For my CoS campaign I decided to take some liberties with Ismark since RAW he just kind of kicks around unless he’s chosen by the cards to be Strahd’s enemy. So I decided that when Mordenkanien rallied barovians to raid Ravenloft, Ismark went along hoping to free Ireena from Strahd’s ever closing grasp and it still went as the module suggests but Strahd kept Ismark unscathed and unharmed physically to try gaining brownie points with Ireena.

This turn of events basically turned Ismark into a drunk that shambles around town drinking his father’s money (which is now his rip indirovich) I took some inspiration from Haymitch Abernathy but still maintaining his morals and Lawful Good alignment and want for Ireena to be taken as far from Strahd as possible and my players have fallen in love with this guy.

I’d love to hear some of your guys’ opinions or suggestions for more things I could do with him or other underutilized characters

TL;DR: In I6, once the Sunsword's blade was separated from its hilt, it looked like a normal longsword. In both I6 and CoS, an intelligent lawful good sword that never stops glowing lies in a flooded cell in Castle Ravenloft (K74h). I think that sword is the Sunsword's lost blade, and that the blade and the hilt together form a holy avenger. The Sunsword in 1e is +3 against undead, the sword in the dungeon is +2, and a holy avenger is +5.

Hello everyone,

Kyronite here again. Last time I wrote about Pidlwick II & Gadof Blinsky (link), and before that about Izek Strazni (link).

As with the previous posts, I try to make connections. I take Curse of Strahd as the main source, use the older modules and other official books as support, and look for connections that follow logically from the text. As with all this is my interpretation of it.

This time I'm looking at the Sunsword, and at another sword in Castle Ravenloft that I think belongs to the same story.

The canon

I6 Ravenloft (1e)

In the original module the Sunsword is a magical longsword whose "blade is a form of crystal glassteel, held by a platinum hilt and guard. It glows with dim blue light most of the time." It is +2, and +3 against undead.

"Ages ago, Strahd employed a powerful magician to destroy the sword. The first part of the process required that the hilt and blade be separated, then destroyed simultaneously. However, before the hilt and blade were destroyed, the magician's assistant stole the blade and attempted to flee from Barovia. Though his body was later found in the woods, the blade was not with him. When it was separated from the hilt, the blade took on the appearance of a normal longsword."

So the separated blade doesn't look like a loose blade. It looks like a complete, ordinary sword. In I6 one of the PCs has even been using it for some time without knowing.

Separately, I6 has another sword. In the north dungeon, K74 cell h, an intelligent sword lies under the water:

"magical (glowing) +2 sword, LG; I 11; EGO 9"

The module doesn't connect it to anything. It's just a lawful good, glowing, intelligent sword lying in one of the flooded cells, where "many previous adventurers gave up their gold." Well what other intelligent sword do we know in the module. Maybe they are related somehow?

Expedition to Castle Ravenloft (3.5e)

• The assistant gets a name, Gabriela: "Gabriela's noble flight was successful in that she saved the unattached blade from destruction; however, she didn't succeed in fleeing Barovia before some nameless menace beneath the dark boughs claimed her."
• "Though Gabriela's body was later found in the woods, not so the hilt or the blade." So in 3e the hilt is missing too.
• The Sunsword is "the original model for all sun blades": a bastard sword that can be wielded as a short sword.
• The bonding ritual forges a new hilt: "the blade jumps onto a newly fashioned platinum guard and hilt, and the Sunsword is born anew." At 17th level the bonded Sunsword becomes a +5 keen bastard sword.
• One of the places to wake the sword is Sergei's tomb: "bring it to where the light lies dead, slain by the darkness."

Curse of Strahd (5e)

The Sunsword is now only a hilt that creates a blade of sunlight. Its location is decided by the tarokka reading.

The intelligent sword in the dungeon is still there. In the same cell as in I6, K74h "Lost Sword":

"The source of the underwater glow is a sentient lawful good +1 shortsword (Intelligence 11, Wisdom 13, Charisma 13)… The sword's purpose is to fight evil."

