While I can understand the need for having some sense of direction, particularly at the beginning, I believe that the module does more or less a good enough job of this on its own: PCs who opt to leave the Village of Barovia are heavily encouraged to venture to Vallaki, and once they’re there the campaign widens up by a lot. A party who opts to skip the Village entirely can still encounter Ireena later, likely being kidnapped by Strahd’s minions. And given the first settlement’s meager nature, PCs aren’t missing things too important to the campaign.

But it is perhaps the Village of Barovia chapter that leaves me the coldest. For its changes make not just the people of Barovia, but Ireena's brother and father, take on a more morally sinister tone. One could argue that Kolyan Indirovich is a hard man having to make hard decisions, but in contrast to the original adventure he and Ismark go from someone resisting Strahd to those who have condemned many people to their deaths. There's definitely normal non-supernatural humans in the module that can be quite villainous, which is best expressed in Vallaki with Baron Vallakovich. But between this and the Village of Barovia, it makes it seem like the common people of the kingdom are as just as much a threat as the monsters for the mission of safely escorting Ireena.

Join us next time as we take a multi-stage visit of Castle Ravenloft, get railroaded into putting Lady Wachter in charge of Vallaki, and have a zombie army railroad us into Old Bonegrinder!
 

Sparky McDibben

Adventurer
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Product Link

Product Type: GMing Tools

Cos-Required? Yes

When reviewing the Barovia Gazetteer Collected Edition and more recently She Is the Ancient, I mentioned what I now dub “overhaul guides” for Curse of Strahd. While most are free plus or minus a few Patreon-exclusive perks, the Curse of Strahd Companion is closer to the Gazetteer in being a paid-for product on the Dungeon Master’s Guild. Its author, Wyatt Trull, has not only been working on the Companion for about two years, he has an accredited record of making many popular products for Curse of Strahd on the Guild specializing in products designed to ease the burden of DMs. Castle Ravenloft Room Flowchart shows how all the rooms in that dungeon connect to each other, while Death House Script provides boxed text for that 1st-level dungeon, along with clear delineations between what is meant to be read out loud to the players and what is to be read only by the Dungeon Master.

But Trull’s most popular product by far is Curse of Strahd: the Wedding at Ravenloft. A mini-adventure designed to take place at the campaign’s climax, it posits a scenario where Ireena has fallen into Strahd Von Zarovich clutches. Assured of his inevitable victory, the vampire count gives out invitations to friends and foes alike (the PCs included) for a grand wedding where he’ll not only marry Ireena, but transform her into a vampire spawn after its conclusion. It turns Castle Ravenloft into both a social scene and high combat dungeon crawl, placing a good chunk of the surviving major NPCs as guests, conveniently allowing PCs to tie up loose ends with such figures by gaining their aid or fighting them as enemies. Rushing through the halls in search of Ireena and/or Strahd as fang, sword, and spell fall upon each other, it adds a nice sense of dramatic tension and background chaos. When first released five years ago, the Wedding at Ravenloft proved to be one of the most popular products on the DM’s Guild, now sitting as an Adamantine Best-Seller.

The Curse of Strahd Companion is a product of several goals: not only is it intended as a DM-friendly guide to make running the adventure easier with handy references and streamlining, it also incorporates several of Trull’s other CoS products into it. The Wedding at Ravenloft is designed to be its climax, and working backwards from that Trull intends for the Companion’s narrative to lead the campaign towards that epic conclusion.

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In order to make easy reference for the DM, the Companion’s chapters have the same name and order as that of the chapters in the default Curse of Strahd adventure. The only exceptions are that after the Werewolf Den, we have Death House and the Wedding at Ravenloft as the new 16th and 17th chapters. The appendices are different, too: Appendix A covers magic items, B the bestiary, C unique effects and non-magic items, and D presents an alphabetical list of NPCs and where they can be found in terms of chapters.

The first chapter covers revisions to the overall setting and adventure. Remember that Wedding I mentioned above? This last part is particularly vital: the Curse of Strahd Companion puts on some pretty big railroad tracks for the default adventure, which otherwise is pretty open-ended in how the PCs can go about the campaign. Said railroadiness extends beyond the “Ireena must be captured by Strahd” territory and affects other scenarios, such as mandating Vallaki be taken over by Lady Wachter, that Ireena is killed by Strahd’s lightning bolt in the pond at the Abbey of Saint Markovia and thus revived by the Abbot, or having the PCs visit Castle Ravenloft at least once on an unrelated mission before the endgame Wedding. I’ll say it ahead of time, but I’m not a fan of these changes. While I’d ordinarily reserve these thoughts for encountering them in their proper chapters, as the Companion spells them out on the first page of the first chapter I wanted to highlight this front and center.

Beyond that, the Companion presents a Campaign Structure, which more or less separates Curse of Strahd into four Acts: Act I involves the PCs arriving in Barovia and concludes with Strahd’s first appearance after the vampire spawn massacre at Saint Andral’s Feast; Act II involves the PCs gathering allies mostly around Western Barovia and taking Ireena to Krezk that ends with Strahd killing, reviving, and then kidnapping her; Act III covers the PCs tying up loose ends in the two weeks before the Wedding; and Act IV covers the assault on Castle Ravenloft as the PCs come up with a plan to halt the Wedding and Ireena’s impending undeath.

Chapter 1 also provides some other changes to the default adventure: Argynvost’s 250 pound skull has been replaced with a much smaller heart in Castle Ravenloft, where the PCs must defeat an undead skeleton of the dragon to claim; Strahd and his vampire spawn cannot walk in sunlight without injury, but Strahd can summon storms to block out sunlight to get around this weakness but doing this makes him suffer a level of exhaustion; Barovia is 16 times bigger as the one-quarter mile hexes are ballooned up to 4 mile hexes, and a few wayside inns are placed along the road from Barovia to Vallaki in order to ease the travel burden; the Martikov’s third wine gem is powering the Heart of Sorrow; and saying Strahd’s true name is taboo even outside of Vallaki, as those who say his name three times summon his attention in some way.

There are two rather controversial changes, one of which is even acknowledged by the author: the first and the one acknowledged is that PCs with darkvision cannot rely on that trait until they acclimate to the Domains of Dread or the Shadowfell, which either won’t happen at all during the campaign or 1d3+1 weeks as a compromise. The other is that Sir Godfrey Gwilym, the undead Knight of the Silver Dragon in Argyonvostholt, is changed into being a recurring villain as a minion of Strahd who fights the party several times during the campaign and can keep coming back due to his revenant nature.

As for the Fortunes of Ravenoft, the Companion alters the Tome of Strahd to reveal its information piecemeal during hours of study rather than all at once. Additionally, it is one of Strahd’s spare spellbooks, and the spells can be individually deciphered and thus unlocked and learnable by Wizards with an Arcana check. The spells are a range of levels drawn from Strahd’s stat block, ranging from Fog Cloud and Sleep to the more powerful Polymorph and Animate Objects. A PC who openly carries the Holy Symbol of Ravenkind will cause Strahd to attempt to take it by force through using a hostage or a minion. If he should be successful, the PCs can visit Madam Eva for a Tarokka reading to determine its new location under guard by one of Strahd’s minions, such as in Wachterhaus or the Werewolf Den. While not a necessity for the railroad, the Companion is pretty adamant that this happens during the campaign, most likely involving Strahd holding hostage an NPC the party likes.

This book also adds a fourth unique item for the Tarokka reading: the Ba’al Verzi Dagger, a weapon wielded by Leo Dilisnya used by the traitorous soldier in a failed assassination attempt against Strahd. Leo Dilisnya is thus given a larger backstory role beyond his brief mention in the default adventure, being closer to that of the novel I, Strahd: Memoirs of a Vampire. In terms of stats the dagger is a legendary weapon which only an evil-aligned creature can attune. It deals +3d6 necrotic damage on a hit that ignores resistance to that damage type, and the wielder crits with it on a 19-20. Like the Sunsword it is a sentient item that communicates via emotion, but it has a lawful evil alignment. Its primary goal is to murder Strahd for good, whereupon it will lose its sentience and be freed from existence. Otherwise, the Companion has no major changes to the rest of the Fortunes besides recommending some Destined Allies over others, with a preference for fan-favorites such as the monster hunters Ezmerelda and Van Richten as well the wizards Kasimir Velikov and Victor Vallakovich.

The rest of this chapter has Narrator’s Toolbox options, such as limiting the amount of times Strahd appears in the campaign to prevent him from becoming “too familiar” to the players; incorporating the Lingering Injuries house rule from the Dungeon Masters Guide complete with the table in the book itself for easy reference; a sample list of recurring minions to spy on and inconvenience the party on Strahd’s behalf; keeping Strahd’s appearances rare and impactful with a suggested list of meeting points; picking out one PC in particular as the Doomed One* who will see recurring visions of their supposed death throughout the campaign; adding wolfsbane as a new unique item that deals bonus poison damage to a werewolf who ingests it and can be burned as an incense that nullifies their senses; using werewolves as an “invisible wall” to limit where the PCs go and to keep them from dawdling too long during overland travel; and some other smaller changes such as adding more magic items as loot during the adventure, and each chapter details said loot and where they can be found.

*This has no narrative effect beyond just being spooky.

I have to say that these changes are a mixed bag for me. On the positive side, I agree with limiting Strahd’s presence to a few narratively momentous encounters to preserve his mysterious and threatening nature, I think that turning the Tome of Strahd into a spellbook is a cool idea, and the recommended Destined Allies are pretty strong narrative choices save perhaps for Victor Vallakovich whose personality can be off putting to many gaming groups. Making Argyonvost’s body part more transportable to better light the beacon is a good change, and as a sojourn into the Castle is a mandatory quest before campaign’s end it is something that can be plausibly done before Curse of Strahd’s finale.

On the negative side, while I do agree that Barovia by default is positively tiny in the adventure, ballooning it up to such a huge size is overcompensating. With 4 mile hexes, the kingdom is roughly 320 miles east to west. Or roughly two-thirds the size of modern-day Germany which is around 450 miles east to west. While the Companion increases the population of Barovia’s towns a bit, the setting still feels downright barren given that even Vallaki is still a few thousand people. The inclusion of the Ba’al Verzi Dagger feels a bit much and being relegated only to evil PCs really limits its usability. While I can see how taking away Darkvision is intended to preserve the spooky atmosphere for a horror setting, as darkvision still applies penalties to ranged attacks and perception checks in dim light it is still a significant penalty for DMs who remember to use it.

