#ch: urlstra despund

[curseofthebloodcountess]

That was me! Last game, our cleric romanced (and married) them both.

hey no shame i’m just curious but I swear to the morninglord i saw a post about one of your PCs being in a polycule with Ezmerelda and Father Lucian can you please identify yourself I am so deeply fascinated

[curseofthebloodcountess]

Saturday: Favorite DM Mistakes I Have Made So Far

Forgot normal weapons don’t do full damage to vampires and let my party nearly kill Anastrasya before realizing “Oh Shit” and having Strahd yoink her out of there. 

Accidentally statted Father Lucian as a War Priest instead of my homebrew that was probably between priest and war priest. The party agreed this was a good decision and given that he, the Cleric, and Ez D’Avenir might be A Thing now, I think he’s going to need the improved stats to keep up. 

Straight up forgot werewolf bites cause lycanthropy and fucked over our already fucked over Paladin. 

Tried to Remove Curse inside the anti-magic tower and gave a badass description before going, “Uh, hey guys???”

Forgot my dialogue vibes for Strahd when the Rogue hopped over the wall at the druid ritual and so they had a long, silent staring contest while I tried to remember what the ritual was for. 

Forgot to put a bedroll in Rahadin’s inventory and everyone has decided he has been trancing in trees for the last, like, three days. He and the Rogue crashed in a homebrew elven temple and neither had a bed rolls so they tranced on the floor. 

[curseofthebloodcountess]

I’m relistening to the family dinner between Strahd and the party from two weeks ago so I can update my notes and I must say the Crelmers’ commitment to making Strahd regret letting them marry into his family in the first place, paired with Alek coaching Strahd to behave makes Urlstra’s commitment to being the only person trying to milk this for information hysterical 

[curseofthebloodcountess]

Urlstra Despund & Lucian Petrovich & Ez D’Avenir

[curseofthebloodcountess]

@sosobol

I need more information, please | referring to this post

My players are free to correct me on the order of events but like.... I wrote an explanation at work and I guess the important things to know going in are:

Urlstra is the most unhinged Clareic (misspelling intended) I’ve seen so far. And this is the.... third (???) Clareic I’ve played with/DM’d for. Clare can correct me because somehow I feel like that number is higher and then I remember that Tana was a warlock (rip Tooth Fairy Elf)

If Victor Vallakovich was the protagonist of CoS, it’d be a coming of age story about a 19 year old Aasimar Wizard losing both his parents in the span of a week and how these five random adultier adults made him a better person, helped his mental health more, and validated him more frequently in a month than Vargas and Lydia managed to in 19 years and now he’s the baron and he rescued Stella Wachter and they’re gonna get married and fix the infrastructure of Vallaki. 

Everything that happens below happened at Rahadin and Scout’s wedding reception. You ever have your party Rogue roast a man alive and then look at him with something vaguely resembling compassion? Apparently Rahadin would sell his soul to feel that high every day for the rest of his life. Not saying he did, but boy is he a simp for his hot wife and boy howdy did Strahd go “Ahhhh yesssss I can use this to my advantage....” like a CREEP. 

Our Paladin is another Clare Creation and he’s just like this in every goddamn campaign: too horny for our sorcerer “Escher” to say an intelligent thing. To be fair, I don’t know if the fact that he and Finnegan are horny for each other is the real reason only one of them ever has the brain cell or if it’s because they’re both like “UGHHH THE WEIGHT OF RESPONSIBILITY IS CRUSHING HEAVY LIES THE HEAD WHICH WEARS THE CROWN” while also treating it like “Hey, babe, it’s your turn to do the laundry” except it’s about thinking. 

Also Dorinn (our fighter), Ireena, Strahd, and the remaining consorts are there because OH YEAH THIS DOUBLED AS DINNER WITH STRAHD. Fucking unhinged 18 hour session. 

OKAY HERE WE GO!

So in my Saturday Game, Victor Vallakovich is nineteen years old and due to the actions of the party, he had become baron of Vallaki by the time the dinner rolled around. He is also the party’s adopted, (chaotic?) neutral wizard. He went with them to the dinner because Strahd wrote him a letter for Strahd Reasons (read: Strahd is trying to get the items back). VV has social anxiety and a history of failed con saves after drinking, so he was talking to the Cleric, Urlstra, about getting wasted at Ravenloft, which, like, no one wants to babysit a drunk nineteen year old, especially as you trek into the belly of the beast. SO SHE TOLD HIM NO. Duh. Good job, Urlstra. 

But the night before all this, Urlstra learned via trancing that she is the reincarnation of Saint Markovia (flavored here as a Dusk Elf who unified the Morning Lord and Lady of Shadows (a goddess whose divinity has been splintered across Lady Ezra, The Raven Queen, and Mother Night in my game). She learned from… I wanna say Father Lucian (Clare, is that right? I feel like this was in the Blue Water Inn when they both ditched VV for being a douchebag) that Strahd had taken Saint Markovia’s bones as a trophy. Urlstra’s goal was to get her bones back and to take them to Krezk to lay them to rest. She knows the Abbey is sketchy but believes that bringing the bones back there will fix things and she has been on a quest to reunite the two religions. (I mean, like, I feel like she might have literally married herself to that cause BUT THAT’S NOT EVEN THIS SESSION JFC). 