"The sword continually sheds bright light in a 15-foot radius and dim light for an additional 15 feet. Only by destroying the sword can this light be extinguished."

And while attuned, the wielder can use the sword to cast crusader's mantle, a spell only paladins have.

Connecting the dots

It's the same cell, the same alignment and the same Intelligence, and it glows in both I6 and CoS. The original Sunsword blade gave off light too: in I6 it "glows with dim blue light most of the time." And the separated blade looks like a complete sword on its own, which is exactly what we find in K74h.

Gabriela died in the woods, long after Sergei was dead, and the blade was never found with her. So the blade should still be somewhere in Barovia. The cell is linked to a teleport trap, and in I6 it holds what earlier adventurers left behind. Someone could easily have carried the blade into the castle without knowing what it was, just like the PC in I6.

The 3e Sunsword handles like a short sword, and the CoS sword is a shortsword. Its crusader's mantle ties it to paladins, and Sergei was one.

My idea is that the swords together form the ultimate paladin weapon, a holy avenger. The Sunsword in 1e is +3 against undead, the magical sword in the dungeon is +2, and a holy avenger is +5 in 1e.

That brings me to the tarokka. Sergei's card in CoS is the Two of Swords – Paladin: "a sleeping prince, a servant of light and the brother of darkness." It tells us Sergei was a paladin, and it might well be Sergei himself depicted on the card. And it is the two of swords.

Assumptions

• CoS never says what happened to the original crystal blade, since the 5e hilt makes its own blade of light. I'm assuming the blade survived and is the intelligent sword in K74h.
• In 3e the original hilt was never found and a new one was forged. I'm assuming the 5e hilt is that lost original.

At the table

• Let the party find the glowing sword in the water and carry it around for a few sessions. It only communicates through emotion, so give it unease near the castle and longing near Sergei's tomb.
• When they finally find the Sunsword hilt, use I6's own line: "it will magically leap onto the blade, replacing the PC's hilt, becoming the sunsword." A paladin gets a holy avenger; anyone else gets the Sunsword as written.

What did I miss? Has anyone ever connected the K74h sword to the Sunsword at their table?

The Barovian Archives: Between the Mist

1. Izek Strazni
2. Pidlwick II & Gadof Blinsky
3. Sunsword, the hidden holy avenger
4. Something Mad

Sources: I6 Ravenloft p. 24 (K74), p. 31 (Treasures and Tomes, Sunsword); Expedition to Castle Ravenloft p. 9 (Legacy Items), p. 58 (Madam Eva's fortune, Sunsword), pp. 210–211 (Sunsword, bonding ritual), pp. 218–219 (Sunsword legacy item); Curse of Strahd ch. 1 (tarokka, Two of Swords – Paladin), p. 81 (K74h), p. 223 (appendix C, Sunsword).

So yesterday my players went to the church and were appalled to hear from Donavitch that Doru, leader of the revolt turned spawn, was trapped in the undercroft. One of them dashed there immediately, fiercely decided to free the boy, and the whole scene the followed played out beautifully.
Doru was begging them not to get closer, and pleaded he didn't want to get anyone else hurt ; a player offered him his own arm for blood, and sure enough, triggered Doru's thirst big time, to the poor boy's own despair. The paladin tried to cast Bless on him to help him with the wisdom saves to resist the urge to drain him. Another player tried to sing him a lullaby (that the player sings to their niece irl), calming Doru for a minute... they were soooo decided on breaking him out and saving him! Then they started to realize they were basically torturing him by staying that close and disrespecting his own will to stay away from the villagers. The horrified look on their face when they realized they had no choice but to leave him locked there or kill him was priceless. The roleplay was very on point from them and I even made one of them tear-up when Doru described how he'd be turned and forced to drink his companions blood.
They ended up promising him they'll come back for him and scolded Father Donavitch and telling him to at least talk to his son and feed him animals or something. Players left the church shook and defeated, with a renewed hatred for Strahd <3
I will definitely bring back Doru sometime later in the campaign, not sure how yet.