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Like the default adventure, this chapter covers Barovia as a whole. The Companion suggests ways of enlivening overland travel, like sample scenery text such as the personification of the Old Svalich Road as a reliable and welcome partner waiting for the PCs whenever they hit the trail, Ireena talking about how the gallows at the River Ivlis Crossroads executed people so far away from town in order to remove the presence of death in the lives of villagers, or the Vistani camp at Tser Pool serving as a safe haven from an “invisible wall” of werewolves should the PCs take the other path. In this last case, the Vistani have burning wolfsbane set around the camp to keep the wolves at bay. There’s an optional encounter at Tser Inn, a rest point near Tser Falls for the PCs to shelter in the night, only to be attacked and burned down by werewolves, forcing the party to either fight or flee. Bluto’s attempted murder of Arabelle is given a twist as he’s sacrificing her to his dead wife, who is a rusalka water spirit using the statistics of a banshee. She will attempt to drown both Bluto and Arabelle, and they become specters hostile to the party should at least one of them die. The areas which would ordinarily trigger random encounters such as the Luna River Crossroads are given their own unique encounters: such as Arrigal and some Vistani bandits ambushing the party, or the Raven’s Roost Inn on the Raven River Crossroads which gets attacked by blights. In this last case the Companion mentions this could be a good first place for the party to cross paths with Ezmerelda.

But perhaps the biggest change of all involves the Mad Mage of Mount Baratok. In this case, Mordenkainen will not be violently hostile should the PCs run across him, and even when insane will invite them into his home but only if they’re at least 7th level. He’ll arrogantly remark on their lack of power otherwise. In this change, the PCs can cure his madness by defeating the sorrowsworn demons infesting his mansion. We get a full two-story map and dungeon crawl, complete with monsters and treasure both monetary and magical. Every Sorrowsworn type is represented here, with the most powerful type (the Angry) appearing once all the others have been taken care of, rampaging through the mansion from the fireplace. At this point, Mordenkainen participates in the battle as before he was too insane to be directly helpful to the party.

This Chapter ends with a Revised set of Random Encounters to replace the ones in the default adventure. They are designed to tie into the various characters and plots and are triggered only at certain times during the campaign, such as the party stumbling upon Muriel Vinshaw’s clothes in a package in the wilderness. She wraps them up while in wereraven form to be retrieved later, and they have a distinct perfume canny PCs can link to her should they meet her in human form later. One such encounter has the PCs come upon Vistani searching for Arabelle, which has some rather problematic text:

Content Warning: Child Abuse


While in the default Luvash was portrayed as a drunken lout who the PCs first meet whipping Alexei, he was not portrayed as having an abusive relationship towards his daughter Arabelle. The text in the spoiler block throws a wrench to this encounter and may cause the PCs to have strong reservations against returning her home.

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The Village of Barovia gets a pretty big narrative overhaul in the Companion. In fact, I can sum it up as a dungeon crawl but with more Commoners!

In short, the chapter has the same overall feel and setup as the default adventure: PCs enter a gloomy village that was recently attacked by Strahd’s minions, Ismark and Ireena ask the party for help in burying their father at the cemetery, Father Donavich’s son is a vampire spawn beneath the church, and possibly ends with Ireena joining the party on the way to Vallaki. Where it changes in a major way is casting Ismark and the former burgomaster in a less positive light while also setting up the common folk of the Village as a threat. During Kolyan and Ismark’s reign, the town held lotteries where a single villager was sent to “dine with Strahd” at Castle Ravenloft in order to fulfill the Barovian blood tax. Kolyan Indirovich never put the names of his children into the lottery, ensuring their survival, and this was an open secret. Although the lottery was seen as a necessary evil, many Barovians lost friends and family to this lottery, and combined with Strahd’s obsession with Ireena many have started to blame the late burgomaster and his family as responsible for the village’s woes. A conspiracy is hatched among the townsfolk to kill Ismark, and kidnap Ireena to dump at the town’s edge to be taken by Strahd after saying his name three times.

These chaotic turns of events start innocuously enough; instead of being in a coffin, Ismark and Ireena have their father’s corpse…lying on their dinner table. They commissioned a carpenter to build them a coffin, but he went insane after losing a loved one to the lottery and he now lives in a cabin in the Svalich Woods. Should the PCs head out, they will find the cabin, a fully-functional coffin, his corpse, and an infestation of overgrowth in which vine and needle blights are hiding. Should the PCs be unable to return with the coffin, Ireena and Ismark will have to make a clearly inferior quality one that visibly disheartens them. The second major combat encounter involves the PCs serving as Ismark, the PCs, and three of his pallbearers* transport the coffin to the church. En route, an angry mob of people who have lost loved ones to the lottery gather, demanding violent street justice. The mob are mostly Commoners who use rules for mobs from the Dungeon Master’s Guide summarized in the Companion, plus three Guards, two mastiff dogs, and Ivan Garvinski who has Thug stats and is the leader of them.

*Who use guard statistics and have unique names.

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The third encounter can occur whenever Ireena leaves the safety of her manor. Bildrath, Mad Mary, and some unimportant Barovian Commoners have arranged a kidnapping, using a lookout at a window and a signal to shake a nearby laundry line when Ireena leaves the manor. Two villagers using Thug statistics will attempt to manacle and kidnap Ireena; Parriwimple is also part of this, having been manipulated by his uncle. This saddens Ireena due to his betrayal, having known him since he was a boy. Parrimple only fights with unarmed strikes that deal 2d4+4 damage, and will flee once reduced to 90 or less hit points. PCs can interrogate/follow villagers and learn that Bildrath is the mastermind of the plot. Should Ireena be kidnapped (which happens automatically if she’s not with one or more PCs), she will be brought to the northeastern edge of the Village. There, her kidnappers beseech Strahd by saying his name multiple times, summoning a black fog which will reach Ireena in 3 turns. This gives the party one last chance to rescue her. If the fog claims her, she will be found later soon enough, such as running from the undead horde on the way to Old Bonegrinder or at the Tser Pool Encampment. The Dark Powers won’t let Strahd have her that easily, and she won’t recall what happened. In such a dire scenario, Ismark will say that he can feel that his sister is alive (“I know it in my bones”) and accompany the PCs in leaving town to find her once his father is buried.

The fourth and final combat encounter occurs at the funeral of Kolyan Indirovich. Strahd has sent either Rahadin or Sir Godfrey Gwilym (DM’s choice) to interfere. If Ireena was abducted, the minion plans on taking Kolyan’s corpse to turn into a wight back at Castle Ravenloft. If Ireena wasn’t abducted, she will be at the funeral, and the minions seek to kidnap her. Both Rahadin and Gwiliym have their own unique boxed text, villainous speeches, and mid-combat quips to trade with the party. Ismark’s pallbearers will be present as cannon fodder to demonstrate the power of Strahd’s agent. Both of the minions have BS rule-breaking features: if Rahadin manages to grapple Ireena, he teleports away with her as an action. There’s no updated statblock or unique item to reflect this new ability. Should Godfrey be used instead, he automatically kills two town guards during the initiative with no roll required. Godfrey will fight the PCs to the “death,” and should he best everyone present he will drag Ireena to the Svalich Woods, and Father Donavich will save PCs from dying with healing spells.

For those Resident Evil 4 fans reading, remember that early-game scene where Leon stumbles into the town square and sees the parasite-infected villagers burning a policeman at the funeral pyre? And this quickly devolves into Leon knifing and gunning his way through Spaniards cosplaying as medieval peasants, plus a strong dude with a chainsaw who just shows up mid-fight? This is the feel that I’m getting from this Chapter.

Now, you may be thinking? What’s up with this? In comparison to other overhaul guides, I haven’t seen any changes to the Village of Barovia quite like this. Well, Wyatt Trull has a sidebar talking about his design decisions in the Chapter Overview section:



This bolded part highlights what I see as a reason Trull took this route. While attacking Morgantha is understandable as in the default adventure she is witnessed trying to kidnap a child, PCs who make the decision to kill Bildrath are strongly on the murderhobo side of things. Sure he’s a miser, but that doesn’t necessarily merit a death sentence! Trull removed the Morgantha encounter in the village, and for good reason. He isn’t the only overhaul guide writer who’s done this. But I feel that his decision in turning the Village into a multi-encounter extended fight scene is appealing to his gaming groups that thirst for peasant blood. Which isn’t wrong, in and of itself, for changing campaign elements to better fit your player base is a good thing. But this particular playstyle isn’t something that really works for Curse of Strahd, and I feel that Trull is overcorrecting for a rather niche audience.

Beyond these combat-heavy encounters, this Chapter has smaller revisions to the Village of Barovia. For example, the three Vistani owners of the Blood of the Vine tavern aren’t minions of Strahd, but helpfully point the PCs to Madam Eva at the Tser Pool Encampment. Bildrath unknowingly sells some magic items among his otherwise unremarkable stock, such as a Hat of Wizardry, Cloak of Protection, and six pieces of Walloping ammunition. Gertruda and Victor Vallakovich were secret lovers, and the latter used a flawed teleportation circle to visit her in the Village of Barovia. This is how Gertruda ended up in Castle Ravenloft, where flaws in its design sent her there instead of the attic in Vallaki. PCs can find clues of this while investigating Mad Mary’s House. Ismark and Ireena have an elderly butler named Mister Falkon at their home, who only speaks when spoken to and is described in the Companion as “effectively, living furniture.” Which to be honest doesn’t paint a very good picture of Ireena and her family. It gives them the impression that they’re removed from the feelings of the common folk.

Thoughts So Far: Oh man, where do I begin? I am not getting good vibes from Curse of Strahd Companion in reading the first few initial chapters. While I like several of the suggestions and changes such as making curing Mordenkainen a more involved sidequest, trying to add a more confined railroad onto Curse of Strahd just feels…wrong. While I can understand the need for having some sense of direction, particularly at the beginning, I believe that the module does more or less a good enough job of this on its own: PCs who opt to leave the Village of Barovia are heavily encouraged to venture to Vallaki, and once they’re there the campaign widens up by a lot. A party who opts to skip the Village entirely can still encounter Ireena later, likely being kidnapped by Strahd’s minions. And given the first settlement’s meager nature, PCs aren’t missing things too important to the campaign.

But it is perhaps the Village of Barovia chapter that leaves me the coldest. For its changes make not just the people of Barovia, but Ireena's brother and father, take on a more morally sinister tone. One could argue that Kolyan Indirovich is a hard man having to make hard decisions, but in contrast to the original adventure he and Ismark go from someone resisting Strahd to those who have condemned many people to their deaths. There's definitely normal non-supernatural humans in the module that can be quite villainous, which is best expressed in Vallaki with Baron Vallakovich. But between this and the Village of Barovia, it makes it seem like the common people of the kingdom are as just as much a threat as the monsters for the mission of safely escorting Ireena.

Join us next time as we take a multi-stage visit of Castle Ravenloft, get railroaded into putting Lady Wachter in charge of Vallaki, and have a zombie army railroad us into Old Bonegrinder!
This look interesting, though the railroady bits leave me cold.
 

Libertad

Hero
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Castle Ravenloft has always been an end-game dungeon for Curse of Strahd, and many genre-savvy players often put off exploring it until they tied up all the loose ends in the rest of Barovia. There have been non-lethal incentives to explore it prematurely, such as a Tarokka treasure or Destined Ally being located there, leads to other plot points such as Lief Lipsiege knowing where the Holy Symbol of Ravenkind is, or a trove of homebrew fancying up Strahd’s dinner invitation to be more than an illusory trap.

