TLDR: I love Ravenloft, and Curse of Strahd, I share my thoughts on the times I have played Curse of Strahd, what went wrong, and how I have worked to address that in my own games, particularly my latest campaign, Once Upon a Time in Barovia...
I have always loved Ravenloft. As a setting, its Gothic horror feel - although derivative - appealed immediately to me even before I started playing D&D. I have run and played I6, Expedition to Castle Ravenloft, and Curse of Strahd multiple times in various editions, but for some reason, I keep coming back to Barovia...
I should probably mention that this blog will definitely contain spoilers.
I have had some great experiences in Barovia running Ravenloft games for my players (although they have ofttimes done their damnedest to undermine the forbidding tone of the game), but, if I am honest, some disappointing play experiences as a player.
Curse of Strahd in particular has been underwhelming. The first play through of the new module, I came late to the table, missing out on Death House (the starter adventure) and the ability to shape the fate of Ireena Kolyana. My character, Abdul Fatwaif, a 5th level knowledge cleric urchin from the distant desert land of Har'Akir, came late to the game, which was hosted on Roll20 by a longtime gaming friend of mine.
The campaign was actually quite enjoyable, although there were one or two players that were somewhat difficult to get along with, the rest of the group stuck together, and we've had a blast ever since on Monday nights, most notably playing through a Spelljammer campaign (which I can say, while a little wacky, is way more awesome than it sounds!).
But the big disappointment of the campaign was Strahd himself. I was actually absent from the final session - we had only just arrived at Castle Ravenloft the session before, so I thought there would be a handful of sessions left, exploring the castle and figuring out how to take down the villain that had been alluded to the entire campaign...
But I found out afterwards that the battle with Strahd had occurred that session, and that it was underwhelming. He fell in the first round of combat.
There were complications in the group - obnoxious players that wanted to ruin the game for everyone else, and GM fatigue probably factored heavily into the outcome. But I was gutted. All that build up, only to have the entire campaign deflate on a less than satisfactory conclusion...
The second time I played through, I created a new character, Finchwilf Gilderleaf - another cleric (hey, I love them, alright?), this time arcana, but with a very different personality. See, Finch was batshit crazy - he had been enslaved by a hag, and she made him do all kinds of creepy and fucked up shit that made him a nutter. He also heard voices, mostly of dead children, and collected toys for them to play with.
I had a very satisfying time playing the character, but despite the sometimes fantastic RP, again, the campaign was an overall miss.
The GM was a neophyte to the role, but made the best of it. However, he also altered the module as written, since so many of us had already played it before - which is a noble feat, and one that I approve of. However, in doing so, he perhaps misunderstood the nature of Ravenloft, and the campaign played out in a way where the Gothic horror essence of Barovia was lost.
In the end, I stopped caring about the game. I wasn't invested, and I had Finch sacrifice himself.
Ravenloft can be so much more - if done right!
I should probably mention now that I have run (and am still running) Curse of Strahd for my IRL Thursday group, and it has been far more satisfying, even if there are still kinks to work out.
This campaign was run off the lessons from the first time I ran through Curse of Strahd - fixing Strahd himself.
My players truly fear him - they have confronted him and lost a first time on Yester Hill, and faced him a second time at the Abbey of St. Markovia - which led to a TPK - only Strahd did not kill them. He imprisoned them under Castle Ravenloft in the dungeon to stop them from meddling - see he had already won - he had lured Ireena to come with him back in Vallaki, and had been since courting her, playing the long game to win her love.
The players had to escape the dungeon, and in doing so, were able to explore a good deal of the castle, which allowed them to find another artefact, powerful weapons and the skull of the Argnvost before teleporting away.
Now, after the Amber Temple, they are finally ready to face him - but they are all quaking in their boots, which is how it should be.
But even though it has been great, there is always room for improvement. There is a shortcoming with Curse of Strahd in that oftenmost the player characters come from outside Barovia, and their investiture in the module relies on them wanting to do the right thing and get back home again. My players had run through the Lost Mines of Phandelver first, and brought to the game a streak of humour and shenanigans that made the game entertaining, but diverged greatly from the dark, ominous tone of Curse of Strahd.
After these experiences, I decided that I could still do better, and I decided that I wanted to run the module for a completely new group of strangers on Roll20.
I had a purpose in doing this - I wanted to set the ground rules. I wanted to make sure that I could avoid the bigotry and ignorance of the disruptive players in the first group, invest the time and preparation that was lacking from my second group, and try to create the investment in the world that was perhaps lacking from my IRL group.
And I figured out a way to do it. I wanted the players to be invested in Barovia in a way that outsiders cannot be - I wanted the players to take the role of villagers of Barovia. I also made them start as children, ten years before the events of Curse of Strahd...
