The chains dangling from the ceiling are 8 feet long; the cultists would shackle prisoners to the chains, dangle them above the altar, cut them open with knives, and allow the altar to be bathed in blood. We awaken thee!", and summons Walter. It takes 2d6 hours for the house to complete its resurrection. These areas are dusty and drafty, everything within them is old and draped in cobwebs, and the floorboards groan underfoot. Its also offered by WotC for free as either a sampling of CoS or as a standalone haunted house adventure thatsperfect for a Halloween one-shot! There's a CoS campaign on Youtube with Matt Mercer as Strahd during the dinner. They regarded Strahd von Zarovich as a god, but he dismissed them and later destroyed them when they killed a party of adventurers, but the house lived on, luring people toward it. I initially gave the group the option of either starting at level 3 or running Death House at level 1. Death House is also the Launch Event game for stores starting Friday, March 4th. Should the worst come to pass, you shall be all they have left. This is with experienced players mind you. avoid detection. Why Arent There More Bonus Action Cantrips? I even did some Kobold Fight Club calculations to double-check it and everything came up good mathematically. Hope yours went well, too! All in all, I think this was a huge weak-spot in what is a flavorful and cool adventure, but lets get into some of the specific fights. Death House isnt the first free adventure for 5th edition that has been shared by WotC, but it is much longer than the other ones. [3] The paladin will investigate and find nothing mystical beyond it being a little scared and hungry, and I know my players well enough to know theyll want to keep it. Hanging above the mantelpiece is a wood-framed portrait of the Durst family: Gustav and Elisabeth Durst with their two, 16. The cult was using these "relics" during their rituals. I'm thinking running it in six sessions of three hours each. If the PCs attempt to discuss this incident or an Uncle Dimov with Rose, she instantly clams up. The only downside to this method of storytelling was the encounter balance. At the start of the shambling mounds first turn, the chant changes again: When the Dark Power accepted Mrs. Dursts final sacrifice, Walter was transformed into a terrible monster: a vessel for the cults hatred, arrogance, and depravity bound within an innocent babe. The balcony has grown into a cliff that drops to a thousand feet below (an eerily accurate representation of the. Not a big deal, but it wouldve been a nice addition. Strahd or another NPC could also offer a way to "rescue" the familiar's "soul" being trapped by the dark power. . The fights were dangerous for a party of level 1 characters, but nothing was unfair or unbalanced. Just attach it to the appropriate Ability Score and make the ability check. While the shadows spend their first round beginning to attack they say: "Begon from this place! They were too young and innocent to understand that their parents were guilty of heinous crimes. Curse of Strahd. Good game ! There are times I'd like to do this. I think its a great backstory, and the story is told in bits and pieces to the party as they explore the house. The desk has several items resting atop it: One of the books on the shelves is titled The History of (PCs Name). If read, it provides a narration of the PCs entire life. Beware: turn back now if you dont wish to see a ton of spoilers! Also, their file size tends to be smaller than scanned image books. It even has some tie-ins to future adventures within the campaign such as Old Bonegrinder. A cistern on the roof used to, 17. Thanks to Roll 20s map pack I circumvented the need to prep the maps and creatures for this adventure (and the rest of the campaign). [2] It acts as an adaptation of the original Ravenloft module for the 5th edition of Dungeons & Dragons. Hi everyone! The ANIMATED BROOM OF ATTACK begins banging on the closet door (room 14) and joins combat on the beginning of the. The Curse of Strahd #14: Death House - Purple Haze, One Must Die!, Lorgoth the Decayer. The last of their four children, Ilya, recently died of an illness. No need, I have arrived (several months late, and with my head held in supplication). This is lovely work and I really want to use this for my group, but it's missing the first half of the dungeon. Cookie Notice My Curse of Strahd campaign is chugging along. As a character makes their way in or out of the dumbwaiter, the oven spits a column of fire. You've got to get from location 38 to location 32 in the basement (assuming you even know location 32 exists). The house has four stories (including the attic), with two balconies on the third floorone facing the front of the house, the other facing the back. The dumbwaiters rope-and-pulley mechanism can support 200 pounds of weight before breaking. Thankfully he did, but it was a close call. Someone more or less recently posted a story about their party's late game encounter with Strahd. They will sing to wake up Lorghoth the Decayer, a Shambling Mound hiding in the southernmost alcove. If the mimic is attacked at range by a wary or alerted PC, it flees, vanishing around the corner and reappearing as a door, chest, or longsword elsewhere in the dungeon. . Violent. The first character to step on the trapped section falls prone and takes 1d6 bludgeoning damage, plus 2d10 piercing damage from the spikes. Thorn and Walter, I wish I could be there for you. If Rendar the barbarian uses his +8 Athletics to leap a chasm, he cannot use Athletics again to lift a boulder later in the challenge; he must find a different solution with a different skill. This seems fine. I cannot stress enough how awesome and thematic this story is as CoS. Sorry for taking so long to get to this! Some links to stores and online shopping websites include an affiliate code. The way to the basement but, "aren't supposed to go down there". I combined the campaign introduction my party decided on and weaved it into The Creeping Fog plot hook from the first chapter. Dimitri Krezkov is the burgomaster of the walled town of Krezk. The toy chest contains an assortment of stuffed animals and toys. Essentially, the party appears on a road surrounded by a strange fog/mist. Roll initiative upon beginning the skill challenge; on 3 failures, the slowest adventurer is left behind. /u/MandyMod, Fleshing out Curse of Strahd, Part 2: Entering Barovia