The Curse of Strahd Companion all but encourages multiple visits to the Castle: one when the party’s low-level in accepting Strahd’s dinner invitation, where they can explore the dungeon in relative safety and perhaps help out Ezmerelda d’Avenir; a second time where an ally teleports them into the castle for some other means, such as searching for a Tarokka treasure; and the third and final time in rescuing Ireena from Strahd’s wedding.

After giving a brief overview of the notable named NPCs in the castle, we get a suggestion of spells to replace Strahd’s default array based on what official sourcebooks to which the DM has access. The book encourages practical ones such as Shield to negate a deadly blow from a Smite or Sunsword, Misty Step to break grapples and being otherwise immobilized, Counterspell and Dispel Magic for dealing with troublesome spells, and Telekinesis for forcefully disarming a character of a magic item. We also get a list of general tactics for Strahd, such as using Nondetection to ward him from enemy divinations, having a swarm of bats take the Help action in coordinating attacks, charming a Destined Ally while they’re isolated from the party to betray them at a later date,* and a list of how he’d deal with the tactics of different classes.

*This may be a harder sell for Allies who are quite fond of the party. Strahd’s charm isn’t like Dominate or overrides their free will entirely, it merely makes them regard Strahd as a trusted friend.

The first visit, To Dine at Castle Ravenloft, recommends this to happen when the PCs are 5th or 6th level, sometime after Saint Andral’s Feast but before he kidnaps Ireena in Krezk. Should the PCs opt to visit, they have the opportunity to converse more with Strahd and learn about things, from Rahadin’s role in genociding his own people to Strahd’s obsession with Ireena by revealing that she’s the reincarnated form of Tatyana should the party not know it already. The meal is then followed by a ballroom dance and a personal invitation to his Study to enjoy some cigars and wine. A bard PC will spot the Instrument of the Bards magic item on the way there, and have a supernatural premonition that it’s a special item. During their time in the Study, Strahd will infodump a bit more during casual conversation, such as revealing that the tobacco leaves were taken from the Gulthias Tree at Yester Hill or that the archmage that built the Castle is entombed with his magical staff in the below crypts.

The PCs are allowed to stay overnight, where they have the opportunity to sneak out of the Guest Rooms and explore the Castle. There’s not much to do here save look around and get a feel for things, and should the PCs meet Ezmerelda she will be there to try (and inevitably) fail to assassinate Strahd, and the PCs can aid her in this foolish endeavor by attacking the vampire on the High Tower Peak. The Dark Powers won’t let the party die, and should they be defeated they will be either dumped elsewhere inside or outside the castle or imprisoned in the dungeons depending on Strahd’s mood. The PCs can also encounter Gertruda who, wrapped up in her own little fantasy world, believes that she can fly and will try to jump off the balcony in an attempt to go back to the Village of Barovia unless the PCs intervene.

The second visit, In the Depths of Ravenloft, occurs around 7th level where they must break into the place in order to get something important. There are various ways to do this, but the way the Companion suggests is an NPC ally helping them teleport inside. Victor Vallakovich’s shoddy teleportation circle, Mordenkainen, or making a deal with the hags of Old Bonegrinder are given as a few suggestions. Regardless of the means, the PCs end up in the Brazier Room and the way back is inactive for a limited time, forcing the party to explore the Castle’s lower levels. Reasons the PCs may go inside include retrieving Argynvost’s heart, freeing the former werewolf leader Emil Toranescu, finding the Ba’al Verzi Dagger or a similar Tarokka treasure, or quite possibly breaking into Strahd’s study for its tomes, although the Companion says that this encounter is intended for the lower levels of the dungeon. At some point during the infiltration, Rahadin will grow aware of the PCs’ presence and hunt them down with a small squad of undead.

The third visit is detailed in its own chapter: the Wedding at Ravenloft. The rest of this chapter deals with covering the Castle rooms in general. We get a one-page map flowchart of how the rooms all connect to each other, a handy two-page list summarizing each room with brief descriptions and likely inhabitants, one page summarizing the individual crypts and their contents in the Catacombs, revisions such as changing the red dragon wyrmlings to silver dragon wyrmlings who are the brainwashed brood of Argynvost, and outlines of rooms suitable for a final confrontation with Strahd complete with their own boxed text, unique magical effects and terrain, and evil speech by Strahd. A former meager +1 shortsword in the original Castle is turned into a Shortsword of the Lost Crusader, which is a lawful good sentient weapon that can shed bright light, can be attuned to by a Lawful Good creature in 1 minute (but the item description doesn’t mention requiring attunement) and can let the wielder cast Crusader’s Mantle once per day.

Overall, a pretty good chapter. It has high marks for its list of DM-friendly tools, especially the flowchart map, and I do like the idea of using the Brazier room to conduct a heist scenario in breaking into the Castle. The only real criticism I have is more of a surface-level one: Strahd doesn’t strike me as a whiskey and cigars kind of guy.

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Ah, Vallaki. The real point at which Curse of Strahd truly becomes a sandbox, and the bane of underprepared DMs and PCs who can juggle only so many quest hooks. The Curse of Strahd Companion is well aware of the location’s infamous reputation, so it advises the DM to take things slow. Not every day has to be full of danger and adventure, and the theft of Saint Andral’s bones can be introduced once the DM is ready to light the powder keg. So far, some pretty good advice.

There’s an awful lot of small changes the Companion makes to Vallaki. Some of them include Father Petrovich telling the PCs about the bones’ theft once he trusts them enough to handle the matter (such as the party rescuing Arabelle or freeing Udo Lukovich from the Baron’s manor), Van Richten doesn’t have a saber-tooth tiger he’s planning to use to kill the Vistani (he’s still present as Rictavio in town to gather information), Stella Wachter is still insane but instead of believing she’s a cat she has an insatiable need to break things and went insane not from Victor but by discovering her father’s corpse in Lady Wachter’s bedroom, the Arasek Stockyard’s goods aren’t overpriced, the Baron’s manor is more heavily defended with the addition of five Guards and a Veteran, Ernst Larnak knows Thieves’ Cant and can communicate with a Rogue PC should the party be willing to help switch his loyalties away from Lady Wachter, the Town Square has three new shops to sell things to the PCs (most notably an apothecary with wolfsbane and magical potions), and Kasimir Velikov can offer to let a wizard PC copy spells from his spellbook at a greatly reduced price in exchange for a future favor of accompanying him to the Amber Temple,

The more significant changes include giving Izek and his status as Ireena’s lost sibling a bigger role. Father Petrovich, upon seeing Ireena, realizes that she was a girl long thought dead, born as Yasmine Strazni to two parents in town who have now passed away. He lies about her brother still being alive, knowing that Izek is dangerous, but PCs can detect he’s lying via Insight and other means. Izek will personally deliver an invitation to the PCs should the Baron become aware of their presence in town, and if Ireena’s with them the party can catch that he seems particularly interested in her. During dinner with the Baron, he will ask Ireena to marry his son Victor, a proposition Ireena is not too fond of and one Victor vehemently refuses to the Baron’s ire.

The time and circumstances of Izek’s attempted kidnapping of Ireena are left up in the air, but it’s more or less intended to happen before the theft of the bones of Saint Andral. It is at this time that the Companion breaks out the trusty ol’ railroad tracks we’ve grown to know and love. Most notably, both noble leaders of Vallaki must be alive when Saint Andral’s Feast occurs, and Lady Wachter in particular must survive for having her take over the town is regarded as a vital plot point. The theft of the bones plays out more or less as it does in the default adventure, but adds an encounter where the PCs meet Milivoj at his home where he learns that he’s caring for his impoverished siblings. Thus, this show’s how he’s motivated by economic hardship to steal the bones for Henrik and something the party can use to get him to confess. Whether or not the PCs recover the bones, Strahd and his minions move upon the church and cause a massacre just as the PCs get back. Strahd is accompanied by any surviving vampire spawn and possibly Arrigal, and the Count will go to kill Father Petrovich while his minions attack everyone else.

If Ireena is present, either with the party or staying at the Church as a safe haven, she will directly confront Strahd with sword in hand.

While writing this guide, it is difficult for me to pinpoint where Ireena is and what she’s doing. If she is present for St. Andral’s Feast—which is the most logical place for her to be, bones or no bones—then she has the chance to shine. Rather than cower or flee, Ireena draws her father’s sword and stands before the Devil. She faces her stalker, her father’s killer, with courage. Ireena knows she is no match for Strahd, but it is better to die a lion than be butchered as a lamb. Strahd, for his part, is impressed.

Under no circumstances does Strahd kidnap Ireena in this chapter—it would shorten Strahd’s game of cat-and-mouse. All Strahd should do is disarm Ireena, caress her neck and bear his fangs. He whispers, “The third bite… I will save for our wedding night.” Combat is effectively paused when Strahd and Ireena converse. Imagine it as a cutscene. The adventurers can interject but not intervene.

Here’s the thing: I agree with the overall setup Trull is trying to do here. Strahd’s first appearance to the party in person should be a dramatic event, and the theft of the bones and the assault on the church is a great way to demonstrate his power and danger. At this point in the campaign the PCs shouldn’t be able to adequately take him on, aided as he is by the Heart of Sorrow, his minions, and the party most likely having drained their resources fighting or running away from vampire spawn at the Coffin Shop. The Companion even has brief snippets to help enhance this terror, like a vampire spawn pulling a crying child out of hiding from beneath the pews, or a churchgoer’s failed attempt to save Father Petrovich by throwing himself in front of Strahd only to be slammed to death. All of these tools are very strong narrative devices that still maintain PC autonomy while conveying the chaos of the scene.

We don’t need to impose a non-interactive cutscene, particularly one where it looks like he’s about to drain Ireena dry. Talking is a free action, but combining that with other “actions” Strahd’s doing like disarming and grappling feels a bit overkill.

The Companion more or less presumes that Father Petrovich will die, and has Strahd disappear via fog in boxed text after he kills the priest followed by all the torches in the neighborhood going out. More cutscene powers.

The railroad tracks continue as the townsfolk’s last vestiges of safety are shattered, setting the sparks of revolution and Lady Wachter encouraging an angry mob to assault Baron Vallakovich’s manor. We get another non-interactive cutscene as the Vallakoviches are either stoned to death or burned at the stake. But Lady Wachter intervenes to have the crowd spare Victor, and she will invite the party to her manor. The noblewoman will note that the PCs are a threat to her rule, and she cannot tolerate their presence in town any longer. They will be allowed to leave the gates and keep their possessions, but otherwise will be “encouraged” to leave should they resist.

