#meanwhile in barovia

[tea-with-eleni]

Meanwhile in Darkon, the Gossip Thickens

While the boys are dealing with the part where the wizard reveals they really shouldn't trust him or he'll kill them... the girls are analyzing past mistakes. My players, you should not read below the cut, for here spoilers await.

“Sweetness, if you feel up to it… you ought to tell her how we met.” Ludmilla is holding Volenta’s hands. She sounds exhausted. “After what the wizard said at the lake, she ought to know your story.” Volenta seems to shrink a little, then nods at Milla. She pulls her hands free and sits on the floor. She does not look at you.

“It isn’t a very nice story,” she admits. “But it will probably help you stay alive if you know it. Please… don’t tell the boys.”

“I can’t promise that,” you say, although you know you will keep her secrets. Milla smiles slightly and rests a hand on Volenta’s shoulder.

“We’ll tell them, if we have to. But it will also be very clear why they would most likely prefer not to know all of our secrets.” Volenta nods in agreement.

“I wasn’t alone, when I came out of the mists,” she says. “I came with friends. Like the boys. But… I was stupid. I wanted to be special, maybe, or more powerful, maybe, or maybe I just got tired of how sure they were that they were doing the right thing, trying to kill the vampire lord.” She shrugs. “It isn’t too complicated a story. Something heard my stupid hopes and wishes, and it told me I could be perfect. I could live forever and love forever and I would have gifts and powers I could barely dream of.”

“Vampyr?” you guess. You think she must be trying to evoke that now-uncomfortably-familiar idea. Volenta leans against Ludmilla and nods.

“There was a price,” she says. “Betrayal. It likes that. I was supposed to lead my friends to the Amber Temple and betray them. Like what your wizard said, maybe. I tried to be clever about it. I agreed to the bargain… then I ran to Strahd instead.”

Ludmilla picks up the story. “He was going to make her spawn. I argued that we did not know enough about creating true vampires. I was an accident, sweetness. I argued that he wouldn’t want to risk anything when turning you.” Her half smile seems sad. “I hope you’ll forgive me for using you as an excuse.”

“I was never spawn,” Volenta almost whispers. “I don’t know that was a good thing. Vampyr did not like that I tried to escape it. The next time I saw my friends, I… I couldn’t stop myself.” Her hands are fists. Her jaw is tight. Milla strokes Volenta’s hair.

“You killed them?” you guess. Volenta nods.

“I haven’t thought about it, much,” she admits. “It only wanted one life, it told me. In exchange for such devotion…” she shrugs. “It upheld its end of the bargain. It didn’t lie. At the time, it felt good. Right. But it was a stupid, stupid, stupid mistake… and I won’t ever be free of it.”

“We’ve seen most other souls be reborn, over time,” Ludmilla says. “But never those four. We used to look. Most people live one or two lives a century, depending on their luck, as best we can tell.”

“I offered him my way out,” Volenta says. She means Lorenzo. “I wondered, if we did leave him spawn… but it wouldn’t work. Vampyr would kill me if I tried, I’m sure. And then you’d have to kill him anyway.” She sounds… broken. Defeated. You can’t help it. You’re the type of person to offer comfort, by your own nature. You get off the guest bed and sit beside her on the rug. She’s tiny, next to you. You hug her. She tries to resist, but soon relaxes into the embrace. Ludmilla freezes when she is upset, you now know, embracing her unliving nature. Volenta almost feels alive in your arms. Her breath is ragged, as if she is holding back tears. She is cold, still, but she moves like a living person. Ludmilla sits on her other side.

“We’ll find some way out of this,” she says. You can’t tell if she means it. “With or without the boys. It would be nice to have allies, but if they destroy themselves…” She shrugs. “Well. He’d listen to you, Ireena, if you told him you begged us to come back. If we’re very lucky, then we can convince him to dine with you, get him distracted enough, then stab him in the back or something.”

It won’t work. It definitely won’t work. It does seem to cheer Volenta, though, a little. She leans her head against your shoulder and gives a weak laugh. “We could stake him,” she suggests. “I wouldn’t mind leaving him like that to wait while we figured out what to do next. Fair’s fair.”

