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[Let's Read] DM's Guild Ravenloft Sourcebooks
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<blockquote data-quote="Libertad" data-source="post: 9175490" data-attributes="member: 6750502"><p style="text-align: center"><img src="https://i.imgur.com/6cj9dig.png" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " style="" /></p><p></p><p><strong>Chapter 17: The Wedding at Ravenloft.</strong> 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.</p><p></p><p>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.</p><p></p><p>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!</p><p></p><p>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.</p><p></p><p>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.</p><p></p><p>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.</p><p></p><p>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.</p><p></p><p>During <strong>Act I,</strong> 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.</p><p></p><p>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.</p><p></p><p>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.</p><p></p><p>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.</p><p></p><p>*A 7th level Oath of Devotion Paladin’s aura makes those inside immune to charm effects, hint hint.</p><p></p><p style="text-align: center"><img src="https://i.imgur.com/CBPDUF3.png" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " style="" /></p><p></p><p>During <strong>Act II,</strong> 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.</p><p></p><p>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.</p><p></p><p>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.</p><p></p><p>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.</p><p></p><p><strong>Act III</strong> 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.</p><p></p><p>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.</p><p></p><p>*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.</p><p></p><p><strong>Content Warning: Fakeout implied sexual assault</strong></p><p></p><p>[spoiler]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.[/spoiler]</p><p></p><p style="text-align: center"><img src="https://i.imgur.com/K1LituZ.png" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " style="" /></p><p></p><p><strong>Act IV</strong> 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.</p><p></p><p>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.</p><p></p><p style="text-align: center"><img src="https://i.imgur.com/fi9Peod.png" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " style="" /></p><p></p><p><strong>Endings</strong> 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.</p><p></p><p>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.</p><p></p><p>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.</p><p></p><p><strong>Thoughts So Far:</strong> 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.</p><p></p><p><strong>Overall Thoughts:</strong> 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.</p><p></p><p>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.</p><p></p><p>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.</p><p></p><p>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. <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/CurseofStrahd/comments/hbjrs6/resources_tips_for_curse_of_strahd_dms/" target="_blank">Not only that, all the ones I listed can be found in a pinned post on the Curse of Strahd subreddit.</a> 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.</p><p></p><p>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.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Libertad, post: 9175490, member: 6750502"] [center][img]https://i.imgur.com/6cj9dig.png[/img][/center] [b]Chapter 17: The Wedding at Ravenloft.[/b] 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 [b]Act I,[/b] 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. [center][img]https://i.imgur.com/CBPDUF3.png[/img][/center] During [b]Act II,[/b] 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. [b]Act III[/b] 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. [b]Content Warning: Fakeout implied sexual assault[/b] [spoiler]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.[/spoiler] [center][img]https://i.imgur.com/K1LituZ.png[/img][/center] [b]Act IV[/b] 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. [center][img]https://i.imgur.com/fi9Peod.png[/img][/center] [b]Endings[/b] 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. [b]Thoughts So Far:[/b] 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. [b]Overall Thoughts:[/b] 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. [url=https://www.reddit.com/r/CurseofStrahd/comments/hbjrs6/resources_tips_for_curse_of_strahd_dms/]Not only that, all the ones I listed can be found in a pinned post on the Curse of Strahd subreddit.[/url] 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. [/QUOTE]
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