So naturally, to get out of conversing with Victor Vallakovich, Urlstra announced that she needed to ask about the bones. Instead of wasting time asking veiled questions at Strahd’s court, because Urlstra doesn’t waste time, she used Sending to instant message Rahadin a message that was like: I need you to find the bones of St. Markovia and bring them to me.

Why Rahadin? Well, you see, Ireena threw herself into the Pool of the White Sun to sever her soul and Tatyana’s. Dorinn, our fighter, and her now-fiancé, jumped in and pulled her out before the waters could claim Ireena, too, and also he got the sword. Pretty sweet deal for Dorinn.  Like... This beast of a man rescued the sword, his someday wife, and then shrugged off Strahd’s lightning damage like it was nothing. And then when things calmed down, they realized “Oh fuck, if there is no Tatyana, we have no Fated Ally because Ireena isn’t The Devil’s Bride anymore.... unless it means someone else???” So Ez, who was with them, drew a card in the Tarokka that I designated as being Rahadin as their new fated ally. SO OBVIOUSLY, if you need to get bones from the crypts of Ravenloft, you gotta ask Rahadin. They told him like a week ago that he was their fated ally and he was kinda like “This is bullshit” while providing them cover from the tree line at Yester Hill because, like I said, he is a SIMP for the Rogue, Scout. And now he’s being asked to retrieve holy bones. 

At his and Scout’s wedding reception.

Because after dinner, like a normal brother, Strahd surprised everyone with a wedding ceremony and reception for Rahadin and Scout, who is the last female Dusk Elf. He told neither of them this was going to happen. #JustSiblingThings. Gotta love the pranks younger sibs pull on their brothers!

So imagine you are Rahadin. You just got married. This is the woman of your dreams and you didn’t think she’d want you. She wants you. You want her. You two privately pledged yourselves to each other on your terms thirty minutes before the wedding under the guise of I Don’t Know What. You are trying to spend some time with your wife and greet your guests and you really just wanna get wasted and go home (except you are home. And at work. You basically got married in your own den during the Work From Home Era and were so busy with work, you didn’t notice your brother send out invitations.) I think at this very moment in the game Rahadin was just straight up chilling with another NPC (Ireena, I think) when he gets this Sending message. What would you do? He sends back: Can you not? This is my wedding. 

And just when he thinks it’s over….

The Paladin asks him for a skull that is TOTALLY UNRELATED to the Cleric’s quest. He wanted a skull to help teach Gertruda to be a College of Spirits Bard so she can replace the sorcerer “Escher” as a consort. The Paladin doesn’t really explain this, but like, it’s in the same vein as everything else he’s ever said to Rahadin, which is like: “You need a postal system” and “There are too many wolves”. 

Rahadin sometimes goes into the woods to practice sparring with the ghosts in his Deathly Choir or take a run or a swim or climb a tree just to get away from the Paladin, to be totally honest. Trevor, THIS IS WHY. Just imagine it’s your wedding night, you didn’t plan to get married, and now your brother and brother in law are working to keep you and your wife apart (for different reasons) and everyone keeps asking you for bones.

And then there’s Victor Vallakovich, right? Paladin convinced him to dance with Gertruda so he can try to modify her memory so she can get a correspondence course in magic. And it.... Worked? Ostensibly? IDK. I didn’t roleplay by myself in that corner of the room, so I was just rolling dice to see how successful VV was. 

And, I mean, Rahadin and Scout did go get St. Markovia’s thighbone for Urlstra and pretend it was so they could hook up during their wedding reception. But like. This escalated SO MUCH, SO FAST. And it all started with the Cleric trying to get a nineteen year old baron to behave himself while he had a panic attack. 

I get the distinct feeling this only leads to more questions. 

[curseofthebloodcountess]

Saturday: The Party’s Ceasefire with Strahd

Some context before I recap last night’s session:

Strahd pressured Rahadin and Scout (our rogue) into marriage

Scout is 2+ months pregnant 

Scout mentioned how much Strahd loooooved Alek Gwilym so he stole the Tome back

Dorrin (our fighter) told Strahd that two souls can reside in a single object or person (as Sergei and Tatyana reside in the sunsword or as Tatyana and Ireena resided in Ireena’s body)

Strahd, despairing, gave the Cleric a mission to reconsecrate the Abbey and then went “Oh shit, I bet that Fucker, the Abbot, can give me what I want.” when he reread the Tome and how In Love with Alek he was and how In Love Alek was with him. So he killed Urlstra (it didn’t last) on her wedding night. 

The party found Alek in the swamps of Berez, sharing a body with Victor Vallakovich’s older, runaway brother who everyone thought wsa dead.