Content Warning: Sexual Assault

This module also turns Lady Wachter into a rapist-by-proxy. She will drag out a visibly-tortured Victor in front of the PCs, mention that she will force him to marry her daughter Stella, and kill him after an heir is produced. Lady Wachter also had plans to force one of her female servants to “be given to the Devils Beyonds” and impregnated by a fiend, and when said maid discovered this plan via eavesdropping Lady Wachter spread rumors to isolate her from her friends and family.

Should the PCs seek to intervene at any time, they will have to fight a huge mob. Not just 30 Commoners, but 12 Guards, 8 Cultists, and 3 Cult Fanatics all at once. The adventure more or less uses these strength of numbers to dissuade PCs from going off the tracks.

As for why Lady Wachter must both survive and take over Vallaki…there’s no real narrative reason besides forcing the party and Ireena to find safe haven elsewhere, most notably Krezk. As for the Wedding at Ravenloft, her survival for that isn’t paramount; in fact, that Chapter is rather open with alternatives to various scenes should important NPCs be dead. There’s even entries for what the Vallakovich family will do at the Wedding should they survive, so clearly Wachter’s ascension isn’t something that must happen for the campaign finale! And what if Victor is a Destined Ally? Well, the Companion more or less says that the party will have to find a way to rescue him at a later undetermined time, rather than…you know, the possibility of the PCs deciding to rescue him right then and there.

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In recognition that fighting three night hags is something even high-level adventurers struggle with, the Companion all but advises against turning this into a violent encounter. In the default adventure the PCs could choose to visit the windmill, but a disguised wereraven will attempt to steer them away. The Companion has other ideas…

To railroad the party into visiting! How, you may ask? Well, in keeping with the Bigger Barovia variant, an army of zombies led by a Barovian Witch will give chase to the party, their numbers more or less “enough to overwhelm the PCs in a straight fight.” And it just so happens that their only convenient means of shelter is the windmill. The book doesn't explain what's preventing the zombies from just massing around it and battering down the doors, and the boxed text when the PCs first meet the hags doesn't have them react, much less acknowledge, the incoming zombie horde. It doesn't even have something like the zombies deciding to retreat, or the hags appearing nonchalant about it with a "it's just a jumped-up mageling, nothing we can’t handle."

The major changes the chapter makes are reflavoring the windmill rooms to look less overtly like a monster lair like with the scattered bones, turning the mechanics of Dream Pastry addition into a progressive series of Constitution saves that impose exhaustion should an addict go without pastries, and instead of a TPK a party who is defeated by the hags are instead stabilized and are spared should they accept a curse or Geas. There’s a list of curses, such as losing their shadow which can be summoned as a monster by the hags. The Geas is a complicated three-step process that forces a PC to indirectly aid in the theft of the bones of Saint Andral and the overthrow of Vallaki’s Baron, such as delivering a letter to Henrik upon arrival in town or casting the first stone or torch during the Baron’s public execution by the mob. The megaliths are given more detail, where the hags will attempt to sacrifice a captured PC who refuses to take on a curse or Geas.

PCs on non-violent terms with the hags can have them set up a teleportation circle to get into Castle Ravenloft. There’s a list of tasks asked for as the price, such as a Geas for a PC to retrieve Khazan’s Staff of Power, finding out the identities of one of the Keepers of the Feather along with a lock of their hair, or a lock of Arabelle’s hair and a vial of her blood. This last one is part of a ploy by Morgantha to manipulate or charm Strahd into letting her leave Barovia. A plot that is highly unlikely to work, at best.

And last but not least, the Companion suggests depowering the hags to green hags save for Morgantha who remains a night hag. Should the party fight her and she escapes, she will plot revenge and conduct cannibalistic rituals to turn herself into an Auntie, a greater hag who gets lair actions. Should this happen, Old Bonegrinder is filled with more monsters such as scarecrows and animated brooms.

I like the idea of avoiding a TPK by having the hags force the PCs to make dark bargains with them. I’ve seen this suggested on online communities for Curse of Strahd, but the Companion provides a set of explicit mechanics to them. I’m not so hot on the Geas, given that things in Vallaki are already railroaded to a predetermined point. It’s like Quantum Ogres, but instead of ogres it’s an entire plot.

Thoughts So Far: It’s at this point I more or less resigned my overall opinion of the Curse of Strahd Companion. Having railroads at certain key points to guide the party is one thing, but doing it in places where it’s both obviously artificial and unnecessary demonstrates a larger problem. Combined with the more evocative boxed text and NPC speeches, the Companion is turning Curse of Strahd into less of an RPG sandbox and more of a novel. In attempting to work backwards into setting up a climactic finale to the campaign with a Wedding at Ravenloft, I feel that Trull became so enamored of the idea that he began shutting down anything that can hint at the PCs going off course into uncharted territory. Instead of preparing for the journey, he kept his eyes on the end destination. And while the Wedding is a pretty cool end-game scenario, it has come at the expense of other important areas in the campaign.

Join us next time as we explore more of Barovia, from the haunted fortress of Argynvostholt to Van Richten’s Tower!
 

Libertad

Hero
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Argynvostholt is actually a breath of fresh air in comparison to the prior chapters in that it adds to the place rather than restricts. Some of the revisions it makes include giving unique personalities, descriptions, and even weapons for the undead knights in the dungeon, along with personalized text for Vladimir Horngaard should he be holding one of the three Tarokka treasures. The Companion also smartly suggests to focus on only a few rooms and ignore the extraneous ones. It also adds a shadow of Argynvost’s soul to appear early on, telling the PCs that the knights can be redeemed should the beacon be lit by his heart held in Castle Ravenloft. Furthermore, it alters Ezmerelda’s entrance, having Arrigal tail her not because she stole horses from the Vistani camp, but because he realizes that she knows something about Rudolph Van Richten. He uses poisoned arrows to shoot at her and the party from outside should they be near any windows. Furthermore, Ezmerelda can show up as “the cavalry” should the PCs be engaged in combat with the nights. As for Sir Godfrey Gwilym, he can show up as a recurring villain, although in this case around half of the knights will fight against him, half join him during a battle. Additionally, should the PCs light the beacon, they will have to fight the corpse of the dragon to put all the undead in the castle to rest. Argynvost has unique stats as an undead, basically functioning like a dragon but with a breath weapon that deals both necrotic and cold damage.

Overall, I’m giving high marks for this chapter.

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We covered the Village of Barovia, we covered Vallaki, and now it’s time to cover the third major settlement/railroad segment in Curse of Strahd. And continuing the proud tradition of linearity, the Companion has its own particular story it wishes to tell, that it must tell for this chapter. When the PCs get here with Ireena in tow, the party is let in automatically due to her family and the burgomaster Dimitri Krezkov being on good terms, so no wine shipment is necessary to pass through the front gates. Additionally, exploration of the Abbey has more or less been de-emphasized, even though it and its inhabitants still exist in the Companion version of the campaign.

When the PCs first come into the village, they’re given a place to stay in exchange for helping out local villagers with labor. During their stay with the burgomaster, they infodump a bit about the Abbot and the Belviews, the former of whom they regard as a curse in disguise. They tell the party that he’s some kind of immortal being whose promises of curing the sick and the cursed have only brought madness and deformity. Basically, telling over showing.

The Special Events in the default adventure are still present, although the one involving the birth of a soulless baby is excised. The Abbot’s resurrection of the burgomaster’s son has a more sinister tone when Dmitri is seemingly magically enchanted after having a private conversation the next room over. He is thus compelled to dig up his son’s corpse, and when the Abbot resurrects him he wakes up screaming about a “black bottle” full of trapped souls. This is the Companion’s unique take on resurrection madness, where those who died are doomed to drift about in a prison of darkness not unlike fish in a bottle. Much like Vallaki, the autonomy of the PCs is discouraged. The Abbot’s visit to the burgomaster occurs while the PCs are staying at his house, but the book doesn’t give any information should the PCs try to eavesdrop, intervene, or figure out what’s up with Dmitir’s fugue state. As for Ireena finding Sergei in the pond, not only is this a mandatory encounter, a lightning strike sent from Strahd hits the pond just as she’s about to accept Sergei’s hand, which kills her. There is no save and no way for the PCs to prevent this from happening.

With Ireena’s corpse, the PCs have two choices: go to the Abbot to get her resurrected, or make peace with her death. In the latter case, Strahd will make the decision for them, going to get the body himself and even fighting the party for it should it come to that. Once secured, he will carry Ireena’s corpse into the Abbey, tearfully begging the Abbot to resurrect her, which he does. This last part feels quite out of character for Strahd, who doesn’t strike me as the type to beg. And it’s also out of character for the Abbot, who believes that Vasilka will be the perfect bride for him.

Should the PCs opt to approach the Abbot, he will be more than happy to resurrect Ireena, but on one condition: she will stay at the Abbey under his watch while the PCs look for a wedding dress. Should the PCs be unable to find one in seven days, the Abbot will threaten to kill Ireena before attempting to do the same to the party. Beyond just raising the dead, the Abbot can also reveal at a certain point his own angelic nature, as well as the nature of Barovia: it is located deep within the Shadowfell, and that Barovia’s current state exists as a prison for Strahd to torment him. Therefore, in order to end Strahd’s curse and save Barovia from the Shadowfell’s depths, the Abbot will present to Strahd the perfect bride, Vasilka.

There’s some good characterization of Ireena during all this. She is temporarily afflicted with the resurrection madness from coming back from the dead, and is horrified at hearing the cosmic reality of Barovia.

The Krezk chapter comes to a conclusion when Strahd visits to take Ireena out of the Abbey. He will attempt to force the PC’s hand by pretending that he can’t enter the holy ground, and has an NPC hostage of someone who is ideally not too important to the campaign but also someone the PCs will care enough about. Strahd will kill the hostage should nobody invite him inside, then reveal he can step onto the church grounds. He will fight the PCs, and during the combat Ireena will willingly offer herself to be taken by him to get him to spare the party’s lives. This is necessary to kick off the Wedding at Ravenloft, and is the primary way for Ireena getting kidnapped for the Companion. The Belviews and two summoned shadows will join Strahd in combat should the PCs prove quite the match for him.

Extreme railroading, telling over showing, de-emphasizing full exploration of the Abbey, and out of character behavior for the primary villains in this chapter; I’m not a fan. It does have some good parts, like some original artwork of stained glass windows hinting at lore elsewhere in the domain: a mural of the Roc of Mount Ghakis being used to transport the Holy Symbol of Ravenkind, a mural of Saint Markovia, and a mural of the Abbot in his true form. Or if an artifact is hidden in a scarecrow then the summoned wights fighting the party are reflavored as former adventurers who fell to Strahd. The Belviews will watch the fight with excitement from within the Abbey, and should the fight go on for too long then the Abbot will show up and turn them all to ash with special “not in a stat block but in a cutscene” powers. In spite of this last part, I do like how it shows that combat in a populated area doesn’t happen in a vacuum.

