Sessions 8 – 9

Come on, you know I had zero choice in the title. I’m not too proud to play into the cliche…

This post picks up midway through Session 8, when the players left the village of Barovia with Ireena in the direction of Tser Pool. By this point, I was following along pretty closely with ReReloaded, although unfortunately I was right at the cutting edge of it – the guide still had potential to, and ultimately did, change as it continued to be developed. Fortunately for the most part few of the changes were substantial enough to cause me any headaches in the grand scheme, only requiring some minor adjustments on my part – the Tarokka reading being the biggest. I don’t have anyone to blame but myself, though, and in the end I feel confident in my choice – Dragna Carta’s work is killer, and in my interactions with him and the community he’s put together he’s proven to be an invaluable source of inspiration and assistance. My next post likely will be a bit of a “Special Thanks” to all the creators and artists who have (largely unknowingly) helped with my campaign, so keep your eyes open for that!

The initial stretch of the journey to Tser Pool, from the village to the infamous River Ivlis Crossroads, went by uneventfully by design – I wanted to give the party the feeling of excitement and adventure that they were moving out into Barovia at large, while still keeping the atmosphere tense and foreboding. Following the mist-covered river and then moving into the dark woods, stopping at the crossroads with its decrepit gallows and gravesite, nailed that perfectly; Ireena pausing to orient them, making them wait for something to happen, only served to increase the tension. The sound of the carriage rolling up the hill towards them and Ireena’s initial hope that it was fellow travellers gave them a hint of optimism before it came into view – but when I described it as sleek, black, and – in contrast to the rest of the world they had seen – finely made and clean, their mood dropped.

I built up the suspense as Strahd surely would have himself, taking his time to let the moment build before he stepped out of the carriage and revealed himself to them. Ireena’s immediate paralytic terror and his confidence only made the situation more tense as he introduced himself.

I had so much fun putting together his dialogue – I wanted him to hint at all the little things each character had hidden, or would be made uncomfortable by, but I also wanted to hint as the DM through his dialogue that he himself was not omnsicient, but had some source of information. To do so, I tossed a minor gag into his introduction:

“I see my information was accurate. A man of the cloth, a scaled beast, a pretty little elf-thing, and three… ah, well, perhaps not entirely accurate, as I expected to be the case. Two children,” he says, correcting himself with a small, humorless chuckle, “and a noble, if diminutive, runaway from the Underdark. I have heard so much about you, but now that I have met you in the flesh I see where the confusion arose amongst my… friends.“

Multiple other NPCs, both before this scene and further into the campaign, had and would continue to mistake Hoid – a deep gnome – to be a child; Strahd mentioning this – and correcting himself – very much demonstrated that he wasn’t necessarily watching them personally, and while he did show respect by correctly identifying Hoid as an adult gnome he still chose to point it out, implying that this “respect” was purely for appearances.

At this point I hadn’t quite had the revelation mentioned previously, so Strahd had a bit more information about their (later revealed to be falsified) histories than he should have, but that was something I could deal with. Strahd went through the players, one by one, hinting at their secrets:

• Luther’s paranoia, and the potential for becoming corrupted (“…always watching and observing, so very aware of everything around him. So calm, kind, and levelheaded…”)
• Fang’s at the time secret Warlock abilities (“You will find no lack of monsters to hunt here – but do take care that you do not become one yourself. Perhaps you might have a better chance, given the… unconventional approach you’ve chosen. Not often do the sorts of rangers that choose to hunt more unnatural prey take up such a dark pact…”)
• Nomuri, not having much of a secret, was made into more of an example of how he could make use of the PCs as part of his harem, and hint at the dinner to come (“It is good to see such enthusiasm for the art of swordsmanship here as well – it truly is something we share. And such a pretty face, too, with that exotic bone structure. My, my, I did not expect to find so many of my… interests… piqued.“)
• For Tallet I mostly used it as an opportunity to further warn against her impulsive behaviours (“…I will warn you, however, should you find yourself in the halls of my castle, perhaps some doors are best left closed, lest you find something behind one you wish you hadn’t.“)
• Hickory’s aasimar and (non-mechanical) elvish ancestry – again, at this point I was going to pursue her having Dusk Elf heritage in some way, but that’s been ditched (“The blood of man clearly flows in you, but with a hint of the influence of the divine… but those ears mark a trace of fey ancestry, diluted over years. Quite intriguing, indeed, as it seems to bear some familiarity – judging from your expression, however, I may still have more of an inkling than even you do.“)
• With Hoid at this point we were still pursuing the idea of him trying to escape his nobility and being hunted – there was never a plan to actually have anyone find him, but it was still his fear. I was also entertaining the idea of the lover who had betrayed him actually being one of Strahd’s brides (a lesser one, outside of the main 4) but the aforementioned revelations put a kibosh on that. That said, she may still have come to Barovia and become one, explaining Strahd’s knowledge of his past, and the memory of her reappearing and stabbing him was the only false part. (“I have heard so many stories about you, although I was under the impression that the stories had outlived you. Do not misunderstand me, if anything this only improves my opinion of you – my anger is instead directed towards a mutual acquaintance of ours that assured me of the contrary.“)

From there, Strahd did what he likes to do – talk. He lead them through a conversation about their actions in the Durst Manor and the village, asking the three key questions as laid out in RRL – to sum them up, “Why should I not punish Ismark?”, “Why should I not take Ireena with me right now?”, and “Why should I not dispose of you as trespassers?”