The party then slipped into a pocket universe probably made by Khazan/Khazan’s unnamed apprentice to hide the remains of the original blade that ran them through a gauntlet of Tatyana’s incarnations so they proved themselves worthy to wield it in its full glory (and weren’t just Strahd trying to get back the pieces). 

The Paladin is flying the skull of Argynvost around. 

Dorinn and Finnegan (Escher replacement) discovered Dorinn is the reincarnation of the first Silverguard, son of Argynvost upon reaching the Lost Battlefield

From there they headed to Krezk and learned they’d been in the pocket dimension for five days and in that time, a vampire nest that Strahd placed there four months ago has been plaguing the village since they left and includes Vampire Spawn Dmitri Krezkov. Now, the Krezkovs’ daughter, Rozaliya, is the Burgomaster and her fiance, Ismark (yes, that Ismark), is now Captain of the Guard. 

Yes, they’ve been a  pocket dimension for five days. 

They debated whether to fight the vampires or to brave the Abbey of St. Markovia (Urlstra our Cleric’s previous life). They chose the Abbey.

The Abbey deeply unsettled the characters but they didn’t explore much. They met the Abbot, who was a slightly-too-beautiful Petrov looking man teaching The Corpse Bride how to set a table. 

Because the players were not hostile to him, he told him his plans to create The Perfect Companion for Strahd to heal the land. He showed them his library and laboratory. 

 Alek was like, “Tell me more” and Scout was like “Outside. Now.” at him and Trevor tried to point out that he’d be a golem under someone else’s control. Meanwhile Dorinn was like “This is my fault, we should leave. We should leave. I fucked up.” and had to confess to telling Strahd that souls can be put into things. 

The party heard a BLOODCURDLING DYING SCREAM and Dorinn, Trevor and Alek ran towards the sound while everyone else was like “Shit. We should have left.”

Standing over Vasilka’s torn apart body was Strahd, chewing the Abbot out. 

“I gave you new specifications,” he said. “How dare you use recycled parts when you know what my demands were.”

Rahadin, upon hearing his brother’s voice stealth over to where he can better hear. 

The Nat 20s begin.

The party convinces Strahd to wait five minutes while they discuss a solution to the problem. Nat 20. Strahd insight checks the new man (Alek) to see who the fuck he even is. Nat 20. Dorinn insight checks Strahd as Strahd stares at Alek. Nat 20. Realizes Strahd looks the most human he has as long as they’ve known each other and is looking at Alek in the same way Ireena looks at Dorinn when she worries he’s going to do something stupid and die doing it and that this is the last moment they’ll be in the same room. 

The party discusses. Alek says he’ll do it. He’ll take a new body. The party realizes we could theoretically, based on the Abbot’s explanation of his machine, clone a body and put a new soul in it. Alek fails his charisma throw against Henry Vallakovich who doesn’t like any of this. Trevor explains that souls are like apples and bodies are like bags (?) and we could have two bags for two apples or one bag for two apples and wouldn’t you like to have your apple in your own bag? No! I don’t!  Scout tells him that’s selfish. Starts working to calm him down as I’m desperately having Alek make a charisma save every thirty seconds. We nat 20 at the same time. Scout calms the kid down and Alek is able to push through. Rahadin thinks his wife is gong to be an amazing mother and he doesn’t have time to examine that because the Crelmer-Von Zaroviches and Trevor and Alek are going for Alek’s procedure. Strahd calls them out for trying to lie about this being the real Alek. Typical family bickering ensues. 

And I do mean typical.

I have never had Strahd behave so humanly with the party. Alek demands the love of his life apologizes for killing him. Strahd struggles to say I’m sorry. Rahadin calls him out for it. Strahd shoots a low leveled ray of frost at Rahadin. Scout fires one back in her husband’s defense. “Is that new?” Strahd asks about the magic. “I’m impressed.” The Abbot hooks Alek/Henry up to the machine and using the rules lawyered rules of the machine creates a new body that Henry goes into.... stark naked so Trevor dresses him and Henry is embarassed he was naked in front of Strahd Von Zarovich. Trevor and Dorinn take him back to the party, dressed in spare clothes. Alek looks up at a worried Strahd who is hovering over him and says, “I have died for you twice. I am not doing it again.” and I think Strahd would have kissed him except Scout, Rahadin, and the Abbot were there so he tells the Abbot to give his family some privacy. 

He apologizes (to Alek) that he forgot how much he loved the people his life, especially Alek, and that evidence he’s gathered in the last few weeks indicate the Dark Powers have prevented him from remember people he loved or his love for them. He thanks Scout for giving him the Tome back (as if she did it willingly) because she gave him his memories back and he remembers how much he loves/loved his brothers and Alek and he can see more clearly that his feelings for Tatyana were obsessions and projections and he believes he was taken advantage of by the Dark Powers. 

“Why are you telling us this?”

Nat 20 persuasion 

“Patrina’s body is gone from the crypt. Only a powerful and ancient magic could do that. I am on my way to the Amber Temple, however, I believe your party may be more suited to the task. Stop her and I will send those of you from the Material Plane home.”