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Originally little more than a combat encounter on the way to the Amber Temple, this chapter is turned into a more harrowing journey, as the Dark Powers prevent the PCs from having a long rest during the trip due to supernaturally cold and dangerous weather,. We get some infodumps about the monsters encountered, such as a fleeing mountain folk screaming in fear about Sangzor, or Kasimir mentioning that the roc is a legendary figure who delivered the Holy Symbol of Ravenkind to a long-dead paladin. Extra encounters are included, such as the PCs being forced to fight gricks and a grick alpha while taking shelter in a cave, or meeting a group of snow maidens guarding a tower. The snow maidens were once an all-female unit of elite soldiers stationed to hold vigil over Barovia’s mountainous borders, but are now undead in thrall to Strahd. Statwise they are new monsters who are easily dealt with at this level, being CR 1 monsters with an HP draining melee attack and spectral arrows. They are led by Minadora Von Zarovich, a long-dead cousin of Strahd who was stationed in this remote place because the Count saw her as a threat to his rule.

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Berez is turned into a literal ghost town, with its long-dead inhabitants appearing as harmless shadow visages still acting like they’re alive and not living in flooded ruins. Only the shade of Lazlo Ulrich, the former burgomaster, is aware that they’re no longer among the living. There’s even a shadowy clone of Strahd who, like clockwork, repeats the vampire’s same motions all those years ago. When the vampire takes revenge on Berez by summoning a flood, it instead summons a flood of Mist that washes over the area and “kills” the shades. Should this shadow of Strahd be destroyed or dispelled, Berez’s curse will end. But Baba Lysaga will be alerted, and the Dark Powers will curse the PC who dealt the killing blow by giving them the Sunlight Sensitivity trait and removing their shadow which hunts its owner.

Baba Lysaga has some changes: she will take a more active role upon learning that intruders are in the village and search for them. If Ireena is with the party,* Lysaga will do everything in her power to kidnap and deliver her to Strahd in hopes of gaining his respect and favor.

*Which the Companion points out is a very bad idea in taking her to Berez despite giving no forewarning in-game.

Lysaga’s flying skull is also removed, as Trull says that “it's frankly ridiculous and difficult to balance a battle with her riding around in it.” In further describing her, the Companion gets one major thing wrong:

Tactics. Review the Baba Lysaga section of Running the Chapter above; you must decide whether you're roleplaying Baba Lysaga with the intent to kill or scar the party, as it influences her tactics. Don't cast finger of death unless you're prepared to permanently zombify a player character. She follows these tactics in battle:
• If Lysaga is out for blood, she casts fireball at 6th-level on her first turn to soften up the party, and follows up with finger of death next on the most injured enemy.
• If Lysaga is out to scar the party, she casts geas on her first turn, instructing the enemy to "Love and loyally serve Strahd and slaughter his enemies on sight." If the target falls prey to the spell and does not immediately attack their companions, they take 5d10 psychic damage.
• Baba Lysaga prioritizes killing healers and spellcasters first with spells of blight, knowing that a power word stun or polymorph spell will probably disable a warrior.
• If the adventurers are forcing their way into her hut, she casts Evard's black tentacles on her porch.

Geas takes 1 minute to cast. This guide's version of Lysaga still uses the same stat block, she has no means in this module of casting it that fast. This is a big oversight considering that the Geas example is brought up again in the "running the chapter" section by mentioning its peculiarities:

f you choose to scar the party, the best way is with a geas spell with the instructions of "Love and loyally serve Strahd and slaughter his enemies on sight." (Such an instruction is not suicidal for the adventurer's companions might offer mercy so don't let a player try to worm their way out of this; this is Curse of Strahd.)

Because geas has a duration of 30 days–and does not require concentration to maintain–the spell persists whether Lysaga is alive or not. With one failed saving throw, a player character might be forcefully set against the party for the next month, taking them out from the party until the duration is up, or a remove curse, greater restoration, or wish spell is cast upon the target. Creative players might temporarily blind the target instead.

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The core foundations of the tower in Curse of Strahd’s narrative are more or less unchanged in being the secret hideaway of Rudolph Van Richten. The major change it makes is having Khazan’s undead soul still persist here, trapped in an adjacent dimension. The PCs can inadvertently free him via a Wand of Secrets left in the Tower, which is immune to the building’s anti-magic field and can spend charges to clean up the dust and disrepair around the tower in addition to other functions such as changing the local weather, detecting secret traps and doors in the tower, erecting alarm spells, or a one-time creation of diamonds in a silk pouch which can be used for Revivify spells. Each use weakens the prison Khazan is in, expressed as a percentage-based roll that starts at 10% and increases by 10% per use. Should Khazan’s bonds be unleashed, he will break out via an extradimensional door. He has the stats of a boneclaw, which aren’t repeated in this book but to sum up for those who don’t have Mordenkainen’s Tome of Foes, they are failed liches. This CR 12 undead specializes in long-reach grappling claw attacks, and also has a rechargeable Shadow Jump where they can teleport and deal AoE necrotic damage while in dim light or darkness.

Khazan is fearful of being trapped by the Dark Powers again, but should he escape then ancient magics from his failed ascension to lichdom will bind him to Strahd against his will. This will compel him to go to Castle Ravenloft and become a future villain in the campaign. The Dark Powers can “save” dying PCs, but for their failure will ask the party to leave one of their own behind in Khazan’s former prison until the rest return him. If Ezmerelda or Van Richten are with the party, they will volunteer to be left behind.

There’s some smaller changes to the Tower, too, such as the fact that it was used by the mage Vilnius before he and his master ventured to the Amber Temple, and his journal can be found here hinting at that. The DM is encouraged to find annoying elevator music that will play in-game while the PCs make use of the slow elevator pulled by golems (who are made of amber, more foreshadowing) for ascension and descension, and the summonable blue dragon is replaced with waves of undead given that is more suitable to the gothic horror feel.

Thoughts So Far: I’ll admit that these chapters contain various things I like. The foreshadowing of further plot points, the tying of otherwise unconnected creatures such as the roc to the greater history of Barovia, and the deeper characterization of Argynvostholt’s knights are all great ideas.

That being said, my positive impressions are once again pulled down again by the railroad tracks, with the events of Krezk being the worst parts. Not only does Ireena have to die, she has to die in a certain way in which the PCs can’t avoid. And not only does she have to be brought back to life, it must also coincide with a battle against Strahd where it’s all but assumed he gets what he wants. There’s no real suggestion on what to do if a sufficiently clever or powerful party manages to outwit or outmaneuver him. This, combined with the other stuff I mentioned earlier, actually weakens the Krezk chapter rather than strengthens or adds to it, like an overhaul guide is supposed to do.

I am also not feeling the addition of more ghosts to Berez or Khazan’s spirit in the Tower; they are more or less just padded content. In my opinion, Berez’s ruined nature gets across the forlorn feeling without putting in literal shades of the past, and the presence of Van Richten, Ezmerelda, and a possible werewolf attack tracking down the latter fleeing gives more than enough content for the tower. I can see the addition of Khazan being there to make it feel less of a pit stop should events in the campaign make it so that Ezmerelda and/or Van Richten wouldn’t be there. But in my opinion, not every location has to have an involved subplot.

Join us next time as we finish up our tour of Barovia, plus an in-depth revision to Death House!
 

Libertad

Hero
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The Companion notes that the blights individually are very weak to send against 5th level PCs, and their large numbers make traditional combat with them a drag. Additionally, the book notes that with their silver immunity it’s highly unlikely that the wereravens would have been defeated by mere blights and a few druids. In order to rectify this, the book provides some battlefield alterations to the opposition: the druids made use of a plant known as crowpoison which has similar effects as wolfsbane but also removes a wereraven’s shapeshifting and silver immunity abilities. Additionally, the companion reduces the number of twig blights inside the winery but gives the druids within the winery unique names, stat blocks, and thus tactics. There are some suggested actions the druids can take making use of the surrounding environment, such as exploding a fermentation vat with a Thunderwave spell to release a flood of poisoned wine, or readying an action to Produce Flame on the brown mold and locking the door behind the PCs (free use of an object interaction) to try and freeze them to death. There’s a generic horde of blights outside the winery which are less of a straight fight and more of an obstacle to overcome, and PCs with carpenter tool proficiency can spend an action to barricade a door or window against them from entering through that specific space.

In terms of stats the four druids are “partial druids” in that each individual has but a small suite of the class’ abilities: Drekht only makes use of spells and can grant resistance to an elemental damage type to themselves or a nearby ally as a reaction; Esmardeus wields a Gulthias staff which if broken kills all the blights around the Winery, and can spend charges to heal damage whenever he strikes a foe with it; Nala is also spell-only but with no unique features; Revyr has hardly any spells but fights with a maul, has a unique rage-like rampage that activates if she sees Esmardeus die, and can wild shape into beasts of CR 1 or less.

Where are the Martikovs in all this? Instead of hiding in a grove nearby, they’re further away huddled in a shack. Should the PCs find them, they can engage in some interactions and roleplay. Helping heal some of their wounded will aid their trust, and Davian can explain the situation and also the power of the Gulthias staff. The Companion also alters the backstory of the Martikovs in that they’re the descendents of druids, and their family had a falling out with that group when most druids converted to Strahd worship.

I do agree that it feels odd that the blights overpowered creatures immune to their major damage types, but I feel that adding crowpoison is a bit superfluous when wolfsbane can still act as a general-purpose anti-lycanthropy herb in terms of lore. Giving the druids silver weapons along with wolfsbane would’ve been an adequate enough explanation in my opinion.

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Curse of Strahd’s other infamous TPK machine gets a major rewrite in the Companion. Trull is of the opinion that the base dungeon is too full of monsters which takes away from the true horror: the brooding sense of dread and the “deal with the devil” in the form of the vestiges. Thus, this version of the Amber Temple cuts down on a lot of the monsters within, such as the flameskulls and arcanoloth. Instead, he makes the Amber Temple a sentient entity who wishes to turn the PCs evil. It does this by imposing automatically failed death saving throws the further they go into the temple, sending them visions and offerings to remove these debilities…should a character willingly become evil in alignment. The failed death saves come in the form of violent seizures and spasms, sometimes accompanied by horrific visions.

Embracing evil also reduces the difficulties of other dangers in the temple, such as becoming immune to the extreme cold environment effect that persists throughout the dungeon. The auto-fail death saves can come either from the passage of time, or triggered at certain points within the temple, and the Companion suggests doing one rather than both. The amount of active Vestiges and Dark Gifts are also cut down, with Trull removing ones that feel redundant with other Gifts or that don’t feel “gothic enough.” A few Gifts are revised, such as Covenant of the Grave Wyrm forcing the gift-taker to roll Charisma saves in order to avoid feasting on corpses and grave dirt.