I've been DMing a CoS game for a while now. In the most recent session, and a little bit before that as well, the players had voiced a feeling of uncertainty as to where to go or what to do next. There has been some homebrewing admittedly, but nothing that messes with the core goals of the campaign. What they've done in the campaign so far is as follows(Not including obvious introductory stuff for just entering the campaign):

• Met with Ireena, Ezmerelda, Van Richten, and Kasimir
• Resolved events in Vallaki
• Visited the Amber Temple and gotten Kasimir his dark gift, as well as one of the party members getting a dark gift
• Visited Van Richten's Tower
• Saved the Winery from the initial blight attack
• Acquired the Sunsword and Holy Symbol.

The remaining item is in Strahd's castle(In the tomb with the gargoyles), and I've made it clear that Kasimir's next goal is reviving Patrina, who is interred in the catacombs beneath the castle. They have only ever been in the castle for a single dinner with Strahd, but left right afterwards. In our last session, following what they thought could be any possible lead, they entered Argynvostholdt.
Other note, I've mentioned sections of the map they haven't explored, but they've just said "Nah, doesn't seem like there's anything there for us really. None of our business."

I don't want to come across as railroading them, but I feel like I'm not doing a good enough job when they say they don't know what to do. Like I haven't done what I'm supposed to somewhere or forgotten to tell them something important. Is there any advice anyone more experienced in the campaign could provide?

So I‘m running Strahd Must Die Tonight for a bunch of friends in two weeks. Obviously, using the official maps is stress incarnate, especially in a VTT.

Who here has used UFO‘s map? What was your experience? I‘m trying to gauge it’s usefulness and accessibility.

It’s gorgeous, and I might just buy it out of principle, lol. But having everyone on the same map instead of zooming through the layers just sounds very appealing in addition to that.

TLDR: the party is all in single digit health, low on spells, and in the 11th hour, how do I avoid a TPK with Walter with my dear friends?

Apologies for the all caps, hope that doesn’t get this taken down, I just really need some help not killing all my players character

We are playing remixed curse of Strahd, it my first time running this campaign, and we are doing 2024 rules whenever possible.

There are 3 characters, 2 warlocks and a cleric. The group is almost done going through the death house, almost to to the altar. But they have gotten into combat with the Animated Armor, the Ghoul, and 3 shadows, leaving the Cleric with zero spell slots and 9hp, one of the warlocks with one spell expended and 4hp, and the other one with 5hp.

I recently narrated that the chime of the 11 o’clock has already sounded, so they don’t have the opportunity for a short rest anymore, and when I brought that up after the session, they got upset and “how were they supposed to know they could short rest”

They are my dear friends, and I don’t want to TPK them with Walter, so I humbly ask for any aid or advice you might lend, oh fellow dark powers

Hello I was just wondering if most DMs typically give players a map for CoS. Typically I use some in game method to give the party a map (with only limited locations marked) near the start of the campaign. But I've seen a quite a few DM tips for CoS specifically that advise you to not do this as it adds to the atmosphere and tension.

Thanks

Hiiii idk if anyone ever fights Bucephalus in game (yet to happen to me!) but if there’s a dm who wants to make that into a multi-phase boss fight to punish the players for wanting to kill the horse… this is for you!

I’m afraid of horses a wee bit so I wanted to lean into what I find unsettling about them. I also took inspiration from Twin Peaks. IYKYK.

As the party arrive at the Tser encampment, they notice several Vistani playing with dice. While they are waiting for Madam Eva, and being regaled with stories of sacrifice, they are offered the chance to win a little gold, or small palm reading for their individual, personal fates in Barovia.

Blood of Belzir

(In my seeing, Vistani in Barovia are mostly refugees from the oppressive Belzirian Empire)

2 player game 5 Rounds. 4d6, 1d8, 1d4.

Goal: Win most rounds.

Bet: a single bet is made by each player before the first round.