“And those not from the Material Plane?”

“They would stay here. This is their home and you’ve made parts of it a better place to live.”

Scout looks at Rahadin. Strahd continues his offer.

“I will not promise you anything I am not certain is within my power, but due to my research on the matter, I believe that it may even be possible to reunite Barovia itself with the Material Plane. Perhaps our goals are aligned. So long as we are working together, I will call for a ceasefire. I will not attack you and those of me will not attack you.”

“And your wives?”

Alek, from the operating table is like, “Wives????” and Strahd is like, “We’ll talk about it later.” Rahadin holds up fingers to indicate how many wives Strahd has had to a heartbroken but mildly impressed Alek. 

“I cannot speak for them. Volenta will do my bidding. Ludmilla has gotten stronger over the years and she may be too far gone in her obsession with scientific research to hear reason. Do we have an accord?”

They do. Rahadin and Scout go to leave. 

Scout goes to hug Alek before going into the hall and whispers to him “Try not to die again. Three uncles is better than two.”

The Nat 20s ran out. Strahd heard that. He knows Scout is pregnant. He and Alek both have smart ass things to say to Rahadin but only Strahd says them out loud as Alek hugs Scout back. 

The party is just now finding out about the ceasefire. Strahd and Alek are in the  operating room but will probably spend some time together talking things out before deciding whether to stay here or go back to Ravenloft. The party intends to spend the night exploring the Abbey so maybe Urlstra can get some peace, the next day dealing with the vampire spawn nest in Krezk, and then maybe heading to the Amber Temple or Argynvostholt. 

I’m very emotional that Scout without meaning to, gave her husband his brother back, and his mentor (soon to be brother in law?). I have been building to some of these reveals that Strahd’s plans haven’t been random, but have been direct responses to the the things the players do in game. For a while, they thought he was just randomly lashing out, but he’s been trying to find Alek for a while. First, to command at his side as he remembered (Finnegan), then, after Scout began tormenting him about Alek to interrogate him for answers the party withheld from him (Ismark), then to seduce him when he had the answers (Trevor), and finally to love him once he reread and understood his own recordings of that love (Alek himself). He has wanted to find Alek’s soul and give it a vessel since Dorinn taunted him in Ravenloft with the sunsword and he has wanted to get the thighbone back since that moment but hadn’t gotten Urlstra alone until her wedding night. He was even serious about sending Trevor and Finnegan back to the Material Plane if Finnegan brought Strahd Alek because that was his goal and how else to atone to the men he mistook for Alek than to give them back tot the loves of their lives and sending them home the way he wants to be with the love of his life? 

Strahd is a terrible person. He went about none of these in an appropriate or reasonable way, but he’s been telling the truth. As far as tough pills to swallow go, I'm sure this is a rather large one for my party. I think they may have thought I was being a meme when I said Strahd wanted to be part of his “vamily” but... literally, the party has been unknowingly handing him back parts of his humanity and the first things he wanted were Alek and to make things right with Rahadin and Scout. He’s not a good person, but he’s a person. 

And he’s going to be so mad when he realizes he’s the third favorite uncle at best with Scout and Rahadin’s kids. 

Whatta ride. Due to the high social rolls, they didn’t even trigger combat. Now all they have to do is fulfill some promises, restore some holy grounds, find Scout and Dorinn’s crazy aunt, stop her, and maybe fight some gods. 

Or... is it? 

[curseofthebloodcountess]

Victor Vallakovich: I am going to drink so much champagne-

Urlstra: No-

Victor Vallakovich: And I am going throw up on Count Strahd's floor.

Urlstra: NO.

Victor Vallakovich: Fiiiiine. I will get so drunk when we go back to Vallaki, after I modify some random girl's memory so I can psychically teach her a useful skill and we can escape.

Urlstra: There we go. I have to go talk to some people about some bones.

[curseofthebloodcountess]

Saturday: Asked My Players to Bet Who Strahd Wants to Wife Up

Cleric & Paladin: does strahd want to be the least interesting person in a harem

Rogue & Fighter: HAHAHA

Cleric & Paladin: we'll give him a participation sticker

DM: I feel like I'd be curious to see what you find more interesting than archmage vampire king

Rogue & Fighter: THE HOT AF MONSTER HUNTER. Ez gives me such Witcher vibes. Ugh. What a babe.

Cleric & Paladin: Bad Ass War Priest Dad

DM: That's just your harem, Cleric.

Cleric & Paladin: i mean i thought that was the assignment

[curseofthebloodcountess]

Saturday Game: Attuning on the Fly. 2/22/22

My friends chilled with me while I typed up notes for next session, which basically means we talked about THE WORST Valentine’s Day for Rogue and Rahadin, Rouge reading “I, Strahd”, Cleric’s harem that includes Ez D’Avenir, Father Lucian (and maybe Davian Martikov). Also me making ominous commentary every now and then. 