Several new events are provided for various NPCs: one such event has the PCs encounter surviving Barovian witches from Castle Ravenloft attempting to open one of the vaults, and they may not initially be hostile. Vilnius is searching for a specific vault: Seriach the Hell Hound Whisperer. Should he attain its Dark Gift, he will summon two hell hounds and turn on the party. Should Kasimir be traveling with the PCs, he will attempt to gain the powers of resurrection from Zhudun the Corpse Star. Vesimir is dead-set on this in order to revive his sister, and no amount of persuasion by the PCs can veer him away from this. In fact, he will become violent if the party persists in obstructing him. Kasimir will become evil alignment in doing so, but unlike Vilnius he’ll still regard the PCs as allies unless they give him reason to think otherwise.

The Amber Temple will have sealed its physical exits after the party’s arrival, and will attempt to kill the PCs by giving premonitions of even more seizures when the party wraps up any loose ends. Evil PCs will not get seizures, but still have a dreadful feeling that the Amber Temple is keeping them trapped as their newest playthings. They have to escape via the teleportation circle, ideally accomplished with a spellcaster who can help them out. Thankfully Exethanter still exists in the Companion, so he can be used for this. Making it out of the Amber Temple in time is resolved as a skill challenge, where they must gain 5 successes before 3 failures. Should the party fail, all non-evil aligned PCs will die, which can end up being a total party kill.

I do agree that the Amber Temple is pretty crowded as a dungeon, and I can understand Trull’s reluctance to have PCs killed off so close to the campaign’s end as a result.* I also like the idea of reducing the amount of Dark Gifts, which can otherwise make the Vaults feel like too much of a “shopping trip” and remove a bit of the mystery and horror.

*which would make coming up with a replacement PC feel all the more out of the blue.

But I’m a bit iffy on the alternative temptations the Companion provides. The Vestiges serve this role well enough by default, and the “become evil to avoid failed death saves” is much more of a hammer than a scalpel. There’s also the fact that the forced alignment change may not be that big of a penalty depending on how a PC roleplays their character. It can either be a relative non-issue, or for DMs who treat alignment as a straitjacket an excuse to mandate how players play their character as a result. The offering of Dark Gifts feels more appropriate in that it comes with a carrot, not a stick, and thus is accepted by a character of their own free will.

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A relatively short chapter, the Companion still makes some big changes: first off, the scene where Strahd Von Zarovich personally appears is excised. Instead, a new NPC is given known as the Prophet. The Prophet is a dhampir who believes himself to be Strahd’s illegitimate son, is the leader of the druids, and heading the ritual to awaken Wintersplinter. Several of the berserkers and druids have been reduced in number, with some vine blights to replace them.

Additionally, several of the Martikovs have been taken hostage and their blood is being used to water the Gulthias tree. The events at Yester Hill are time-sensitive: the PCs only have enough time to either disrupt the ritual to awaken Wintersplinter, or free the Martikovs before they bleed to death. They may have enough time for both if they split the party. Wereravens rescued (plus Davian) can fight alongside the party as allies and also help rescue their brethren. The PCs can learn about the Martikov’s capture the next time they return to the Wizard of Wines, where they find an injured Davian restrained by Gulthias roots who can tell them what has happened.

The Prophet is statted up as a druid who can use the Quickened Spell metamagic ability once per day. He can Shadow Crash as a bonus action where he teleports and deals necrotic damage and the frightened condition to those within 10 feet of his teleport destination. His spells are mostly elemental and “battlefield control” themed, such as Call Lightning, Gust of Wind, Thorn Whip, and Mass Cure Wounds/Mass Healing Word. The Gulthias Tree isn’t a creature, but it is alive and has its own lair actions such as shooting out twig blights from its body, raking damaging branches against nearby targets, or restraining targets with its roots.

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The Companion’s take on the werewolves is much more of a straight dungeon crawl. Dispensing with the internecine politics, they are first and foremost straightforward monsters to slay. Even so, Zuleika Toranescu will still seek to be an ally and offer to help defeat the current werewolf leader. The big twist to this chapter is that most of the children kidnapped are Vistani from the camp outside Vallaki. Arabelle is one of those kidnapped, and possibly other children rescued during the course of the campaign. Arabelle’s father, Luvash, has taken several Vistani adults in an attempt to rescue them. They have no silver weapons, meaning that their mission is a fool’s errand unless the PCs help them out.

Another big addition is that Mother Night herself doesn’t endorse the werewolf’s kidnapping of children, and will give a vision to one PC explaining the situation as well as a promise of the goddess’ favor should they kill the werewolves.

Content Warning: Child Death

Kellen, one of the children, is infected with lycanthropy, and is praying at the Shrine to be cured. Luvash and the Vistani will seek to kill him, something which Zuleika will violently object to. Unless the PCs intervene, both sides will fight to kill each other.

During the tournament, the longer the PCs take the likelier it is that one or more of the kidnapped children will have been forced to kill each other.

Should the PCs be successful in the rescue attempt, the party can loot all they desire from the Shrine to Mother Night without risking curses. Any PCs infected with lycanthropy are cured, as are infected children should one of the PCs request this on their behalf. Luvash will also reveal that his brother Arrigal is working for Strahd should the party not already know this, and offer to take any messages to the PC’s loved ones in their own homeland.

For one, I like the idea of the PCs gaining aid in fighting the werewolves. Much like the wereraven allies at Yester Hill, this shows that the PCs aren’t the only ones trying to do something about Barovia’s threats. Even if said NPCs are a little in over their heads. On that topic, while the non-Luvash Vistani exist more or less to be cut down, due to the action economy this can be a lot of people for the DM to track during combat. We have the generic Vistani, Luvash and Zuleika as unique NPCs, the possible addition of Ireena and a Destined Ally, and the enemy werewolves. And that’s saying nothing of the noncombatant children!

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The Companion’s take on Death House still serves as a “prologue dungeon” like in the default adventure. But like the other chapters it has quite a bit of changes. For one, it more or less incorporates Trull’s two free products on Death House: the addition of descriptive boxed text to just about every room, and replacing the omnipresent death traps in escaping the dungeon with a skill challenge. Some other changes include placing the manor on a hill east of the Village of Barovia rather than inside it, the library is given some actual books with titles and summaries which can foreshadow future campaign elements, and PCs who lay the bones of the Durst children to rest gain temporary hit points for their troubles. Several of the monsters have been removed or altered: the grick has hardly anything to feed on, the ghouls in the basement are spread out and don’t attack all at once, the broom of animated attack is instead changed into a one-attack trap, the shambling mound is replaced by a gibbering mouther, and the nursemaid’s specter is too deadly for 1st level characters and will only deliver one attack before fading away.

Two of the more significant changes include the sacrifice in the final room having to be a sentient creature (animals don’t qualify), and the skill challenge for the house isn’t an instant TPK should three failures be accrued before five successes. Instead, one PC is left behind and fails to make it out. If five failures are accrued, two fail to escape.

One more major change the Companion does is providing a unique prologue: the PCs begin as part of a larger caravan in their home setting. A group of Vistani have joined them, and they relate the tale of Barovia but don’t mention Strahd’s name. During the trip, foul weather occurs over the course of several days, and during one night six werewolves attack. The PCs are free to flee or fight, but the DM is encouraged not to infect any PCs with lycanthropy this early in the campaign. As it’s unlikely that 1st level PCs can overcome the werewolves, they’re encouraged to flee, where they end up surrounded by Mists and brought into Barovia. While fleeing the PCs can meet up with other survivors who will gradually be picked off. There’s even one tense scene where the party is faced with the choice of holding open the Gates of Barovia for others but at risk of having a werewolf pass through. Or they can close and lock it, ensuring the safety of those who made it past but dooming the stragglers. This is resolved via skill checks, and even on a success only one NPC will survive: one of the children of the Vistani leader who joined the caravan.

Content Warning: Child Death

The Companion suggests that said child become lost in the Mist or be the first target of a monster attack should the DM not want the hassle of managing a persistent NPC, or be a possible sacrificial victim on the altar at the end of the dungeon.

Overall, I like this revision of Death House. It still maintains the creepy feel and sense of risk yet cuts down on the lethality and randomness by replacing monsters with more general traps. The added boxed text is a blessing, and the skill challenge still maintains a sense of risk without bogging down the party in die rolls for virtually every room like the default adventure does. I actually used the Skill Challenge in my own campaign, and it worked out very well.

Thoughts So Far: In comparison to the disappointment of earlier chapters covering the land of Barovia, I like these ones quite a bit more. They’re not needlessly railroaded, make use of allied NPCs that aren’t powerful enough to overshadow the party, give some faces and unique abilities and tactics to the otherwise rank-and-file druids, and the changes to Death House are well thought out. The only chapter I really didn’t like was the Amber Temple for reasons I explained above.

Join us next time as we finish this review with a bang in the Wedding at Ravenloft!
 

Libertad

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Chapter 17: The Wedding at Ravenloft. This is it,the moment we’ve all been waiting for. The finale to the Curse of Strahd Companion, when the PCs venture to Castle Ravenloft, save Ireena, and defeat Strahd! This chapter is meant to be used in conjunction with Chapter 4 in that one details the changes made to the Castle. The Wedding adventure is split into four Acts and an Aftermath. Act I involves the PCs’ arrival at the Castle, Act II covers the wedding ceremony, Act III takes place in the post-ceremony reception and where things get violent as Strahd takes Ireena away to turn her into a vampire spawn, and Act IV is an open-ended series of optional side quests wrapping up loose ends before the PCs find and fight Strahd at the final location as foretold in the Tarokka reading.

The Chapter notes that every group’s Curse of Strahd has gone differently, so in addition to covering likely scenarios such as the deaths of important NPCs, the Companion provides a checklist for the DM to answer: things like whether or not the PCs thwarted the Saint Andral’s Feast massacre, if the Destined Ally was invited to the wedding/currently with the PCs, whether Vallaki is ruled over by Baron Vallakovich or Lady Wachter, whether or not Kasimir Velikov obtained Zhudun the Corpse Star’s Dark Gift, and so on. Father Lucian Petrovich of Vallaki will be the religious officiator at the wedding, either living or undead should he have died during Saint Andral’s Feast. In the event that his dead body can’t be made undead, Strahd will have Donavich serve in his role.

And since you’re likely asking…what about all those rail-roaded scenarios in the prior chapters? Well, the only part that mattered was Ireena being alive and getting captured by Strahd!

The DM is encouraged to give the players time to make preparations and plans before the Wedding. Such advice includes the DM asking them for “battle plans” in how they intend to rescue Ireena, if they plan to write any toasts or bring gifts for the occasion, and the like.

Strahd spared no expense in spreading news of the wedding far and wide, and around 50 people will come to attend it. Strahd has no problem with gathering so many potential foes under one roof: he is drunk on victory and hyper-arrogant, assured that nobody could stand against him now. But that doesn’t mean he won’t have contingencies or plans to do away with the PCs and his other foes, who he expects will have some tricks up their sleeves.