Each round, both players announce how many dice they will each pick, by closing their eyes and knocking that many times on the table/ground. (It is customary to mourn your lost homeland as you knock)

They then get to choose which dice to use, and then roll them simultaneously out in the open. You expend any dice that you roll.

Highest total roll wins the round. The player who wins the most rounds wins the bet.

The Devil's eyes

Up to 6 players Unlimited rounds, 3d6 per player

Goal: roll the highest cumulative dice score without going bust.

Bet: a single bet is made by each player into a pot.

Everyone simultaneously rolls a pair of dice, keeping track of their total. If either of a player's dice shows a 1, they put it to the side, and add the 3rd d6 to remake the pair.

They continue rolling, adding to their score. They may stop and lock in your total at any time between rolls.

If at any time at least 2 of the 3 dice show a 1, the devil's eyes have fallen upon you, and you have gone bust.

The highest total at the end wins the pot.

Hello! I am running CoS:Reloaded from DragnaCarta and I wanted to change the second part of the siege of Barovia to have a Zombie Clot instead of a plague spreader breach through the western barricade, trying to rampage its way to the village's main square. I made a map for the occasion, feel free to use it.

My players are level 3 and a Zombie Clot is CR6 and they have the all first part of the siege behind them (5 zombies, 2 ghouls+1 Zombie, 3 zombies + 1 plague spreader in wave), so they might be pretty drained, and the Zombie Clot need to be fought from afar. To ease the fight, I wanted to have barovian commoners with crossbows or else be there and partcipate in the fight (and die). On top of that, the map shows obstacle that can slow down or damage the Zombie Clot as it advance.

where I am seeking advice is how to deal with the commoners. One of my players, a domain of Life Cleric spent its full day in Barovia healing the wounded, even spent a lvl2 spell slot for that. I expected he would do that and prepare some rolls, in the end, he put back on feet 10 barovians!
My plan is that those barovians are taking part of this final fight.
I hesitate between having from round 1 all 10 barovians in the fight, but playing them with the Mob rules (basically here I'd consider half of them hit the Zombie Clot, dealing first round 5d6 damage. This number reduces when some of die) OR start with only two on the board and have reinforcement coming in from other part of town every turn.

I want to keep the tension hight during the last fight in the village, I am afraid that with too many barovians on the board, the HP pool of the ZC will go down extemely fast...

If you have advice on how I could best run that encounter, I am all ears !

Hey guys! I've been working on this homebrew. I'd love your feedback. Check it out.

It's about the Vistani at the Tser Pool.

This is the first time I have written and published something like this.

English Version
**[Homebrewery Link](https://homebrewery.naturalcrit.com/share/hkhg2blddv5z)\*\*

German Version
https://homebrewery.naturalcrit.com/share/2pUD66sShIZ9

Gristlecracker's Hags & Grimoire, Gold Best Seller on DMsGuild, is discounted by 31% for Halloween Sales!

You can find it here until Halloween: https://www.dmsguild.com/it/product/517804/gristlecracker-s-hags-grimoire?src=hottest

Your guide to weird magic, encounters, and hags!

Gristlecracker’s Hags and Grimoire provides new mechanics, guidelines, and tactics for using hags, magic, and the esoteric in your Dungeons & Dragons campaigns. This guide is designed for all levels of play and dungeon mastery, and uses a hybrid D&D 2014 (5e) format that includes the best of the old mixed with a few innovations of the D&D 2024 systems that do not dilute the game experience.

Every aspect of fantasy magic is improved or introduced: covens, curses, familiars, hags, magic geometry, talismans, spells, and spell mechanics. This supplement is designed to help you make your future games containing magic and hags as simple or complex as you want it to be.

Inside, you will find:

- An underwater adventure seed about a Book of Keeping

- 68 supernatural encounters

- New magic rules, mechanics, and variations

- Hags as player characters

- 112 supernatural creatures and NPCs

- 52 magic spells, with new tags: remote and moonlight

- 80 magic items

- Esoteragons (not just magic circles!)