And then we realized we could knock out a mini session as they race to Yester Hill from the Winery, since they have two magic items (Sunsword and Gulthias Staff) to check out. It was so fun!

Thunder and rain drown out much of the sound outside the wagon as they race towards Yester Hill. The storm has gotten worse - why wouldn’t it be? Strahd is planning something atop that hill and its a race against the clock. 

Fighter has the Sunsword and he was inspecting it to attune to it as Vallakovich told him to and he realized it could hear his thoughts and convey feelings and memories to him and it took him about five minutes to realize two spirits inhabited it and one of them was Tatyana. As Ireena’s boyfriend, he recognized the energy. It led him to the correct conclusion that the other soul bound to the sword is Sergei’s. He talked to the sword to learn its properties and it bonded with him on the ride. As he asked it questions, sunlight flared from it and lit up the covered wagon they’re travelling in. It temporarily blinded Vallakovich (who was driving, so they had a bumpy ride) and Ireena, who had never seen sunlight before. It also startled Rogue and it startled poor Paladin SO MUCH he fell over. Paladin is a disaster boy and we love him. Fighter attuned to the sword and then told the group that he planned to keep it a secret from Strahd. 

Cleric, riding shotgun with Ez on her special wagon, explored the Gulthias Staff. She decided it was fucking creepy, but she’s a Drow. Creepy is her second language. She attuned to it for its useful properties and decided once they kill Wintersplinter, she will destroy it. It was fun to watch her get grossed out by the spongy wood, the way it could take as much as it gave. 

Rogue is still carting the Tome around... which meant as they arrive to the hill, rain pelting the wagons and drenching the drivers, lightning streaking in the sky, an effigy of Strahd ahead, beyond a gnarled tree, it was Paladin’s turn to get something cool.

A voice called out to him - and only him - saying that he sought a champion to wield his spear, which hungers for blood and will help the user rule the valley. Paladin was overwhelmed by an urge to check out the cairns first. He thinks it might be the spirit of Argynvost, with who he has communed once, and who he swore to champion for. What a delightful bit of piecing things together!

Vallakovich and Ez just drove. That was their job tonight. Saturday, they will be casters and bad asses. 

Rahadin, known only to Rogue, is tracking the party for their safety. Because Rogue kissed him last session, the elven spirits who haunt him have decided that as long as he is working towards Rogue’s safety, they will not harm him and will let him harm Rogue’s enemies to protect her. He is also statted as an Oath of the Crown Paladin in my game (because I can!) which means he’s hiding in the trees with buffs and healing, trying to keep close to Rogue, hiding. All it will take is a significant hit to her for him to rush the fight to heal her. Because Strahd and Rahadin have a deal concerning the Rogue, Strahd may grant him permission to protect her - and only her. He will not hurt Strahd or interfere with the ritual. He is just there for Rogue’s sake. Swear to god, he will break his oath for her if he isn’t careful. Fun Date Idea: Have your semi-boyfriend rededicate his paladin’s oath to you in the ruins of a Seladrine temple.

God, the party has to defeat and survive everything at Yester Hill, get back to Vallaki. They realized they have between three and four elves (depending on whether Rahadin ends up joining them). I conceded that Ez would take a level of exhaustion to drive her wagon if they have to ride all night. I’ll probably toss a random SOMETHING their way - but not combat. Just something to make the trip eerie in the night. 

Then they have to see if they can stabilize the town (which is a shit show. They know that, but I won’t tell them what I’ve done except that it’s a lot of math.) They also know they might lose allies in the fight. It’s a truly massive encounter, because there are townsfolk they are invested in and townsfolk they hate clashing. I’ve made “half-character sheets” for NPCs who are Special Commoners but who don’t have appropriate statblocks in the Monster Manual or in any of the sourcebooks. 

If they survive that, Rogue and Rahadin are going to go on a proper date... at an Elven Temple. If he defends or heals Rogue during either battle or if he travels with the party to get them to Vallaki, he will gain an additional ability with his Deathly Choir. I also think it might be cute for him to form some kind of picnic dinner. He hasn’t been on a date since he massacred the Dusk Elves (gee, wonder why) but he used to be good at this. And he’s fallen hard for her. I think if she lets him, he may finally get to kiss her back. I’m fantasizing about an epic, in the ruins of an elven temple, inspired by mosques in Shiraz, in the twilgiht, surrounded by the dappling of colored light. 

Strahd is planning a wedding, reception, and honeymoon for them at the dinner that the whole party knows about out of character. Paladin is wounded because he and “Escher” got engaged first, but Paladin is going to have more reasons to be mad at the dinner than that. Strahd has plans for “Escher”, provided he makes it to the dinner. Cleric is also in more danger than she knows, tbh, but that’s a DM secret. Because Ireena is no longer Tatyana, Strahd’s plans to hurt her and the fighter aren’t going to be as entertaining to him, so I have to decide if he’s remotely merciful or if he does the most casually brutal thing just to be a petty bitch. Probably the latter. That sounds right. Vallakovich and Ez are also attending the dinner, but Strahd is less concerned with NPCs as anything more that knife twists.

