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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Retreater" data-source="post: 8186907" data-attributes="member: 42040">Sorry, I haven't read through all the posts in this thread, but wanted to just give a bit of background to when I was running the campaign (which was Spring/Summer/Fall 2020). "Death House" had to get changed a bit. It didn't hit me until I had already started running it that a player's wife had just miscarried and having dead children be a focus of the adventure would be a sore spot. I back-tracked and said that these were the memories of the children who were frightened in the house and provided clues that they were later adopted by relatives to save them from their weirdo parents. I didn't have the characters come across the bodies of the kids or empty crib in the nursery. In hindsight, I would've likely just picked another intro adventure to start CoS instead of Death House, but we were already playing when I learned of this event. When we got to the Dusk Elves, presenting it as a group of men who can't have offspring was just off the table. So, instead, I focused on their servitude to the evil Vistani as thralls to Strahd. I didn't get into the reproductive issues at all.As the DM, you can focus on what you want. If you are set on running Curse of Strahd, don't give them the background information if it's problematic. There are plenty of reasons to take out Strahd besides making him a killer of children. My players had no issue with the way I presented the Vistani. I don't know if it's that I portrayed them more well-rounded than the adventure, or if my group just isn't as sensitive to cultural issues. I didn't use the "g" term to describe them. I tried to show them as real characters with real motivations. Many were friendly to the party. The ones who drank to excess usually had a reason to do so (I mean, they're in Barovia and life is awful, so many NPCs did.) Use your discretion - if the players would have a problem with their depiction, I would consider removing their cultural trappings that make them analogs to real-world cultures. However, in the case of all published adventures, my primary suggestion is to consider it this way: take what works for you and leave the rest. Don't try to modify the rest to fit what you want to do. If the Death House bothers you, cut it out and replace with another 1st-3rd level adventure. If the dream pastries bother you, just remove them and have the hags terrorizing the town through nightmares (if you want to use them at all - which is a big "if" for me, because they are a TPK waiting to happen). Same with the Dusk Elves. There is plenty in CoS that you can't (and shouldn't) use it all. Have the items and allies in places that avoid these problem areas.</blockquote>

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