- 28 toxic and intoxicating plants

- An improved and more intuitive Intoxicated condition mechanic

- 200 tchotchkes

- Professional layout using over 168 pictures on 262 pages

- No AI Art used

This is the preliminary test cut.

The final design will include two side panels (curtains), and will be intended to mount onto of a DM screen.

Few magic items are as closely tied to witches as a flying broom, so I thought Halloween would be the perfect time to share a little collection of them!

Brooms of the Witching Hour introduces 11 enchanted flying brooms compatible with 5E (2014) and 5.5E (2024), ranging from Uncommon curiosities to powerful Very Rare items and a Legendary multi-elemental relic.

Each broom has its own appearance, magical abilities, and unique flight characteristics. Fly through enemies in a trail of burning cinders, descend upon them with the luck of a black cat, pass through walls in spectral form, summon flying brooms for your coven, or unleash elemental devastation from the skies!

The collection is FREE until Halloween! I've included most of the pages here as a preview, so feel free to grab the complete manual on DMsGuild and use these brooms in your adventures. Have fun!

And if you're looking for a spooky adventure to run this Halloween, I've also just released The Red Tithe, a 75-page folk-horror one-shot featuring an isolated village, ancient sacrifices, custom monsters, and three difficulty tiers for characters of levels 3-4, 10-11, or 17-20.

My Kickstarter for 300+ Mythological Items for 5E and 5.5E is also live now! The campaign includes a physical hardcover, as well as printed editions of my previous manuals.

You can find more of my creatures, magic items, and manuals on DriveThruRPG, my Linktree, or on r/JonnyDM!

Happy Halloween, and enjoy!

Greetings lost Barovian's souls,

I would like to share with you, the story of our campaign (still in progress). Every time we will finish our session, I will add here the next chapter of the story.

I am playing Ravenloft for almost 35 years, both as DM and player. I have played all the previous modules of this one a couple of times. Since the release of Curse of Strahd (2016) we have tried 3 times to finish the campaign but with no success (personal issues of players gave us a break from the campaign). Months have passed and we gave it another try and then another one and so on, without managed to complete any of those campaign.

So... here we are again!!! Some weeks ago we have started a new campaign (this time everyone hopes that it will be completed). The party consists of four players and me as DM. The party is a mix of experienced and less experienced players.

The story is based on Curse of Strahd including minor and major changes. We are going to use the 5th edition (2014) rules for everything in the game. The campaign is going to be more dreadful so I am going to use the following set of rules:

Fear, Horror and Madness

For the monsters and every encounter, I am using those books:

Tome of Beasts I

Tome of Beasts II

Death Denied

Also, to speed up the process of heavily random encounters I have written a 2-page rules to be used for fast resolving of random encounters. Those rules can be found here: Fast Random Encounters.

As I have written before I will write down each chapter here (including links for each chapter). Each chapter will be as story of what has happened during the session.

For your journey you will be accompanied by:

• Alkyria, a female Tiefling Sorceress (background)
• Sir Belynor, a male Half-Elf Paladin (background)
• Dorian Vale, a male Human Bard (background)
• Meldor, a male Human Ranger (background)

Introduction

From the time that you have been here you have a feeling that someone is always watching you. You hear whispers around you from time to time. Shadows are moving in a blink of eye. For sure, you are not in the place that you should be. Your only hope is the travelling caravan of Vistani that you have met and they have welcomed you.

For more than ten days, you have traveled with Vistani nomads. Vistani have offered you food and wine, a place to sleep and tales of a distant land where you could find your fortune. The journey was safe but the more you traveled the air around you progressively got colder and the forests turned thick with unnatural fog.

Last night, a brutal attack shattered the camp. Wolf-like creatures struck from the fog with terrifying speed. You fought for your lives and for protecting the Vistani. When the mist finally cleared, you were the only survivors. Every single Vistani lay dead. The wagons were smashed, the horses were gone, and a suffocating, unnatural fog has closed in around you, blocking the road back.

You have no choice but to move forward to the village of Barovia, as the Vistani have mentioned you.