My god. This is an endless source of joy. 

[curseofthebloodcountess]

CoS Saturday: Recap 2/19/22

Summary: The party left Vallaki and visited Krezk and the Winery and learned Lady Lydia Petrovna Vallakovich, and perhaps all of Vallaki, is in imminent danger. They also encountered Rahadin on the route to Yester Hill to receive a summons to dinner at Ravenloft. 

The party - Rogue, Fighter, Paladin, Druid, Ireena, and Victor Vallakovich - divided and conquered for their remaining tasks in Vallaki. 

Fighter, Paladin, and Ireena went to report the kidnapping of Arabelle by Bluto to Lady Vallakovich, who was entertaining her cousin, Anna Krezkova, at the time. While they waited, they picked up some light reading from the library (spoiler: Ireena found an erotic novel thanks to a random roll table). Lydia invited them downstairs to discuss the issue and to meet Anna Krezkova. Anna came to comfort Lydia in her time of need, since Vargas’ death. They talked politics and legal proceedings and diplomacy with the Vistani and Paladin and Fighter realized that something was wrong with Anna. Lydia explained that tensions in her family must still be high from whent they were young and Lucian abandoned his noble duties - including marrying Anna - for the Church, but she thought it was an odd thing to be upset about. Himbo Squad (Paladin, Fighter, and Ireena) accepted this explanation. 

Rogue, Cleric, and Vallakovich went to the clothiers’ shop and twins Hewin and Harwin assisted them. Harwin is delighted to design formalwear for the party for the upcoming dinner with Strahd. Hewin ensured they had warm furs for travel. Harwin revealed a book of Dusk Elf fashion design from 200 years ago and the Rogue (a Dusk Elf) was unnerved and excited. She has not realized the twins are half-elves but BOY HOWDY has my party out of character. Vallakovich paid for everything like a twenty-year old getting screened for his first credit card, got thoroughly roasted for being a bisexual disaster, and announced that he wants Strahd to take him seriously. The Cleric wants Twilight colors. Ireena and the Fighter want to match like a couple at prom. The Rogue wants pockets. The Paladin has requested pants. Good for him. 

The group reconvened and instead of going to the Church of St. Andral as they skipped town, the Rogue and Vallakovich stole a covered wagon and a horse from his mother’s house and were very pleased with themselves.

And then the werewolf nation attacked. 

They fought the werewolves from the wagon valiantly and BOY HOWDY am I glad that I statted Ireena as a fighter and that Vallakovich swapped his cantrips for fighting that day. It wasn’t enough to keep Paladin from getting bitten. He has the worst luck. His boyfriend went missing, he fell into a bear trap, his boyfriend is an Escher/Vasili Mashup, and then this. Vallakovich COULD cure him, but he used all his spell slots fighting werewolves. They pulled over at an abandoned tower surrounded by an antimagic field and they solved the riddle to get in pretty quickly - Rogue and Vallakovich, again. They make a great team. 

In the tower, the figured out the creepy elevator and decided Rogue, Paladin, and Vallakovich would go up while the rest of the party kept watch. They spotted bats and flipped out. At the top floor, Vallakovich, Rogue, and Paladin discovered all of the monster hunting tools. They went nuts looting the place. They also found silver traps and decided to clean them up but also box Paladin in, just in case he went feral. Paladin agreed to this. Then Rogue saw the bats and they nailed the blankets over the windows. 

The rest of the party joined them and they made camp for the night. Ireena and Fighter got to snuggle. You go, you funky little lovebirds.

Of course they woke to a woman with a blade at Fighter’s throat. Turns out it was Ez D’Avenir and she demanded an explanation. Eventually they reached peace, cured Paladin of his lycanthropy outside of the tower, and Ez offered to go with the party. Now they have TWO WAGONS and one is filled with useful shit.

Then they found a dead body with a letter from Anna Krezkova, informing Lydia that she empathized with her, but could not leave her ill child’s side. Cleric used Sending to communicate with Father Lucian and got a near immediate response that he has hs suspicions, is forming a guard, and is worried for his sister’s safety. 

The party went to Krezk and Rogue announced that they were the entourage of Baronet Victor Vallakovich. Turns out the Vallakoviches visit their family somewhat regularly and the guards baby talked him about how much he’s grown and took them in immediately. Dmitri Krezkov embraced his nephew. And then the party saw Anna Krezkova. Yep. All is NOT well in Vallaki. 

Of course, all is not well in Krezk. The Krezkovs’ last child, a daughter named Rozaliya, was ill with a wasting disease. A medicine check revealed she’d been poisoned and their best hope would be some kind of lesser restoration. The Krezkovs recommended the holy pool. The party happily went to the Shrine of the White Sun. 

Whereupon Ireena yeeted herself into the pool, calling out for Sergei. 