We have a long guest list of NPCs along with relevant factions to which they’re part. About two-thirds of the potential Destined Allies receive invitations too, with the ones not invited being those who are too much of a loose cannon threat (like Van Richten or the Mad Mage), are already presumed to be his loyal minion unless proven otherwise (such Pidlwick II or Sir Godfrey Gwilym), or in Vasilka’s case would come as an uninvited guest when the Abbot crashes the wedding..or if with the PCs, I guess she would be regarded as too ugly or monstrous. The werewolf Zuleika is not mentioned at all, either as a guest or in being denied an invitation. Emil is present at the wedding should he have not been freed, being made to watch over Ismark in exchange for his freedom. The Companion says that ultimately he’ll escape and reunite with his wife Zuleika, which implies she was denied an invitation.

There are no new NPCs here, meaning that virtually all those at the wedding are from elsewhere in the module. Still, the chapter spares no expense in saying what they’ll be up at the castle, if they have any plans or schemes of their own, and how their role would differ if such an NPC is a Destined Ally. Some of them are quite clever: for example, Lady Wachter and several of her cultists plan on robbing Strahd’s study of magical tomes when the inevitable bloodbath occurs, hoping that should Strahd die she can become the prominent supernatural political authority in Barovia. Ismark is at the end of his rope in having to abide by noblesse oblige, and unless the party convinces them that they have a foolproof plan he will try and save Ireena by challenging Strahd to a duel, a duel that will either end with his death or imprisonment unless the PCs intervene.

During Act I, the PCs will arrive at Castle Ravenloft. Rahadin will be waiting for them at the front gates, where he will ask them to turn over any weapons, including spellbooks, magical items, and casting foci. They will be kept in storage before entering, but PCs can hide such items on their person via Sleight of Hand or other justifiable means of smuggling. The book calls out the Sunsword as being hideable while its light blade is “turned off,” which is a good reminder. Once inside, the PCs have the opportunity to mingle with the other guests, and during this time Strahd will attempt to charm their Destined Ally in secret to betray and attack the party should a battle occur. PCs can sense that something is wrong with their ally via an Insight check, showing that they’re in a daze.

While we’re on the subject of Strahd’s Charm ability, I should note that the Companion has a much more powerful interpretation of the ability than normal for its text. Strahd will have charmed Ireena during the ceremony, who during that time acts more or less like a semi-conscious drugged woman who has a persistent glazed expression and doesn’t react to her surroundings without coaching. Even should Strahd kill Ismark, she’ll have no reaction to it in her state.

Strahd’s stat block, like most other NPCs and monsters, is repeated in this sourcebook. And looking at his Charm ability, it’s more or less the same as in the default adventure. Like the other “pull it out of my ass” alterations of super-enhanced abilities for the NPCs in this book, there’s no mention of how Strahd’s charm is that much more powerful.

In a gesture of goodwill, Strahd is even willing to let Ireena ask for a PC to be a bridesmaid or groomsman. It should be a PC who is closest to her or one who she’ll feel most safe having next to her during the wedding,* but as Rahadin will be watching over her along with a rug of smothering and guardian portrait, attempting to escape with her can risk rolling for initiative. Ireena isn’t charmed yet, but Strahd will come to meet her to do so once the PC is escorted back downstairs by Rahadin. Otherwise, PCs have the chance to sneak off and explore the Castle.

*A 7th level Oath of Devotion Paladin’s aura makes those inside immune to charm effects, hint hint.

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During Act II, the ceremony takes place in the chapel, complete with a handout for where the PCs and all the major NPCs will be positioned. Dead or missing characters can be replaced with more generic Barovians/monstrous minions/etc as befits their role. As the chapel is desecrated, the posies scattered by Arabelle (who is taking the role of flower girl) wilt as soon as they touch the ground. In addition, six wights stand guard to seize Ireena should she try to flee.

Two people will object when the officiator gives the opportunity for people to speak out. The first is the Abbot, who arrives with Vasilka unannounced, saying that she’s a better bride than Ireena’s. Strahd will shoot him down, saying that he doesn’t desire perfection, he “desires Tatyana,” and will point out that the Abbot’s duty is to follow Strahd’s heart and not his own. The other objection will come from Ismark, who will draw his sword and charge at Strahd before being tackled by the wights and imprisoned in the crypts below unless the PCs intervene or talk him out of this plan first.

If the PCs don’t do anything, then Ireena will recite her vows, and the PC closest to her can sense via Insight that her consciousness underneath is internally screaming at what she’s being made to do. Strahd will return the vows, kiss Ireena, and take her from the chapel.

But if the PCs attempt to cause a commotion or rescue Ireena, an all-out battle will occur. Strahd will order Rahadin and Shasha Ivliskova (one of his oldest brides, unstaked for this moment) to take Ireena away while he and the rest of his minions fight their enemies. Due to the huge amount of characters present, the DM is encouraged to focus on just a few enemy NPCs, with vague descriptions given of the surrounding battle.

Act III only occurs if the PCs didn’t start a fight at the end of the ceremony, where the guests gather into the audience hall to mingle and eat. PCs have the chance to sneak out during the mass exodus to go elsewhere in the Castle should they so desire, toasts will be made to the bride and groom, and gifts will be given. Should the PCs have not obtained one of the three Tarokka treasures, it is possible that an NPC found it and presents it as a gift. If Ismark was imprisoned, he will be brought out, with Strahd debating on how he should be punished. He is initially fond of Trial by Combat to the Death, but PCs can talk him and his vassals down to a duel to first blood, a ten-year imprisonment, or amnesty which is the hardest roll and requires a majority vote among the nobility. If Ismark was prevented from objecting, he will challenge Strahd to a duel instead. In either case of a duel, the vampire will regard it as beneath him to sully his hands and appoint one of his NPC minions to act as his champion. A PC can thus act as Ismark’s champion, filling in for him.

Strahd will then call an end to the wedding, thanking all his guests for their hospitality. This is when he will enact a Red Wedding: he has no desire to let his enemies walk out free and alive tonight, and perceptive PCs can make checks to notice that something bad is going to happen. Little cues include things such as Arrigal* maneuvering closer with a poisoned dagger up his sleeve, Lief Lipsiege retreating to his office with a look of visible distress, or hearing the wight guards sliding wooden planks over handles on the other side of a door. Like a fight at the wedding, there are too many NPCs to keep track of, so the PCs will fight a small group of Strahd’s minions such as Rahadin, Escher, Arrigal, Fiona Wachter, or some other notable named characters.

*If Arrigal is a Destined Ally, he will not attack the PCs at this moment. Instead, he and some Vistani allies will fight on the PCs’ sides whenever violence breaks out.

Content Warning: Fakeout implied sexual assault

Strahd will give the impression that he’s taking Ireena to his bedroom to “consummate” the marriage, when in reality he’s taking her down to the crypts to drain her blood and turn her into a vampire spawn. This is bait to lure the PCs to the wrong place should they try a rescue attempt, wasting valuable time.

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Act IV is an open-ended section as all hell breaks loose in Castle Ravenloft. The survivors of the massacre retreat elsewhere in the Castle, and there are seven possible side quests involving various NPC enemies and allies to tie up loose ends as the PCs run around the Castle. The Companion recommends running at least 2 of them, and during the side quests the PCs can level up from 9th to 10th. There’s also a sidebar suggesting that PCs who made allies of the Keepers of the Feather can ask them to deal with one of the side quests. As can be expected, said side quests are contingent on the presence/survival of various NPCs from elsewhere in the campaign. For example, Blood of the Innocent involves helping noncombatant NPCs escape Castle Ravenloft by dealing with the green slime and gargoyles/wyrmlings guarding the front gates, as well as securing horses and carriages to speedily and safely make it across the moldering drawbridge. Brother to Evil involves rescuing Ismark from the dungeons should he be imprisoned, where he is watched over by three wights and Emil Toranescu while a gray ooze makes its way into his cell to eat him alive in a race against time.

One side quest, the Devil’s Bride, involves rescuing Ireena before she can be turned into a vampire spawn. Should the PCs head for Strahd’s bedroom, they will find four vampire spawn guarding a woman who seems to be Ireena but in reality is Gertruda serving as a decoy. If the PCs fall for this ruse, then Ireena will be found dead in Strahd’s coffin, watched over by his three brides. She is not yet a vampire spawn, but will be by next dusk unless her body is burned.

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Endings details potential Epilogues for the campaign’s conclusion for both victory and loss. PCs who fail to rescue Ireena awaken in the dungeons of the castle, stripped of gear, chained to the wall, with 3 levels of exhaustion and 1 hit point left as they’re guarded by 10 wights. The next evening, Strahd will take Ireena as a vampire spawn, setting her to feed on the PCs. This is pretty much a Bad End all around, as Strahd’s other enemies will meet similarly final fates and Barovia will become a worse place in general.

Should Strahd have been defeated, a lot of things can happen. The Vistani will seek to take over the Castle and repurpose it, and should Arrigal survive he will attempt to rule Barovia but die from infighting among the Vistani. If Kasimir resurrected his sister, she has no desire to help repopulate the dusk elves, causing the survivors to find a way to leave Barovia and join their kin in other lands. If Kiril Stoyanovich is dead and Emil Toranescu survives, the werewolf pack will be replaced by a less outright evil leader and their raids on the PC’s home plane will come to an end. If Ireena is dead and didn’t become a vampire spawn upon Strahd’s defeat, she will be freed from the cycle of reincarnation and ascend to a higher plane of existence. Her spirit appears above her burning body alongside Sergei’s, with the two thanking the party as the dawn brings true sunlight to Barovia.

The contents after this are four Appendices. There’s not really much to cover that we haven’t in prior chapters, and much of it is filled with material in either the core rules or Curse of Strahd so as to be all in one handy sourcebook.

Thoughts So Far: The Wedding at Ravenloft is a great finale to a Curse of Strahd campaign. It is open-ended, gives the PCs many opportunities to break convention, takes into account the presence and absence of various NPCs based upon variations in how individual CoS campaigns have been played out, and the side quests occurring around the Castle are nice touches that can help wrap up loose ends in defeating hated foes or gaining the aid of trusted allies. For those DMs who want to end Curse of Strahd with a suitably epic “assault on the palace,” it feels a lot more climactic than the PCs simply sneaking into Castle Ravenloft and wandering aimlessly to hunt down Strahd.

Overall Thoughts: The Curse of Strahd Companion clearly has a lot of effort put into it. Wyatt Trull worked on this for two years and took pains to fill the book with enough material from Curse of Strahd and the core rules so that a DM can find pretty much whatever they need in its pages. Alphabetical listings of virtually every named NPC in an appendix, matching up the chapters with the ones in the default adventure number-wise, the addition of new material such as the climactic wedding adventure, the Magnificent Mansion dungeon delve to heal Mordenkainen’s madness, or the much-needed revisions to Death House, speak to a writer who genuinely wants to help Dungeon Masters have an easier time in running Curse of Strahd.