“He didn’t want us to interfere with you,” Milla tells you quietly. “There are extensive crypts underneath the castle. Staking a vampire paralyzes us. He left us there…for years, sometimes.” You wince. She nods. “Please…it would be kinder to kill us. If it ever comes to such a thing. We would prefer it. I trust you, if… just, if.” You sigh and rest your head against Volenta’s.

“Thank you for telling me.” You close your eyes. “I’ll be better than him,” you promise. “I could never be him.”

“Thank you."

[luckyblackcatxiii]

God it feels like forever since I posted any art (because it HAS been)! I've been busy but hopefully I'll be getting more me-time so I can draw more TTRPG related things :Jc

Anyway, I know I promised Rahadin as the next designed NPC--he's next I promise--but we finally arrived in Vallaki and Saverio made quick friends with a very sophisticated man he met and I just had to draw him. Our Vallaki has a Victorian vibe to it, and my DM based him off of Gary Oldman Dracula so I went along that line of thought while also adding a little bit of Gankutsuou inspiration because it felt right.

Sav thinks he's so cool~ I, on the other hand, am suspicious as Hell... (No spoilers please 💕)

[lyriumheart]

how does cae with just a +2 have a higher wisdom roll success record than auriel my fucking cleric/paladin who has a +4. hewwo.

[olberic]

curse of strahd is so good. my character and escher are bffs and we’re playing music together and he taught me a bard spell as a boon. literally the path to happiness is to leave your party to their own defenses and join strahd’s bitches

[anantplayingdnd]

once again thinking about Barovia as a means of understanding abusive relationships and the various ways people in situations they can’t escape try coping with it all.

barovia village is full of people who have just accepted how terrible this is and have lost all hope. they’re miserable but with ravenloft literally looming above them, living in ignorance is just as impossible as escaping.

the vistani are people who maybe aren’t in the abusive relationship themselves, who have the freedom to leave (mostly, they just have to ask for permission first). their general mindset is “well, i’m sorry Strahd is so mean to you guys, but he’s generally been pretty nice to us, so i don’t really feel like I can/need to stand up to him.”

vallaki is a whole city full of people who just want to act like… you know. All Is Well. vargas in particular is so deep in denial that it opens him up to being manipulated by Strahd. it’s hard to know to shut the gates for a monster you don’t believe exists.

lady wachter, although she believes Strahd is real and acknowledges how bad he is, thinks she can solve the abuse and make everything okay again without ever dealing with the actual problem (you know. Strahd.) my version of her was obsessed with bringing the sun back to Vallaki, which she wanted to do by sacrificing one of the PCs. even had this plan worked, it’s not like Strahd would have let it work for long. the sun can’t come back until Strahd is dead.

the abbott, meanwhile, has no intentions of just killing strahd. they know that wouldn’t work. so instead, why not just give the man what he wants? strahd wants a red-headed girlfriend, so let’s make him a red-headed girlfriend. nevermind the fact that what strahd actually wants is one specific red-headed girl. but the abbott has convinced themself that there must be a way to do this without anyone getting hurt. dead bodies don’t need their arms and legs, so that isn’t really hurting anybody. if this works, nobody has to get their feelings hurt. if we can compromise enough and just give Strahd what he wants, then he’ll leave us alone. surely.

[artsekey]

When was Cas bit by a wolf?

Session one! It was part of the first combat in the campaign. We have an optional in-house rule that says if a single attack takes you below half HP, you can decide whether or not the hit leaves a scar. At the time, Cas was level 1, so even something as simple as a wolf bite was super dangerous.

The opening of our campaign was really great, actually! I don't know that I've written about it on here, so here we go (sorry @ my DM and fellow players if I'm misremembering any of this):

After wandering for miles, Casimir finds himself passing through the mists at the edge of Barovia. He's completely alone, unaware just how far from home he's roamed, and it's not long before a monstrous "dire-wolf" catches the trail.

Casimir, who's never been out in the wilderness, doesn't realize he's being followed until it's too late. As he turns to face his pursuant, trusty lens to his eye, he comes face to face with a horrific, mutilated creature; a wolf made of skin and bone, it's body hollowed out by bugs and maggots. He freezes, and the wolf takes full advantage of his shock and rips into his shoulder.