Fighter, her loyal boyfriend, dove in after her and saw Not Ireena (Read: Tatyana) embracing Sergei Von Zarovich. They hit the bottom and their souls were absorbed into the Sunsword, leaving a now-drowning Ireena scrambling for the hilt of the sword and the surface. Fighter pulled her out of the water and as they surfaced, lightning struck the pool and Strahd’s voice rang out: She is mine. The party managed not to get knocked prone by the blast, but Fighter and Ireena got fried. Below half health, they stumbled from the water and Ireena explained that the part of her, the Not Her, was gone and she was free to love Fighter totally and completely and without hesitation. Vallakovich and Paladin checked to see if the water still had magical properties. Nada. Cleric flipped out and panicked. She’s been dreaming of a past life here and feels protective of this pool. Meanwhile, Paladin saw someone carrying a jug of water uphill and got Fighter to go with. To everyone else, it looked like they yelled at a child to give them holy water. It was really a mutant (Belview). They struck a bargain.

Rogue began thinking about the Tarokka reading and began to panic. They’ve already found the Tome (it’s how the got Vallakovich to come with) and they now have the Sunsword, she realized that Ireena was no longer the Devil’s Bride as predicted and therefore might not be their ally. She then realized that the wounded elf with they holy symbol and dark dreams is her father, Kasimir, who she doesn’t trust at all and she threw up. A lot. Vallakovich announced that the sword had magic. Ez calmly pulled out a Tarokka deck and read for them, revealing that they might look to the Devil’s brother, who will betray him. Rahadin. You know, the weird elf man, haunted by screams, who wrote Rogue a passionate love letter and warned her to avoid the Dusk Elf encampment because she might be the last woman?

Fuck. 

More vomiting. Vallakovich tried to comfort her. Cleric insulted Ireena. Ireena took a lap. While alone, Cleric called out to the Raven Queen for aid. Low percentage roll. Signal lost. Fighter and Paladin came back with the holy water to this shitshow. 

The party went back to the Krezkovs’ house and accidentally revealed they pissed off Strahd. Dmitri wanted to throw them out but Anna said if they could heal Roza, they could stay.

Success!

They stayed the night. 

Fighter and Ireena 100% had sex for the first time. I have a strong feeling that without Tatyana’s genteel nature imbued in her, Ireena is not exactly quiet. Paladin heard EVERYTHING. 

Ez was lucky to sleep in the wagon. 

After breakfast, they went to the Wizards of Wine Winery, except they forgot to get directions. The party wandered aimlessly until Rogue and Cleric heard hoofbeats chasing them - large. The party tried to outrun it, tried to hit this unseen force. NOTHING. They stopped. The hoofbeats stopped. Rogue went to investigate. A letter bearing Strahd’s handwriting fell from a tree, followed by an exhausted, but exceptionally attractive Dusk Elf Chamberlain. They started having A Moment, flirting and checking in with each other. Behind them, Paladin kept yelling that Barovia needs a postal service and then Cleric yelled to ask if Rahadin believed in Tarokka readings. I outfitted him as an Oath of the Crown Paladin and he cast Zone of Truth on the party. He, Ez, and Fighter saved. They explained that he is meant to assist the Rogue on getting out and he said that that had become his chief goal the moment he met her: her safety. Rogue insight checked him and as much as he tried to lie, he could not hide his earnest feelings for her. Because of the Zone of Truth, she couldn’t hide her feelings, either, calling him charming and telling him she hoped to see him again. He gave the party directions to distract from his heating cheeks. Rogue asked him about an Elven temple and he drew her a map to the ruins outside Vallaki. This place is in her trances. He promised to tail them and to meet her there when they were safe in Vallaki. He crosssed to her to give her the map and exchange Lingering Gazes. She was not damaged by the screams (he absorbed it all). Then as he went to mount his elk steed, she ran to him and kissed his cheek. He bade her to be safe and disappeared into the woods. The only sign he is nearby was the sound of slaughtered Berserkers. 

The arrived at the winery and Paladin SWORE something moved in the vines. Everyone dismissed him as crazy and then they found the displaced Martikovs who told them about their plight - the invasion, the missing gem, the shipments that will not make it out to the valley. With the help of Elvir and Stefania, the party cleared the house of druids and blights. Highlights of this fight include:

Cleric, who has hit on Lucian and Ez throughout the game, saying, “Oooh Mister Martikov” in such a horny way to Davian Martikov that we spent half the game mimicking it.

Paladin setting blights on fire and Vallakovich putting out the fire with ray of frost. They’re both named Victor and the make a great team. 

Paladin getting covered in blights and half the party hitting him with the broad, flat sides of their swords to help. 

Fighter one-shotting the Druid with the vampire staff.

Vallakovich using Suggestion. It was highly effective and they got the last Druid to tell them all about the ritual at Yester Hill tonight. 

Apparently, they have to stop SOMETHING called “Winter Splinter”. Paladin knows too much about trees and announced that it’s an evil tree makes blights. Great. 

Also, the Martikovs are wereravens, I guess??