and Streamlining Death House. Since I have a lot of older players in my group who have been playing from the AD&D days, they demanded that we not use any virtual tablet. If the party refuses to make the requested sacrifice, the cult is angered and begin to chant, "Come, demon! A character possessed by Rose gains the following flaw: I like being in charge and get angry when other people tell me what to do., A character possessed by Thorn gains the following flaw: Im scared of everything, including my own shadow, and weep with despair when things dont go my way.. i just realized before running this for my group in a couple days, this only has the subdungeon, it does not have the upper part of Death House dungeon in it. Purchased this and the labyrinth section BEFORE the shambling mound / pool section is missing. They are fearsome agents of, island domain. After 1d10 days, the house begins to repair itself. Not quite ghosts, yet not quite illusions, the Dursts are representative of the emotional carnage of the manor. If one of the ghosts possesses a character, allow the player to retain control of the character, but assign the character one of the following flaws: One must die! they chant, over and over. Tweak the final encounter The final confrontation in Death House is an odd one. Here is the Paladin choice for example was between Lathander and one of the old ones ( Tenebrous): [This is for you and you alone to know] The chanting heard throughout the dungeon originates here, yet when the characters arrive, the dungeon falls silent as the chanting mysteriously stops. Originals can be found here:https://prints.mikeschley.com/p678546160/h61fadc4d#h61fadc4d, /gs_flipbook/flip.php?xml=/demo_xml/250210.xml&w=500&h=324, https://watermark.dmsguild.com/pdf_previews/250210-sample.pdf, Customers Who Bought this Title also Purchased, These are awesome maps! By rejecting non-essential cookies, Reddit may still use certain cookies to ensure the proper functionality of our platform. This site works best with JavaScript enabled. Monstrous. The books rot and fall apart if taken from the house. Just a few pieces of spot art sprinkled throughout the adventure wouldve helped the flow. We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites. It is titled Song for Elizabeth., A handwritten, partially burnt note sits beside it; it reads Bulwartons words can open the way., (The red-covered fake book that opens the secret door is titled An Architects Art, and is written by Archibald Bulwarton.). Vistani NPCs. Death House is the introductory adventure for the new Curse of Strahd campaign. Lorghoth the Decayer, a shambling mound, was both the final boss of the adventure (depending on the ending the party chose) and the most ridiculous fight in the adventure. You could practically run it as-is just by changing the references to Barovian names and locations to ones that match your setting. This is hours of work. There will be a AL players guide released this week that will have rules for players and instructions for DMs to run games in the official campaign. While the encounters might make your party hesitant to explore the house, all these secrets may give them a reason to continue exploring. While frightening at first, it quickly loses its charm. These products were created by scanning an original printed edition. The skill challenge begins as soon as the party defeats or decides to flee the Mound in the basement. Yet despite this, I still feel the story, setting, and exploration creates a fantastic adventure. For more information, please see our Fixed now. If the characters achieved 4 successes before 3 failures, all make it outworse for wear, and forced to carry in their hearts this hellish night forevermore. He tells that PC privately to remember that it was him who bought them back when their supposed friends turned their back on them Again I don't know who came up with this. You want this to be fun, scary, and challenging. Our ever-adventurous eight (the original "Fab-5", Ireena, Ismark and "Flaps") have found themselves in the lower dungeon of what the locals call "Death House", where our party has just splashed under the portcullis and entered the Ritual . Before the curse of Strahd befell the land, the Morninglord watched over the Barovian people from . Summary: Max goes sheet white, like Steve's said something horrible, like he said something bad. Most older books are in scanned image format because original digital layout files never existed or were no longer available from the publisher. Once the sacrifice is made, the characters are free to go. Unfortunately, you would have to do printable scaling yourself. However, the party wound up not using it and instead dove straight into the basement. An ambient soundtrack I mixed together from existing videos for my groups playthrough of Curse of Strahd! the shambling mounds first turn, the chant changes again: The end comes! Her lips and gums have gone black with rot, and her smile shines with madness. My players are approaching the sacrificial room, and beyond one of their characters, they have nothing to potentially sacrifice. It should be there now. Although they appear to be flesh-and-blood children, Rose and Thorn are actually illusions created by the house to lure the characters inside. Violent. She has retained her memory, but has completely succumbed to her own dark whims. Mrs. Durst has gone completely insane. I despise what your mother has become, but I love and pity her all the same. Oer the past several congregations, I have become suspicious of the ambitions of the others. The party was stacked with healing so they were thankfully able to keep reviving their downed comrades, but the fight was still a very close call. The party has just finished Death House. One of them for the sub-dungeon, one for the main house. When you start Curse of Strahd, the players can do anything. Not to mention the fact that we had multiple near-TPKs during these first 2 sessions. No effort has been made to preserve the contents of the third floor or the attic. The Curse of Strahd handouts are all available for free from the Wizards of the Coast web site as a PDF here: http://media.wizards.com/2016/downloads/DND/CoS_Handouts.pdf "Orcs are savage raiders and pillagers with stooped postures, low foreheads, and piggish faces with prominent lower canines that resemble tusks. must make a DC 11 Constitution saving throw. 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