Casimir takes off, absolutely terrified, and the commotion catches the attention of another (much more local) wanderer: Borivoj, a Barovian native who's spent most of his ~50 years in the wilds of Strahd's domain. He almost resolves to let it be-- after all, no good comes from looking for trouble in Barovia-- until he realizes what the creature is chasing seems to be a kid.

He intervenes, sword at the ready, and Casimir has a chance to hide. The battle is quick and bloody, leaving both the wolf and Borivoj unconscious.

Meanwhile, not too far away, a Cleric-- disowned by his chapter and sent on a pilgrimage he will not return from-- finds his path changed by what must be a sign from god. The trail he's been following, marked by churned earth and chittering insects, takes a sharp turn. As he follows, he manages to catch a glimpse of Borivoj as he falls to the ground. Compelled the help, he arrives on the scene just moments before Borivoj may have otherwise perished.

As Borivoj comes back around, Casimir emerges from hiding and the three meet for the first time. After they recuperate for a bit, Borivoj, sympathetic to their circumstances and grateful for the aid, offers to guide them to the nearest city so they can get settled in.

After all, it's not like they'll be leaving any time soon!

Thus began the adventures of Casimir Wójcik, a porter from a lesser noble house in the foothills of mountains not far from Barovia, Tao Hadal, an excommunicated cleric from the far city of Daggerfort, and Borivoj, a local of Barovia.

[sapphim]

OH my god. they canonically speak forgotten realms common in ravenloft. of course they do, why wouldn't they. there are > 5 domains whose rulers originally hail from Faerûn specifically and they all share the same dominant spoken language between them. that's. the common language of faerun. Vaasi is, to be sure, the most bogwild bugfuck dialect of FR common it's probably possible to encounter, but it IS a dialect of common. out of my gourd over here that I had to, for the sake of making my campaign actually playable, handwave a mystical translation convention to explain why my player characters were all mysteriously fluent in Balok despite Barovia originating in a prime material nobody's ever even HEARD of and meanwhile two of my pcs are literally from the sword coast. they could have landed in Kartakass or Nova Vaasa or something and it would have not even been a thing. fuck

[kiss-my-asymptote]

So, I’ve been in a D&D campaign for about two years now, and we’re wrapping it up with our Dm’s take on Curse of Strahd, where a lot of our characters’ personal stories are going to resolve. Our wizard is looking for her mentor who was last heard from while leaving for Barovia, My ranger/cleric’s long-lost mother is in league with Strahd and killed the uncle who raised her and kidnapped her estranged father in order to lure her to the castle and make them a family again, our werewolf blood hunter needs the blood from three of my mother’s lieutenants to cure himself of his condition and our sorceress is looking for a powerful legendary object in Stahd’s possession that might help her brother pull off a coup and save her homeland from a tyrannical king.

We’ve been dreading the castle this whole time thinking it’s going to be rough and impossible, but then last session our wizard sits down and was like “hey, so, I had a thought. Remember that time we explored that crashed Netherese city full of wizard shit and I pretty much spent the whole time in the library? I found this scroll to summon a tarasque there, how about we just summon it on Strahd’s front lawn as a distraction so we can do the things we need to while they’re distracted? It can be like a heist!” we were all like “that sounds so fucking insane, we’re so down for that plan…hey, we did that module like, almost a year ago/ six in-game months ago, have you had that scroll this entire time???”

So we take these giant barrels of magic fire wine we collected earlier and we set them up about a mile from the castle and then we walk right in because we had been invited as guests. We immediately scooby doo this shit, splitting up, my ranger goes down to the dungeons to find her mother/the catacombs where their coffins are so she knows where to find them once she and Strahd turn to mist and retreat, the blood hunter and the wizard go up to the tower to get my ranger’s dad, and our sorceress goes looking for a treasure room as well as the bones of an old dragon we’re supposed to bury to lift the curse on Barovia. The ally of ours who gave us that quest is like an undead dude who’s been quietly following behind us for like a week at this point and we put him in a bag of holding so he wouldn’t get in the way, and we forgot to take him out this entire time.