The party received a letter via raven express from Lucian saying that he thinks whatever is in the house is hurting Lydia, that her maid escaped to tell him horror stories, and that Lady Wacther is planning something. The party had to decide whether to stop Strahd’s ritual or to race back to Vallaki. They left for Yester Hill immediately after. I wish them luck. 

[curseofthebloodcountess]

Urlstra was our Twilight Cleric - a drow raised by Shadar Kai, in the service of the Raven Queen. In this version of Barovia, the Raven Queen and the Morning Lord were lovers forced apart by the creation of the Dark Domains (to house great evils, they sacrificed their love to protect the people. A wild difference from my current game, but I digress.) The first character Urlstra really fell in love with was Yeska in a totally maternal way. Yeska is Lucian's son in pretty much every version of CoS that I run. Yeska decided to play matchmaker and Urlstra (and Urlstra's player, my now girlfriend) was like, "lol give me a good reason to ship it."

So I did. I made Lucian one of three stable adults in Vallaki, held together by fantasy ibuprofen, hot in a DILF kinda way, incredibly kind, and a pretty decent cleric with some skill in combat - a legitimate threat to Strahd's vampire spawn. if not to Strahd himself. He fell in love with Urlstra I think before she fell in love with him, but they ended up being down bad for each other. They would go on mission trips to the Dusk Elf camps, not to evangelize, but to share supplies with them. Lucian spoke fluent, if Barovian, Elvish to Urlstra, they parented Yeska together, and there was a lot of peace in their relationship.

Granted, when the party met Ez, Urlstra was also down bad. Ez was reckless and smart, free spirited and so terribly awkward about romance (a "love 'em an leave 'em" type who didn't know what to do with real feelings for Urlstra). The encouraged each other to take risks, fight monstes (so many monsters), and Urlstra rescued Ez from Ludmilla. They were passionate and exciting as a couple. Ez offered to take Urlstra traveling across the mists to fight more evils, but when she thought that Urlstra was going to marry Lucian only, Ez still bought her her wedding dress.

I wasn't sure how Urlstra was going to choose. Then we had the three of them interact. It didn't go perfectly, but Yeska was enamoured of Ez and his seal of approval opened Lucian's heart to her. The two of them flirted, a little meanly but like... it worked. Urlstra encouraged them both to pursue each other and her at once. The three of them had some fun times in the Blue Water... The Church of St. Andral... and Ez's caravan. Mind you, not all of this was directly in session, but we would talk about it, write about it, and do 1x1 roleplay. The parts of it that made it into the game were delightful.

However, out of character, I was less sure what to do. We were building this fun, little polycule for fiction, but my not-yet-girlfriend who I was falling for IRL kept saying Lucian and Ez were two sides of me. It's all fun and games, flirting with your friend as a hot priest and sexy monster hunter until you catch feelings, you know? Especially since I prize my storytelling ability and didn't want to compromise it. I had to think it through.

There ended up being some worldbuilding about how souls had split (specifically St. Andral split between Ez and Lucian) and reincarnated (Urlstra was Markovia), Urlstra gained the ability to pray to the Raven Queen or the Morning Lord, and the three of them got married at Vallaki's wedding festival. Strahd then killed Urlstra on the wedding night (literally only so he could steal her shit) and Ez brought Urlstra back. The three of them hate Strahd, even though everyone else ended up neutral to posiitve towards him. It's implied that Lucian will keep down the home base in Vallaki while Ez and sometimes Urlstra travel now that Barovia is liberated from the Dark Domains. But that game has been finished for a long time.

I eventually got the girl, btw. Somehow, being a mix of Father Lucian and Ezmeralda D'Avenir is the thing to be if you want a baddie to move 1000 miles cross-country to be with you. The week we started dating, I was visiting her in Chicago. We were talking to another friend who was also running CoS and, in comparing notes on Ez, I turned to my now-GF and said, "Would you like to tell our friends where your girlfriend is?" I meant that Ez was captured by Ludmilla in Tsolenka Pass. Instead, she went, "Right... here...?" and that's the story of how we started dating.

In our current game, Blood Countess, we made Lucian's dead wife Urlstra with a Twist and the party has a straned relationship with Ez. I've been trying to decide if it's funnier for Ez and Lucian to still be a thing in Blood Countess because like... I cannot stress enough how much my GF's new cleric, Alistor, hates this woman and how much "Father Lucian definitely fucks"/"But he's my dad!!!" the warlock (Theo, Lucian's adopted daughter) has had to put up with. (Legit: the party thought he was renown rake, Alek Gwilym, reincarnated because he had ... *checks notes* Three children, one of them adopted. Which would have been even funnier, since Alek is Alistor's dad, but, no, I did something else there. A different story.)

I have only a few hours to decide if Ez and Lucian are 1. strangers 2. exes who are mad about it 3. exes who are chill with each other 4. still together in some fashion. or 5. about to start dating for the first time much to the chagrin of everyone.

hey no shame i’m just curious but I swear to the morninglord i saw a post about one of your PCs being in a polycule with Ezmerelda and Father Lucian can you please identify yourself I am so deeply fascinated