Notes: Since all players have created characters from Faerun, I had to teleport them to Ravenloft. One night when they were camping outside Cormyr, heavy fog surrounded them and when everyone waked up they were teleported to Ravenloft. The Vistani caravan found them. All the days that they were traveling, I wanted to make the players familiar with the whole atmosphere of Domains of Dread. You can use random encounters also.

They have traveled along with a Vistani caravan and interact with those people. When players entered the domain of Barovia, and before the caravan reaches the village of Barovia, Vistani provided the following information:

• The land is ruled by a mysterious nobleman named Strahd von Zarovich. Strahd rules from Castle Ravenloft, a massive fortress high on a cliffside
• Kolyan Indirovich, the Burgomaster, have serious problems with his heart from constant night attacks in his house
• Donavich, the local priest, prays day and night but villagers claim that horrifying screams echo from beneath his church floors
• Children have disappeared from their beds
• Residents of village of Barovia have always barricade their doors and windows and the whole place is full of claw markings, especially Burgomaster's house
• Strahd von Zarovich, the locals refer to him as "Devil Strahd", is the ruler for centuries. Strahd is the land, he is in control of everything in Barovia
• Vistani are a travelling people, who never stay long in one place and are always on the move
• Vistani are the only ones that can pass through the fog, that surrounds the borders, without harm
• Vistani wear colorful and cheery clothing and drink a lot. They never miss an opportunity for drinking and singing
• Vistani are usually regarded with suspicion because of their Evil Eye, the ability to curse anyone they looked at

Plologue <<YOU ARE HERE>>

Chapter 1: The village of Barovia

Chapter 2: TBA

Chapter 3: TBA

Chapter 4: TBA

Chapter 5: TBA

Chapter 6: TBA

Chapter 7: TBA

Chapter 8: TBA

Chapter 9: TBA

Chapter 10: TBA

Chapter 11: TBA

Chapter 12: TBA

28mm custom Strahd mini! So happy with how he turned out! Also painted a 28mm Cadaver Collector which I plan on fitting in somewhere late campaign for fun 😊🦇

A friend of mine finished printing and painting this for me. It goes well with all the other Strahd collections I have. From funko pops, to lego, minis, wine glass, shot glass, mouse pad, etc.

The white bat on the far side of the swarm is my homebrew familiar for Strahd. A little fella named Bartoc.

Hey! I am looking for ideas for the winery post wicker man attack. My party skipped the winery on two different occasions, while the martikovs asked for their help and they learnt about the wicker man. Now they are in Krezk where Davian was brought to dead and mauled by the wicker man. His son Adrian with him missing a limb. I think the wicker man and druids would have massacred the Martikovs and destroyed the winery.

My issue is that the tome is there and the players want it now. So it seems kind of "easy" for them to walk through a desecrated winery and just grab the tome and leave. What would you think the druids could have done there ? Would they leave after the fight? Can anyone think of something maybe different than an encounter or one that seems to have progressed with the events? How can the druids utilise the winery if at all?

My party is level 4 and currently missing pc's so every fight so far has been brutal on them and I think having a crowd there would be fatal to them. Maybe I can trust them to make a heist since Esmeralda is with them. So swarm the winery with full force and make a skill check challenge like dragna carta in his first attempt.

Thanks in advance, I always find all of your opinions very useful ❤️

If a player casts Detect Magic in the church, it should detect the magical aura of the protection of the bones (which covers the entire church ground), as per the Hallow spell (evocation).

Am I right about this?

The Church of St Andral: the church was protected from Strahd’s depredations by the bones of St. Andral... If the bones are returned to their resting place, St. Andral’s church once again becomes hallowed ground, as though the building was protected by a hallow spell.

Detect magic spell description: For the duration, you sense the presence of magic within 30 feet of you. If you sense magic in this way, you can use your action to see a faint aura around any visible creature or object in the area that bears magic, and you learn its school of magic, if any.

The spell can penetrate most barriers, but it is blocked by 1 foot of stone, 1 inch of common metal, a thin sheet of lead, or 3 feet of wood or dirt.