Eventually, my ranger finds her mom and our sorceress gets in trouble, running into one of the lieutenants. Sorceress sends a message to our blood hunter telling him to follow her scent with his werewolf nose and help her fight because they’re in love, my ranger has a back and fourth with her mom and has to fight her, another lieutenant and like six zombies by herself and immediately casts sending to the wizard saying “Tarasque! Now!!”

The wizard ( who has been leading a running joke about becoming ranger’s stepmom) found my ranger’s dad at this point and he’s not looking great. She summons the tarasque right in front of the wine barrels, so the thing gets drunk and has several charges of firebolt (because it was magic fire wine, you might recall) and starts charging towards the castle. 80% of the enemies in the castle go out to fight it off and immediately get gobbled up or scorched or both, meanwhile my ranger/cleric has the Holy Symbol of Ravenkind (which is a cleric object used to hunt vampires), so she casts hold vampire on her mother and destroy undead getting rid of all the zombies and putting her mother in the position where she’s frightened and *has* to use her action to dash away but physically can not move so she’s sitting there taking psychic damage while my ranger absolutely molly whops her and her little helper. She’s got spirit guardians, her bow is cursed by the vengeful spirit of her dead uncle, the blood hunter put a lightning effect on her bow… it’s absolutely disgusting how much damage she was putting out.

Elsewhere, our sorceress and blood hunter are using a wild magic rod to produce a stink cloud around their enemy and then lighting it on fire and causing explosions that shake the whole damn castle like lethal MacGyver and our wizard is just happily skipping through the castle pointing out the rapidly approaching living bulldozer to anyone who tries to stop her from walking around the castle with a recently freed prisoner and making her way down to my ranger where she precedes to just sit back and watch what’s going on until the hold vampire spell is about to wear off at which point she gets up to my ranger’s mom while she’s still stuck, yanks her crown down over her eyes and then casts immovable object on it so that she still can’t fight and my ranger can keep wailing on her. The other enemy in the room is fucking dust at this point, the spirit guardians demolished that dude.

In the end we managed to finish the ranger’s vengeance quest, find the object the sorceress needed, and got the blood vials for our blood hunter with very little effort and looney tunes tactics. This whole time we’re like “where even is Strahd?” but by this point we’re like “Seriously, where is that dude???” no one rolled an investigation check above a fucking 7, so our DM was like “gee, I don’t know 🤷🏽‍♀️” .We got out safely right before the tarasque hit the castle, demolishing it and burning it to the ground before it got up and started making its way towards one of the other unsuspecting towns and we’re like “…now what?”

At this point my ranger goes “OH SHIT THE DRAGON BONES WE WERE SUPPOSED TO BURY, [SORCERESS], DID YOU GRAB THOSE?”

Our Sorceress says “Oh… no, I saw them but didn’t grab ‘em, I was kinda busy…” then she lets out the undead npc THAT WAS STILL IN THE BAG OF HOLDING THE WHOLE TIME and points him towards the rubble saying “it’s in there, still, good luck” before we all have a discussion about if we even should lift the curse at this point because the trasque is still here, it won’t unsummon until it has no more hit points and it’s almost impossible to kill. It’s stuck in Barovia so long as the curse remains, we could just get one of the nomad people to help us get out and just leave the thing here because the whole place was doomed anyway and the people here kinda suck really bad.

That’s where our session ended that day, and it’s been almost a week since then but I’m still reeling over the way we essentially Bugs Bunny’d our way through Strahd’s castle—and where the fuck even is Strahd???

[barovianchickenandwaffles]

Barovian Tales: The Great Squash

While in costume for Strahdmas I, Oleksii, have been preparing for the arrival of the Great Squash. It came to me in a dream weeks ago. I stood in a vegetable field at midnight, and beheld a huge, bloated squash rising to the sky in its heathen glory.

The Great Squash said to me, “this field is most insincere and wicked. It is here I shall rise and preach many blasphemous and eldritch truths, while giving away much candy and presents. But only to those who are faithful.”