Which is why it pains me that I cannot recommend this adventure. For while the Curse of Strahd Companion has many good points, it brushes hard against what I feel makes the campaign such a classic in its open-ended freedom. In the Wedding at Ravenloft, Trull mentions that that chapter was the ending to a months-long campaign he ran. I’m certain that he and his players had a grand time with it. But his Curse of Strahd is but one tale, a tale that worked for his gaming group. It is not a tale that can be guaranteed to be fun for others, for each and every campaign is personalized not just by the DM, but by the players. The players shape the plot just as much, with their unexpected harebrained schemes, their sudden love of an otherwise minor NPC who gains an ascended fandom, or their roleplay-intensive subplots fashioned from backstories that no published adventure could hope to predict.

When I read the Curse of Strahd Companion, I feel at times that I’m reading Wyat Trull’s own campaign log. Be it the extreme linearity at certain points, the hefty boxed text in places, or the Strahd/Ireena cutscene dialogue exchange at Saint Andral’s Feast, speak more to capturing a very specific kind of story. A story unsuitable for a sandbox adventure module that provides the worlds and the pieces for the DM, and lets the PCs tell the story as they play.

Not only that, there already exist free resources online that more or less do what the CoS Companion is setting out to do. DragnaCarta’s Curse of Strahd Reloaded, MandyMod’s Fleshing Out Curse of Strahd, PyramKing’s Legends of Barovia, and Lunch Break Heroes’ Raising the Stakes and accompanying YouTube videos are all DM guides for this campaign. Much like the Companion, they have their own advice sections, personal additions, role-play advice, and even new subplots and side quests. Not only that, all the ones I listed can be found in a pinned post on the Curse of Strahd subreddit. If I’m going to be paying $20 for such a guide, I expect it to exceed these others by leaps and bounds and to give me something that these others do not. She is the Ancient, in spite of its flaws, actually provided something these other overhaul guides didn’t: a trove of gender flipped NPCs and accompanying artwork and tokens. I can’t say the same for the Companion, and much of its best highlights such as the Wedding or the Death House revisions can be obtained for free or at a far lower price by Trull elsewhere on the Dungeon Master’s Guild.

There’s only four days left in October, and I’m uncertain on what to review next. I will be taking a break from Ravenloft for the time being. But during this month, we managed to review 13 third party products for this wonderful, wonderful setting. 15 if we include the whole of 2023 up until now. I hope that my reviews have been entertaining to read, and given some of you ideas on what to buy next for those who want to take a stroll in the Lands of Mist.
 

Libertad

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Product Link

Product Type: DMing Tools
CoS-Required? Yes

While I usually don’t review free products, I felt that this one’s interesting enough to merit its own discussion. When it comes to the various recruitable Destined Allies in Curse of Strahd, Mordenkainen clearly stands out. Not only is he the most powerful of the lot, he is a famous icon in the game (more so than Rudolph Van Richten), and he doesn’t accompany the party on the adventure save for the final battle against Strahd. The maker of this product didn’t like this last part, still wanting to keep the legendary archmage as a traveling companion but also redoing his stat block to be less overpowered but also reflecting his unique talent. Mordenkainen’s stat block is also promised to be “simplified” so that a player can run them in combat alongside their own PC.

Mordenkainen here is effectively a 13th-level Wizard statwise, his depowerment explained as undergoing significant mental damage in his fight against Strahd. Even though the PCs may have restored his mind, his practice of Old Vancian Magic means that many spells ordinarily attained by him have been “forgotten” as a result of his prior insanity.

Mordenkainen is a CR 13 NPC, and his base stats pretty much scream “wizard.” His Armor Class is an appreciable 16 with Mage Armor, and he does have quite a bit of hit points at 87. The only skills in which he is proficient are Arcana and History, which with double proficiency are +14 each. As is to be expected, Mordenkainen has an unmatched knowledge of all supernatural things, and should know an awful lot about Barovia’s past. His high Intelligence, Dexterity, and Charisma make him decent at stealth, other knowledge skills, and social skills, but will be easily eclipsed by PCs who specialize in such fields. He has resistance to all damage from spells, which while a bit situational is pretty strong when fighting some of the more infamous magical adversaries in the module. Such as the Old Bonegrinder hags, Baba Lysaga, and Neferon the arcanaloth.

Mordenkainen’s spellcasting differs from traditional 5e prepared casters. Being explicitly modeled off of pre-4e Editions, he doesn’t use spell slots but has to prepare each and every spell individually. Unless he prepares a spell more than once, he can only cast it once before requiring a full day to get his spells back. Once per short rest he can swap any memorized spell with another spell of the same level from his spellbook, and said spellbook has every wizard spell in it. However, the text is a bit confusing on Mordy’s refresh rate, as while the spells mention they recharge once per day, it also mentions that he can replace any number of spells after finishing a long rest. While a lot of writers often use long rest and per-day interchangeably, in 5e these are two distinct things. A per-day refresh happens automatically with the passage of time, while long rests can be interrupted or foregone. If hewing to the former, this means that Mordenkainen’s spells are regained even should he somehow be unable to rest or sleep.

Mordenkainen more or less has access to every non-cantrip wizard spell of up to 6th level, but the stat block gives him a default array for when he’s in an “adventuring mood.” Mordy’s base allotment hews strongly towards battlefield control, with spells such as Darkness, Web, Ice Storm, Wall of Force, and Globe of Invulnerability, with a few utility ones such as Protection From Evil and Good, Dispel Magic, and Arcane Eye. He doesn’t have a lot of damage-dealing spells: Magic Missile, Fireball, Fire Shield, and Ice Storm. As for unique equipment, his spellbook can be summoned and dismissed into a pocket dimension as an action, and he carries a Silver Key of Portals that can spend up to 4 charges per day which can cast the Knock spell with no audible loud sound. I still presume it requires a Verbal component, so it’s not entirely silent.

Regarding the Silver Key, most locked containers and doors in Curse of Strahd take a DC 15 Thieves’ Tools check to open unless otherwise specified. There are cases where manacles or physical obstructions also prevent doors from opening, particularly in Castle Ravenloft. The item’s use is a bit situational but very useful in the Castle, particularly to overcome Strahd’s Lair Action in locking such a place. If the Silver Key is given to a familiar or other helper-type ally in such cases, one can avoid giving up an action on the part of Mordenkainen or a PC in case of combat or other scenarios where time is tracked round by round.

When it comes to Mordenkainen’s signature spells, he doesn’t cast them the Vancian way. Instead they are unique Actions of his he can use at will, have new features not present in the base spell, and don’t require concentration to maintain but he can’t have two such versions active at the same time. His Phantom Hound can detect creatures within 60 feet instead of 30, and as an action he can have the hound and an ally within 30 feet of the dog swap places, provided an enemy is within 5 feet of an ally at the time. His Planar Sword (Mordenkainen’s Sword but renamed) can be commanded to protect an adjacent ally, granting them +5 to AC and Dexterity saves until the beginning of Mordenkainen’s next turn. Finally, his Magnificent Mansion has a permanent duration but still requires 1 minute of casting time.

Being able to use Planar Sword at-will is likely the reason for his lack of damaging spells, as by default it’s his main method of offense. His Phantom Hound can serve a similar purpose albeit is a bit short-range.

Overall Thoughts: Comparatively speaking, this version of Mordenkainen is less powerful than the default Archmage stat block in spite of having a 1 higher Challenge Rating. Not having at-will invisibility or the higher-end spells such as Teleport and Time Stop really sting. Also this version of Mordy isn’t proficient in Wisdom saves like the Archmage, which is a very common saving throw. But even with all that being said, some things had to be cut if he’s to be a traveling companion like the other Allies.

So how does this homebrew Mordenkainen stack up as an Allied NPC? Will he not eclipse higher-level PCs like the product advertises? Well for one, he is still extremely powerful; even with his more limited Old Vancian Magic, the fact that he can swap out prepared spells makes him different from NPC casters who are more or less stuck with their spell allotments. In comparison to the mage Allies such as Victor Vallakovich or Kasimir Velikov, Mordenkainen can cast up to 18 times per day for non-cantrip spells, while they have only 14 total slots. Victor and Kasimir have more wiggle room in being able to upcast with higher level slots and aren’t locked into casting such spells once or twice in most cases. But Mordenkainen having effectively all wizard spells can open him up to getting some unique magic for themselves and the party wizard. Major Image, Leomund’s Tiny Hut, Summon X series of spells, Polymorph, Passwall, I can go on. Of course, he still needs material components, and given how treasure-poor Curse of Strahd is, Mordenkainen will still be locked out of the more costly spells such as Clairvoyance or ones with rare components such as Evard’s Black Tentacles. His lack of cantrips may initially seem punishing, but his Faithful Hound and Planar Sword make for decent “at will” magical offensive options. An at-will Magnificent Mansion is really good in giving the party a mobile safe base and might be able to elude Strahd and his minions for a time.

For other Allies he pretty much blows most of them out of the water. The only ones that can conceivably compare are the higher-end ones. Van Richten has access to support and Cleric spells while also having a variety of skills, Sir Godfrey Gwilym is a very powerful paladin who is literally immortal and is a living Strahd Detector, and Vasilka can solo most enemies who don’t have access to magical and non-physical damage sources. As for Ezmerelda, she is kind of a hybrid in being more broadly reliable with a variety of skills, magical weapons, a curse and evil eye abilities, and some utility magic. So while Mordenkainen has access to better spells than her, Ez can afford to be more liberal in spending her resources.

Personally speaking, while this makes for a more “reasonable” Mordenkainen to take on adventures, I still feel that he can outclass PCs. Not as a group, for I can’t see him soloing some of the more powerful enemies in this module, but outclass more on an individual level. A PC wizard is likely going to feel second fiddle in comparison, and even if limited by slots Mordy can still pull out high-level spells such as Globe of Invulnerability to save their bacon. Some spells such as Legend Lore may end up altering certain plot points in significant ways. As for other classes and archetypes, bards/rogues/skill users are still going to be useful, for even if Mordenkainen can ace social or stealth challenges with an appropriate spell it will still cost him valuable slots. For straight damage, a decent martial build will show him up unless he goes all-in on damaging spells like Chain Lightning and Disintegrate. PCs capable of restoring his sanity have access to 5th level spells, so by the time they get him they will have cleared the gap a lot more (Mord can cast 5th and 6th level spells, but once per day each) to the point that he won’t feel like the star of the show 100% of the time.

As for whether his stat block is simple enough for a player to run in combat alongside their own PC, I’d have to say no barring those players who can multitask well. It still is a full page worth of text, and as he still heavily relies upon spells the player will need to look up and consult their descriptions when appropriate. It’s a lot more complicated than using a Sidekick, that’s for sure! In a typical party, the PCs are likely going to have Mordenkainen make use of his Hound, Sword, or low-level spells, saving his higher-level slots for the appropriate time. And with his spell replacement for a short rest, they can use it in case they come upon a challenge they hadn’t considered.

Personally speaking this product isn’t for me, as Mordenkainen’s placement in Curse of Strahd doesn’t feel right. But for its proposed mission statement, I think it does its job in most cases, albeit I’d still Proceed With Caution in his use as a Destined Ally.
 

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