With only some minor prompting – they were coming close to what he wanted to hear – they were able to satisfy him and get the concessions they needed – Ismark would get a second chance but no more, Ireena could walk away from the crossroads unharmed, and the party would be forgiven for what they had done in Durst Manor and not have to face him unless they provoked him.

I had really hoped someone would get snippy with Strahd, and was a bit dismayed when Fang played it smart and restrained himself – he knew this was not a fight they were prepared for. Fortunately, Nomuri got snarky… until the wolves stepped in to threaten them. He backed off, avoiding combat, but the session ended with them alive and in one piece, facing down the corpse of Nomuri hanging from the gallows.

The next session picked up with them continuing towards Tser Pool, soon encountering Muriel once again, falling from the sky, as the Greater Strix chased her. At the time I ran the encounter only the single Greater Strix was part of it, making it an easy fight – they downed it before it was even able to close in, with Fang not even getting an opportunity to hit, and giving me a chance to tease Player!Hickory a bit:

We like to have poke fun, what can I say?

The party, especially Tallet, immediately latched onto Muriel, who I allowed to croakily introduce herself (well, provide her name, at least). I don’t think they caught onto her being a wereraven by any stretch, but there was definitely an understanding that she wasn’t just a dumb bird.

Continuing onto the Vistani camp, I knew I needed to do something to not have them hate Vistani entirely – in the party’s minds, Stanimir and friends had stolen all of the party’s gear, and while I had regretted doing so I wasn’t entirely sure how to address it up until this point. They were fairly quickly greeted by Stanimir himself, who seemed genuinely confused as to why they had shown up without the armor the set out in – and some fortunate insight checks backed him up. Once they had finished with their Tarokka reading he provided them with some backpacks and essentials to make up for it, although Hickory is still upset over her sugared almonds, something I’ve firmly established is not part of the Barovian culinary scene.

Once they entered Madame Eva’s tent, Muriel was able to escape Tallet’s overly loving grasp to rest, and then were sat down for the big event.

The Tarokka reading itself I’ve covered previously in my post about correcting the backstory issues I had unwittingly introduced, but I’ll link the video I put together for our absent players here:

While this is condensed from how it played out in-game, it covers the important elements. For a quick summary:

• The players recieved two separate readings; the first revealed that they had all been deceived by false events or memories. The idea is that the Dark Powers knew that these particular individuals could be the ones to stop Strahd’s attempt to escape, and took steps to ensure they would end up in Barovia and had the experiences they needed to get here. Most of the details haven’t come up to the players, but I feel confident that saying a Modify Memory-like effect would have been used on each of them at some point in their lives to create their own inciting events that would lead them to seek out the mists.
• They got some other information from it as well; foreshadowing the Dark Gifts, they were warned of “temptations”, and to prevent them from entirely trying to be complete heroes suggested that falling for said temptations may be bad for them individually, but have a much bigger impact on their overall success. “Better to die a hero than to escape as the loser” or something along those lines.
• I also foreshadowed that there were allies that could be found in Barovia, to make sure they weren’t completely distrustful of everyone.
• The second reading was the standard one – unfortunately, while I had followed the current draft of RRL available at the time, some changes had been made since that are fairly key. The ones that didn’t change, first off, were:
  • The Sunblade being placed in the Amber Temple (an easy choice)
  • Ezmerelda d’Avenir is their Fated Ally (a choice I would have made regardless, love me some Ez)
  • They’ll face Strahd at the Heart of Sorrow (Dragna’s logic was and is sound – the Heart is the ideal spot for it)
• The other two will require some work on my part.
  • Dragna’s placed the Tome of Strahd in a few different spots, but has settled on Wachterhaus – specifically, during the questline where the players deal with Victor and Stella’s predicament. One of the previous choices he had recommended was inside of Khazan’s Tower (Van Richten’s Tower, RAW), and that was what I had selected – fortunately, that questline does involve the party visiting the Tower, and being a less essential item (or at least, less immediately useful) that should have a minor impact.
  • The Holy Symbol, however, is a bit more difficult, although I have more time to work on a good solution. I had selected the nursery of the Abbey of St Markovia, while Dragna opted to formalize the Werewolf Den as its location. At the moment, I’m leaning towards putting it in the Werewolf Den anyways – the specific card reading was “Look to a place where sickness and madness are bred. Where children once cried, the treasure lies still” which isn’t a wholly inaccurate description of the Shrine of Mother Night – especially as the werewolves refer to themselves as the Children of Mother Night.

Following the reading, the party – not fully convinced of the Vistani’s innocence in regards to their belongings – poked around a bit (fruitlessly) before settling in for some bedtime stories with the Vistani.

I’ll end this recap here for now – only one post to go before Arc I is closed off, and hopefully with a bit less of a gap! We’re quickly closing in on present state of the adventure – currently, the party is talking with Victor while investigating the disappearance of Arabelle, and have already retaken the bones of St Andral back from Volenta’s clutches in a fantastic full-session combat encounter. We’ll get there soon!