The people in Barovia laughed at me, and thought I was crazy. “The Morninglord protects us, why should we believe in a flying vegetable?” I swore to get my revenge when the Great Squash would grant me power to crush my rivals at last.

But Gertruda, ever the ditzy and devoted person, believed in me. I promised her much power and candy too as my new consort if she would wait with me in the vegetable patch on Strahdmas Night, rather than celebrating in the village with the other peasants.

Meanwhile, Gary the High Master Illithid / barista had some kind of rivalry with a mad wizard who styled himself the Crimson Duke. Overhead they flew into the night in some kind of epic aerial battle, until Gary was defeated and crashed into a field nearby.

The night wore on, and the vampire spawn of Strahd soared overhead, laughing their cruel, cold, soulless laughter at me. “You’re missing the profane festivities for a flying vegetable!” they heckled. But my devotion to the Great Squash was strong and the time of my revenge was nigh.

Gertruda’s faith began to waver, and she berated me for missing the paltry celebration back at the village what with its tricks and its treats.

Then, there was a rustling in the field. My heart froze as it drew closer and closer

“There it is! There it is!” I exclaimed.

Finally, a shape rose from the bushes just beside Gertruda, and I realized only too late that it was only Gary, not the Great Squash. He was about to eat Gertruda, then caught sight of me and said with a silent, telepathic shrug, “what?”

… and so, another Strahdmas came and went, and the Great Squash had lied to me. Thus, I learned the true meaning of Strahdmas.

Epilogue : I will try again next year to find a vegetable patch that is even more devious and insincere. Let them laugh at me, for in time I shall have my revenge.

This has been another Barovian Tales. Thanks for reading!

[rahadaddy]

Session 20 Recap

We had Session 20 this weekend! It was a wild ride because it’s one of those games where political intrigue dominated the session and I learned just how deep the conspiracy well runs within some of my players. 

The warlock had a confrontation with Father Lucian, her adoptive father, first thing in the morning, about her hasty engagement to Doru Donavich. Lucian confronted her about whether or not Doru is a vampire and received an honest answer, much to his dismay. He tried to forbid the marriage, but Theo managed to convince him that she has the situation well in hand. Ireena, Ismark, Yeska, and the church staff joined for breakfast and preparations.

Alistor, our cleric, awoke alone in the Blue Water Inn. He tried to rouse the ranger, Tam, but Tam’s player was absent, so Tam was ruled too hungover to join in. Alistor then went downstairs and learned of the first stirrings that all is not well with the Martikovs’ wine supply. He spoke briefly with Nikolai Wachter about the masquerade plans to restore Stella’s broken mind and the two of them (separately, but not that far behind each other) arrived at church late. Theo realized that Nikolai is trying to be seen at church, not unlike the way her uncle, Vargas, Tries To Be Seen, but is also very much trying to fill his late father’s shoes. He spoke with Theo briefly and mentioned that his cousin, Lavinia, would be back in town for the masquerade and he hoped his mother had the good sense to match her with his Bachelor Uncle, Rafael Buckvhold. Theo and Alistor concluded that it would be a lavender marriage and, you know? Good for them. 

The party then ventured to the clothiers’ for masquerade costumes. I told the party they have one week to surprise me with what they’re going to wear. I’m excited! Then, they went to Vallakovich Manor to peruse the baron’s library. On the way, Izek Strazni revealed that he has shifted his Intense And Possibly Violent Romantic Longing from Theo to Ireena, based on things that have happened since the last festival. No one liked this information. The party arrived to the manor. They agreed to lunch with Lydia after they did their researchl. They caught Vargas practicing his speech for the Festival and they began researching the Teray family tree on behalf of one of the revenants. The family tree showed interconnection among the nobility of several of the towns, including Vallaki and Barovia Village and the party learned that Sir Robern Teray’s last living (“living”) descendant is either Doru Donavich, Thorn and Rose Durst, or a woman named Anastrasya Karelova who appears to be a clerical error without a death date. They plan to go to Barovia Village at some point to deliver the Teray family crest to Doru. They then had lunch with Lydia, which I thought revealed more than it did. Oops. They also checked on Victor and tried to dissuade him from using his teleportation circle to try to find Ez D’Avenir again. While they were upstairs, Theo and Ismark clocked a voice in Lydia’s private chambers and Theo saw the outline of a woman in the mirror fading away. Vargas invited Ismark and Alistor back to dinner to discuss politics because the party successfully convinced Vargas that they know about political organization and, yes, Ismark is still definitely the burgomaster of Barovia Village. Theo and Ireena decided to get more information out of the Wachter boys about Fiona’s book club. During preparations to speak with the baron, Alistor caught Ismark checking him out and Ireena made fun. The group split.