This blog, is about that game, and how I have adapted and fixed some of the shortcomings of Curse of Strahd and turned the valley of Barovia into a living, breathing sandbox.
I have always loved Ravenloft. As a setting, its Gothic horror feel - although derivative - appealed immediately to me even before I started playing D&D. I have run and played I6, Expedition to Castle Ravenloft, and Curse of Strahd multiple times in various editions, but for some reason, I keep coming back to Barovia...
I should probably mention that this blog will definitely contain spoilers.
I have had some great experiences in Barovia running Ravenloft games for my players (although they have ofttimes done their damnedest to undermine the forbidding tone of the game), but, if I am honest, some disappointing play experiences as a player.
Curse of Strahd in particular has been underwhelming. The first play through of the new module, I came late to the table, missing out on Death House (the starter adventure) and the ability to shape the fate of Ireena Kolyana. My character, Abdul Fatwaif, a 5th level knowledge cleric urchin from the distant desert land of Har'Akir, came late to the game, which was hosted on Roll20 by a longtime gaming friend of mine.
The campaign was actually quite enjoyable, although there were one or two players that were somewhat difficult to get along with, the rest of the group stuck together, and we've had a blast ever since on Monday nights, most notably playing through a Spelljammer campaign (which I can say, while a little wacky, is way more awesome than it sounds!).
But the big disappointment of the campaign was Strahd himself. I was actually absent from the final session - we had only just arrived at Castle Ravenloft the session before, so I thought there would be a handful of sessions left, exploring the castle and figuring out how to take down the villain that had been alluded to the entire campaign...
But I found out afterwards that the battle with Strahd had occurred that session, and that it was underwhelming. He fell in the first round of combat.
There were complications in the group - obnoxious players that wanted to ruin the game for everyone else, and GM fatigue probably factored heavily into the outcome. But I was gutted. All that build up, only to have the entire campaign deflate on a less than satisfactory conclusion...
The second time I played through, I created a new character, Finchwilf Gilderleaf - another cleric (hey, I love them, alright?), this time arcana, but with a very different personality. See, Finch was batshit crazy - he had been enslaved by a hag, and she made him do all kinds of creepy and fucked up shit that made him a nutter. He also heard voices, mostly of dead children, and collected toys for them to play with.
I had a very satisfying time playing the character, but despite the sometimes fantastic RP, again, the campaign was an overall miss.
The GM was a neophyte to the role, but made the best of it. However, he also altered the module as written, since so many of us had already played it before - which is a noble feat, and one that I approve of. However, in doing so, he perhaps misunderstood the nature of Ravenloft, and the campaign played out in a way where the Gothic horror essence of Barovia was lost.
In the end, I stopped caring about the game. I wasn't invested, and I had Finch sacrifice himself.
Ravenloft can be so much more - if done right!
I should probably mention now that I have run (and am still running) Curse of Strahd for my IRL Thursday group, and it has been far more satisfying, even if there are still kinks to work out.
This campaign was run off the lessons from the first time I ran through Curse of Strahd - fixing Strahd himself.
My players truly fear him - they have confronted him and lost a first time on Yester Hill, and faced him a second time at the Abbey of St. Markovia - which led to a TPK - only Strahd did not kill them. He imprisoned them under Castle Ravenloft in the dungeon to stop them from meddling - see he had already won - he had lured Ireena to come with him back in Vallaki, and had been since courting her, playing the long game to win her love.
The players had to escape the dungeon, and in doing so, were able to explore a good deal of the castle, which allowed them to find another artefact, powerful weapons and the skull of the Argnvost before teleporting away.
Now, after the Amber Temple, they are finally ready to face him - but they are all quaking in their boots, which is how it should be.
But even though it has been great, there is always room for improvement. There is a shortcoming with Curse of Strahd in that oftenmost the player characters come from outside Barovia, and their investiture in the module relies on them wanting to do the right thing and get back home again. My players had run through the Lost Mines of Phandelver first, and brought to the game a streak of humour and shenanigans that made the game entertaining, but diverged greatly from the dark, ominous tone of Curse of Strahd.
After these experiences, I decided that I could still do better, and I decided that I wanted to run the module for a completely new group of strangers on Roll20.
I had a purpose in doing this - I wanted to set the ground rules. I wanted to make sure that I could avoid the bigotry and ignorance of the disruptive players in the first group, invest the time and preparation that was lacking from my second group, and try to create the investment in the world that was perhaps lacking from my IRL group.
And I figured out a way to do it. I wanted the players to be invested in Barovia in a way that outsiders cannot be - I wanted the players to take the role of villagers of Barovia. I also made them start as children, ten years before the events of Curse of Strahd...
This blog, is about that game, and how I have adapted and fixed some of the shortcomings of Curse of Strahd and turned the valley of Barovia into a living, breathing sandbox.
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