Intro to Curse of Strahd
Game Zero
So, in my Thesis Diary Post this week, I mentioned that I was about to partake of a monthly Curse of Strahd game. While this is not my first time playing in Ravenloft, it is my first time playing in any of the Castle Ravenloft based modules.
Any of you who have read through the posts on this site, hell just read my Bio on the landing page, knows that I love horror. More I love Dungeons & Dragons. To make this even better, this is a new group I’m playing with. I mean they are ALL friends, but I have only gamed with one of them before, and another one of them ran me through some Call of Cthulhu gaming.
I’m super excited to be playing with some of my friends from the Horror community. I don’t know if they would mind their names being mentioned here. I will just say that the group is being run by a romance writer (MM), the other players include a Horror/Thriller writer (BM), a gaming artist (RS), short storists/fans (KV, CC, CC2) and my friend and fellow aspiring author (RM). If you’ve read my TORG posts, RM is a player in those games. He’s been my regular D&D DM for the past 20-25 years.
What’s the Story About:
So, I have never played this module but I do know some of the story behind it. Strahd is a cursed ruler in a cursed land called Barovia. His story of love and loss is utter bullshit and he’s a total monster, but he tries to paint himself as a tragic figure locked in an eternal story of love and loss.
His kingdom and all of its people have been pulled form their world and placed into the Demi-plane of Dread (if you follow the links in the opening paragraph, you’ll get a lot of better information than I’m giving here). Suffice it is a cursed place where everyone relives Strahd’s “great loss.”
The opening hook takes characters from multiple worlds and brings them into Barovia.
Characters
So, normally this post would be all about the characters in the game, and I would run through the dynamics of who is who and what they are capable of. BUT as I write this, the first game is actually 12 or so hours away from starting and I only have cursory information. I will still try to give you the basics as I know them.
After this post I will be posting the events of the game as in-character journals. Where I run through the events as I witnesses them. Hopefully we’ll all have a good time and my character won’t die in the first game.
Isca Mallard (played by RM)
Isca is a halfling wizard, who lives in the shadow of his warrior grandmother. He is on the cusp of finishing his apprenticeship and has been sent out to act on his own and come back later as a “full mage.” In other words, his master had thrown him into the middle of the pond and is seeing if he sinks or swims.
Jherek Ondo (played by CC)
Half Elf, at the age of 13 he was beaten and his mother murdered. He ended up living in the streets/sewers of the great city Waterdeep. He might have become an urchin but was saved by a cleric of Helm. Jherek decided to protect and help the weak, and (I’m assuming now, remember I don’t have these character sheets) became a paladin.
Naamah Kobal (played by BM)
A blue skinned Tiefling raised in an orphanage. He left the home and joined a traveling sideshow where he became an expert entertainer, sleight of hand artist, and sexy boy. His weakness for tall, statuesque women saved him. Whilst on a tryst, his entire troupe was murdered by nobles. They blamed the crew for thefts, infidelities, and anything else they fancied. This bard is now working solo.
Raven’s Child (played by CC2)
A foundling, she was wandering through the forests, with no memory of her past. Taken in by a druid, Raven, who raised her in the old ways. Over twenty years, Raven’s Child has never recovered those early memories. With the passing of her Druid mother she is now leaving the grove to find her path in the greater world.
Sorrow Mai (played by KV)
A Tiefling woman raised as a black smith, she stands 6’6” and is 250# of pure muscle. A warrior of great skill she is practically Amazonian (and I’m predicting that Naamah falls madly in love with her). She is one of the only members of the crew that has both a solid childhood, living parents, and a normal, bright outlook. Between her and Isca they have normal parents and the most upbeat attitudes.
Tate Watershanks (played by RS)
His character bio was left blank on the Roll20 page… as he’s the artist of the group (as in his primary profession is art) he can be forgiven for leaving the page blank.
Lucian Esophorus (played by ME)
I am a Half Elf bard. I was raised by my elven father with my step mother and half-siblings. Despite being my father’s bastard, my mother was still kind to me. Though she did make sure I understood that as a half-breed I would never inherit any of my father’s lands or wealth. Offense wasn’t taken. The family was blessed with an over abundance of siblings. Most of whom would not be able to inherit much either.
I was given two options. I could work for my brother as a farmer on the land, or I could travel to the great city of Invalice and seek apprenticeship. The latter seemed best, not realizing that my apprenticeship had already been picked for me. They sent me to a monastery. My job was as a scribe and book keep. But there was pressure for me to take up the holy vows and join the clergy.
I was a teenager, I was beautiful (named after my platinum blond hair and sunny smile), and I was not looking to live the life of a monk. I quickly learned how to pick the lock of my cell, and the outer doors of the monastery and spent many of my nights in the streets and bars of Invalice.
The years passed and I was beginning to walk a line between education and sagery in my library, and being a charming scoundrel. But then word reached me that my family had fallen ill and that my youngest siblings had already passed from the illness. I rushed back home, days away by foot, and when I arrived only my father was left, half mad in his illness and grief.
He spoke of a curse on the family and over the next few days he died. Even as the sole survivor of the family I still didn’t inherit the lands. But I did take up a mantle to discover this witch’s curse.
It turned out to be undead spirits living in the woods. I went to confront them, only I was ill prepared. Luckily a band of monster hunters saved me from my revenge. They taught me the arts of hunting the dark creatures.
Now I travel the lands hunting down and writing the stories of such creatures, and learning how to kill them. My goal is to amass the greatest Tome of Undead Lore ever; and to kill as many of the creatures that feed upon the living as possible.
Intro to the Game:
My character begins his journey toward Castle Ravenloft by having a series of bad dreams. Nightmares of creatures praying on people, and myself always too late to save them. As soon as I arrive both monster and victim break into smoke and drift away. Finally, a voice speaks, telling me of a great evil that lives and preys on an entire land. A place I have never heard of before. A place called Barovia. The voice asks if I have the power to see it through, to be a hero for the people?
I awake in a cold sweat; it was all just a bunch of dreams. But clenched in my hand is a card, a tarokka card. Scrawled on the back of the card is the name: The Devil’s Teat. I know it’s a bar, but I don’t know how I know that.
On to Tonight:
That’s where I’m sitting… waiting to see how it goes tonight with these people I haven’t gamed with before. I expect a killer good time though.
Now, the way this is going to work is that you all need to wait for a while. The game happens tonight, I will then turn my notes into a journal and etc. But the game is only ONCE a month. So, the next post in this series will be all the way out on April 15th.
That said, I have been looking to add a few more posts to each month for those of you who are less interested in the Thesis Diary and more interested in the Gaming stuff. In 2 weeks, on Thursday the 1st of April (not fooling), I will be starting a series of Call of Cthulhu Posts. Here I will talk about the game, 7th edition rules, Pulp Rules, and then my thoughts on how to set up and run a campaign. I run campaigns, I don’t ever run modules. I know the bulk of CoC players seem to favor running modules and either stringing them together, or just running lots of one-off games. But that isn’t my style and never has been. So, we’ll talk about that in two weeks.
I hope you all enjoy this post. I would love to hear from people about their characters or games, or thoughts on games. So feel free to comment here. Or if you found this post through Facebook or Twitter, you can talk to me there as well.