Ismark and Alistor went to the manor and went on the weirdest double date with Vargas and Lydia… and Izek who kept asking if Ireena is single. Through some really good rolls, Alistor persuaded Vargas to consider building a council so he can focus on the truly important things in rulership (“Like festivals!”). Ismark clocked that Lydia was upset and scheming and he told Alistor of his fears as they walked back to the inn. 

Meanwhile, as Ireena served as a decoy for the very drunk Karl Wachter, Theo challenged Nikolai to a vodka-drinking contest and asked him about the book club. Nikolai drunkenly revealed that it’s not really a book club, but a place to discuss political and religious dissension and that his mother has introduced (or perhaps reintroduced) worship of The Lady of Shadows, with the belief that Strahd is her prophet. Nikolai expressed some disagreement with this view, stating that worshipping monsters never prevented tragedy from happening, never prevented him from losing Elizaveta (Vallakovich, his fiancee) or his father, never prevented Stella’s curse. He then drunkenly revealed to Theo that he doesn’t think his father died from sickness like everybody says. He said that the night he died, his father had a cold and went to bed early, his mother was out, and while Nikolai had the house to himself, he invited Elizaveta over. They heard a strange noise and Elizaveta ended up leaving. The next day she was gone and his father was dead. It had been mere weeks before their wedding and he’s never recovered from the double loss, which is why he thinks his mother is pitching him to Lavinia. He told Theo the book club will be kind of like a church event, kind of like a town hall, but that “miracles” happen - always for other people and often involving money that answers people’s prayers. Karl then interrupted the conversation, trying to get the girls to dance and Nikolai took his brother home. Alistor and Ismark rejoined Theo and Ireena and decided to walk them back to the church for the night. When they did, one of the PCs asked Lucian if it was ridiculous to think Lydia might be an assassin and Lucian got really quiet and said that he didn’t think it was ridiculous at all. 

That’s where we ended the session. The PCs are in the Church, asking Lucian for information about Lydia and possibly getting the reveal of a lifetime. Tune in next time for a “book club” meeting and the impending Moonlight Masquerade, the best festival of the year!

[beholdingslut]

barovia is getting its first democratically elected dark lord where the party wants it to be the three fanes (archfey nature goddesses) but there’s going to be some leftist infighting where some groups are voting for all three and other groups are going to only nominate one of them. meanwhile there’s a cultist witch in the running so they cannot afford to split the votes like this

[tea-with-eleni]

This week in Barovia...

My players, DO NOT READ FURTHER.

So the players debated, then continued to read the Tome of Strahd. Revelations were made. A very uninvited guest showed up. Relationships progress.

The short version: they read the chapter where Strahd mildly lost his mind, made his dark deal, and drained Alek Gwilym.

Not much to say about that one; if you know, you know.

The funny thing happened AFTER...

So, if you're in the minority that read The War Against Azalin, remember how Strahd got around the geas against Darklords going to each other's domain? He possessed a guy. The problem was that the guy fought back.

Well.

Now Tatyana has gone to Darkon and Strahd must follow. It takes time to brew the potion again, time to dig out those old notes, but who's on hand who would never fight back? Who's expendable?

Hi, Escher. Sorry dude.

It's almost like your master is a dark lord and not a great guy.

It gets worse.

The wizard has had a crush on Escher for a while.

And Strahd, being Strahd, has been extremely interested in the wizard. Like, he will kill the rest of the party. But the wizard really is interesting. He's kept a single adventurer from a party before, if they're interesting enough. (Side-eyes Volenta...)

