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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Libertad" data-source="post: 9147274" data-attributes="member: 6750502"><img src="https://i.imgur.com/Nmxy8ts.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " data-size="" style="" /><a href="https://www.dmsguild.com/product/290369/Weekend-at-Strahds" target="_blank">Product Link</a>Product Type: AdventureCoS-Required? NoWhen it comes to the DM’s Guild, Oliver Clegg is one of the more prolific creators of Ravenloft material. However, he often veers between more serious works or outright parodies suitable for one-shots. Regardless, his books are nothing if not visually eye-catching.Weekend at Strahd’s is a one-shot adventure designed for PCs of levels 5 to 10. One of the PCs takes on the role of Strahd who uses either the base vampire stat block or Strahd’s unique one based on what books to which the DM has access. The adventure also makes use of meta-material, from a sample soundtrack which is played for different scenes plus a punch bowl containing a mixture of beverages* someone can drink from in order to gain a benefit on a roll for their character. Additionally, each major scene has Pillars of Adventure, where modifications to the encounter trigger based on whether the DM wants to provide a challenge based on Combat, Exploration, or Social stuff.*This mechanic is called New Koke, and the group is encouraged to do a mixture of drinks that would result in something downright disgusting.The adventure starts out in Castle Ravenloft, where the PCs have vanquished the Darklord after an epic quest. Pidlwick II comes in on a small bicycle upon which is perched a miniature piano he’s playing, telling the party that they have two hours to dispose of Strahd’s corpse or else an apocalyptic event known as “the Final Credits” will occur. To make things easier, Pidlwick will offer to sing <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L2cstHtZ4gQ" target="_blank">Axel F</a> to reanimate Strahd’s corpse to make their job easier if each PC gives him their right pinky fingers. When so animated, Strahd cannot speak and can only move around by dancing. In order to get rid of Strahd’s body, the PCs must find five pieces of an artifact known as the Pentaforce scattered throughout Castle Ravenloft. There are 10 possible locations generated by dice rolls. Each such location has its own encounter-specific music, Pillars that impose an additional effect or complication, and a challenge to overcome in order to get the Pentaforce Piece.Each such location is a reference to a piece of pop culture. For example, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CdqoNKCCt7A" target="_blank">the Study holds a group of NPCs from the Village of Barovia plus Stella Wachter</a> whose gathering is known as the Brunch Club. They’re waiting for the vampire’s arrival to let them leave, as they’re being punishment for violating various Barovian laws. The Pentaforce is located in a trapped book in a nearby bookshelf. If a piece is in the Chapel, the PCs will encounter <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dx7vNdAb5e4" target="_blank">Father Donavich dressed as Saint Elmo</a> and is burning down the place with an alchemical substance. The PCs must fight Donavich (who has angel wings and a fly speed) as well as having to deal with environmental threats from the blazing inferno, and the Pentaforce piece is on the altar.One of the weirder scenarios is in the Cauldron room, where green hags have captured game designer Jeremy Crawford and are seeking to boil him for brunch. Crawford has a Pentaforce in one of his pockets and will offer to give it to the PCs if they can rescue him. They can fight the hags as usual, but one other way they can conduct a rescue <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6GCNUeTFSbA" target="_blank"> is to do a Dance Off skill challenge (Strahd is expected to participate),</a> and there are meta options where a player who dances in real life will get advantage on rolls. Whoever rolls lowest can slip into the cauldron on a failed Dexterity save, dying instantly.* <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2nXGPZaTKik" target="_blank">Another such encounter turns the Heart of Sorrow into a rave,</a> where its lights are pulsing strobes that can cast the Confusion spell, and the Pillars are various traps and defenses the Heart uses to prevent PCs from smashing it open to get the Pentaforce piece contained within it. And the one I find the most amusing involves of Strahd’s consorts, Escher. He recently learned of a concept known as “prom” from a traveler who got sucked into Barovia by the Mists. <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oNjQXmoxiQ8" target="_blank">He wants to experience such a wonderful custom, with Strahd as his date!</a> The PCs have to set up a prom via a variety of skill checks (including having Strahd pass a convincing performance as a dream date) in order for Escher to give them his necklace with a Pentaforce piece in it.*There’s no mention as to whether or not the adventure ends early if Strahd is the one who meets such an end.In between Pentaforce challenges, the DM rolls for random encounters after the party collects two and four pieces of the artifact. They’re a small d4 table of pop culture references, such as human veterans hunting for ghosts who will give the PCs their business card in case they find any <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fe93CLbHjxQ" target="_blank">so they “know who to call.”</a> Only one of the encounters is directly threatening to the PCs, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sOnqjkJTMaA" target="_blank">where a group of dancing zombies will attack and eat the characters if they fail to impress them with dance moves.</a>Once the PCs collect all 5 Pentaforce pieces, they combine into a blinding light, summoning Christopher Perkins who tells the PCs to “hurry things up” as he offers to alter reality to end Strahd once and for all. The first is that he can rewind time before Strahd ever invaded Barovia, or gives a PC a golden stake in which to stake the vampire, causing him to explode into a million pieces. If the PCs pick the alternate timeline ending, Strahd will become a bard in a big-hair band instead of pursuing politics. If he explodes, his spirit will possess a wizard <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Perkins_(game_designer)" target="_blank">known as Christopher Zarathrustra…who is one of Chris Perkins’ pen names.</a>Overall Thoughts: This adventure is incredibly subjective for various reasons. First is the fact that the overall challenge and threat levels to the party can vary widely depending on the encounters and pillars used, along with the wide scale in power from 5th to 10th level…and having an honest-to-god Vampire on your team! Quite a bit of encounters don’t have any big threats that can tax the party’s resources, save perhaps the green hags who may form into a covey. The adventure doesn’t say if they do, but with 1 hag per PC one can assume.Additionally, the other variant value of the module is its humor. I can see some groups laughing it up at all the pop culture references and egging each other on in drinking disgusting beverage mixtures in order to better succeed at tough rolls. But I can see others, myself included, finding the levity falling flat. Personally speaking, when I hear the title “Weekend at Strahd’s,” I’m expecting something closer to the PCs taking on the role of Strahd’s minions trying to keep up appearances so that the other power players in Barovia won’t try to take his place and thus put the PCs out of a job at best, executed at worst. The humor from Weekend at Bernie’s comes from Larry and Richard going to ever-more-ridiculous lengths of tricking people into thinking Bernie is alive, while the mobster hitman responsible for his death slowly goes insane after assassination attempt after assassination attempt fails. In Weekend at Strahd’s, only a few encounters have some kind of negative social consequence for people realizing Strahd is dead, and the whole thing of “collect the Pentaforce pieces or the world will end” feels like an unrelated thing tacked on that has no real place in the fiction.Or maybe I’m overanalyzing a silly adventure. Humor is, after all, subjective.Join us next time as we engage in another kind of deception, with a side of intrigue in The Real Housewives of Ravenloft!</blockquote>

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