I think the wizard was way too wrapped up in his own head/Vampyr whispering in his ear Dark Urge style that it would be so easy to kill a party member who so utterly trusts him, that it would be so easy to follow in Strahd's footsteps and embrace vampirism without the risk of a sire that may or may not allow you your free will afterwards. He didn't notice that Strahd's portrayal of Escher was anything but perfect. Either that, or he didn't care.

(Strahd did actually, maybe even sincerely?, warn him about Firan Zal'honen, on the grounds that he recognized the description and do not trust Firan Zal'honen. Pfft. Pretty sure Firan might very well prove a very, very, VERY interested ally if they actually approach him...but he's a little busy, he has a dinner party of his own to go to. Something about Lord Darcalus and vengeance for his son. If you know, you know.)

Anyway, this is a long way of saying that Strahd banged the wizard and my players might actually kill me when they find out, because this is like the third time Strahd has been acting via a false face to get close to them.

Fool me once, amIright?

Meanwhile, I really ought to write a short on how Ludmilla and Volenta and Ireena are coping with the aftermath of having read Tatyana's introductory chapter of the Tome of Strahd.

[archivestarlyht]

sol's luck is impeccable. infected with mind flayer parasite. manages to resolve that. either in barovia (that's a WHOLE new set of bad luck problems to deal with) or not after all that gets infected by werewolf bite.

fox meanwhile with the magical stuff he handles and people he steals from it's amazing that he hasn't been cursed by now. the mindflayer parasite is the worst thing he's had to really deal with in a while.

[nirikeehan]

What's your favorite aspect of Thalia and Metrion's friendship?

SO GLAD YOU ASKED.

As you probably know, writing about class and how my characters relate to class is one of my favorite things. One of the most interesting things to me about Thalia is how she is a noble, and has the entitlement of a noble, but has had enough personal experiences of oppression by being a mage and having to live in the Circle that she can transcend class lines and want to abolish them when possible.

When I listened to Twice Bitten, I knew pretty quickly Metrion was going to become my favorite character. This is because despite his player being American, the affected posh British accent he was putting on was not just fake for the player, but fake for the character. Suddenly Metrion was slipping into this low class-sounding cockney and I realized that was a deliberate character choice!!! This is the first indication that Metrion isn't just not everything he seems, but perhaps nothing he seems. It's absolutely brilliant character work.

So of course I think: Thalia is high class but instinctually empathizes with the downtrodden. Metrion is putting on airs of the aristocracy, but is actually from the dregs of society. And they are both deeply, deeply traumatized.

I have to make them best friends.

It's the class interaction that I love – despite the fact that they could not come from different places socioeconomically, they've both had weirdly similar traumas in their pasts, and I think that would give them a lot of unexpected common ground. They both have a lot of empathy, too, which is interesting – it's something you might not expect from a snooty noble (Thalia) nor a con artist (Metrion). Yet I think they end up wanting to look after the other because, especially in Barovia, no one else really sees them the way they do each other. Thalia is there as Inquisitor, a role of power – and is surrounded by a retinue sworn to protect her in this capacity. Meanwhile, Metrion is there because he's running from a string of questionable choices that has arguably kept him in the lowest rung of society.

Fuck me right up with that shit.

Also, they're both YOUNG. I write Thalia opposite a lot of older men. It is kind of a treat to let her pal around with someone her own age for once.

[thrumugnyr]

Of course @kat-therines-blog! I didn't think most people would care as it's a very OC specific side quest, but let me elaborate under the cut! (Minor spoilers for Curse of Strahd).

So, our Warlock's patron was one of the entities trapped in the amber temple. He didn't know at the beginning, as he had amnesia ever since he ended up in Barovia.

One of the special powers his patron gave him was the magic missile attack. But it turned out that every time he used it, a tiny part of his soul was ....sucked out of him with it. We only really put 1 and 2 together when it was too late and boom, soul gone. For a while we just went on like this, but of course Barovia is a dangerous place and having one player that you can't revive at all was freaking us out lol

Enter Patataj and his great idea to ask his friend Senna for help. Senna is an Aasimar sun god in training and she's always looking for followers (Patataj is the only one so far, and more in a 'supportive friend' kinda way rather than being an actual devout follower. She helped him escape when he was captured by orcs that one time).

Senna is my DM's character from an other campaign - so obviously she couldn't really be in the game per se, but her and Patataj were in contact through sendings and it was agreed that we could perform a ritual and with enough luck she might be able to rip the warlocks soul away from the being holding it and making her the new patron instead.

We went to the lake in Kresk, where Patataj's connection to Senna was strongest, and did the ritual in there.

Essentially we had to battle some lesser nightmare and other minions and survive for 10 rounds. Sadly, Gunther (the warlock) failed literally all the rolls against those attacks that permanently reduced his HP - and eventually, in the last round, his HP went down to 0 - without Patataj able to heal him back up or anything. And so we lost.

Now Patataj is upset for failing Gunther and he's also cross with Senna for not being able to hold onto the soul (though it is not really her fault at all and deep down he knows that of course).

Meanwhile Rahadin showed up for emotional support and hesitantly admits to Patataj that he was also kind of looking into a similar ritual and is quite pleased to see that it is potentially possible. Though right now he wants to work together with the group to prevent the entity that has Gunthers soul from escaping its prison at the amber temple, which now seems quite likely.

All this while we just try to save Kresk from starving and a werewolf from freezing!! Patataj has a lot on his plate I swear.

[xmoriartea]

Curse of Strahd Spoilers Ahead but oh my god

So we returned to the Abbey to check on Ireena - after our last sending to her, she told us the Abbot was a monster and she didn't think she was herself anymore

Well golly gee, guess who offered an operation to make it so Strahd wouldn't want her anymore?

The Abbot fucking swapped Ireena's face with Vasilika's - and if that weren't enough!! Ireena died on the operating table!! The Abbot brought her back!! But this is Barovia and everything is fucked up!!!

So what does the party do? Well the artificer thinks this is a great fucking plan and he and the healer/druid decide to ASSIST THE ABBOT WITH ANOTHER SURGERY, this time trying to reduce the seams on Vasilika so she looks more human.

Meanwhile the paladin and my Barovian batfolk monk want to test to see if Ireena can hide from Strahd by taking her down to the pool with Sergei's image in it to see if this face swap would be enough to hide her. It wasn't. The pool tried to draw her in but unlike last time, she walked towards it. Like her emotions and her sense of self are.... wrong since the resurrection. She was afraid of the pool when she first saw it. This time she didn't seem to have any opinions of it and went because the paladin suggested she do it. The monk did not agree and was not happy, and as she got very deep into the pool my monk called her to come back.

But then the storm came in. Strahd's voice echoed through the village that she was his, and he struck the pool and gazebo with lightning. Ireena was unharmed, but the pool's magic was depleted and the gazebo destroyed. And the wereraven who turned our paladin who had perched inside the gazebo was killed. Cue a scramble to protect a slightly more with it but not really Ireena while the paladin rushed to Tsonka's side to rez them with our only revivify scroll.

The evening spent in the Abbey afterwards was then filled with moral dilemmas about how to escape the domain or deal with Strahd, my monk unwilling to agree to most of it and calling them out for wanting to curse someone else in Strahd's place just so the rest of them can go elsewhere, and the party panic realizing Volenta was in her batform in my hood for the entirety of the 'we need to kill Strahd' conversation.

It's fine. Volenta is the least likely to willingly betray any of us because doing so puts my Remi in danger and she does not want that. She told the party they're basically as safe as she can see they are while still being hunted for protecting Stella from Strahd.

Remi also privately informed her that he might be Rahadin's son to which she was all kinds of disbelief and let slip that she was avoiding the castle right now - probably in part of the protect Remi plan she's got? - otherwise she'd be trying to get that gossip.

So things are going great in Barovia guys.

Oh. Also Baba Lysaga was resurrected by the witches in her swamp and she is PISSED because the only face she remembered was Remi's and she's not only tracking his movement, but she used Dream to hunt him in his sleep and promised to destroy him and everyone he cares about (jokes on her, that's a short list).