Curse of Strahd (Dungeons & Dragons)

I am familiar with every 5e adventure up through Tomb of Annihilation (and I have DM'd Out of the Abyss, Storm King's Thunder, and Lost Mine). In my opinion this is the best, though the best parts of OOTA are at this level. I was skeptical about running a horror-themed adventure b/c my group is sort of into traditional swords and sorcery, but the story was so good that this objection was quickly swept away. What I like (and the below includes spoilers that are inappropriate for any non-DMs):1) The overall atmosphere is wonderfully spooky, with lots of superb little touches -- a pool of water that reflects a character's face but much older, abandoned children's toys, dead people hanging mysteriously from a gallows beside the road, villagers who are afraid to speak to the PCs, a duplicitous invitation to Strahd's realm to kick things off, a tower with a huge live heart beating in it that causes the tower to shake and tremble, and that explodes in blood when attacked.2) Strahd is a wonderful villain -- it is fun for everyone the way he is supposed to escalate his attacks on the players. First he might just watch them, or send his spies to gauge the characters' powers (which is itself a spooky encounter), then he might change shapes (a lost dog scratching at the door, an orphaned child) to try to lure the players to allow him to come close. Then as they become a true threat he tries to kill them, most likely in his castle, which contains all sorts of areas ripe for an ambush. As the DM, you control Strahd and get to cook up his murderous schemes, but the book also gives you plenty of ideas and guidance. It is also fun to have him identify particular players that he particularly likes or hates; I had him try to kidnap a player he fell in love with, and another player he tried to destroy above all others (after first charming that player and trying to chop off his hand, in full view of the others).3) The basic structure is straightforward to run, and the players are never left to feel that they are wandering around pointlessly (as occasionally occurs in SKT); they have a clear objective, which is to escape from the valley controlled by Strahd, and which can be done only by killing Strahd. Such a simple plot, but so many twists along the way. To succeed the players have to (a) visit two towns, both of them fully brought to life and invested with dread in dozens of little ways, with great NPCs, (b) visit several locations to obtain magic items that will help them defeat Strahd, and then (c) go to Strahd's castle to kill him. The locations with the magic items are determined by a tarot card reading -- a really great and spooky thing in and of itself. Of course I rigged the card reading to pick my favorite locations, e.g., a mill where children's bones are ground up into pastries sold by night hags, or an abbey run by a lunatic, full of his gruesome Frankenstein-like creations, including a bride to be offered to Strahd and made from dead bodies....4) There are some great fun traps -- eg a doorway that can be opened only by mimicking the body positions of the stick figures etched into the lintel, in the order indicated by a line connecting the stick figures. Strahd's castle is just excellent in every way, full of wonderful NPCs, and far from the standard hack and slay D&D climax.5) The writing is excellent. This adventure has gone thru multiple iterations, and it has the feel of a classic that has been improved and deepened and broadened several times. Chris Perkins is the writer for pretty much all the best D&D modules, and he said this one he wrote easily and quickly -- I think he really got in a groove and did a great job adding on to the older versions (which were justly celebrated in their own right).

I mean, do I really need to write a review? This is one of, if not the best 5e module I have run as a Dungeon Master. The whole feeling of the story if nice and dark, which is a nice change of pace over the normal heroic fantasy adventure many adventures provide. The big bad here is cunning, evil, and very well fleshed out. The cast of characters all make sense and are also fleshed out. Overall, this will always be my favorite adventure to run!

I have now run this adventure 4x. Once as a player and 3x as a DM. Everyone of my games have been a far different experience. Like all the 5e Pre-made adventures, there is quick introductory one-shot adventure before the campaign starts, called Death House, which alone is one of the best adventures available in 5e. After the introduction, the land of Barovia is open to the players to explore. This is both good and bad.The Good is that the players have complete freedom to explore and pick their battles. The book is well crafted to accommodate most any off the cuff player decisions.The Bad is that the players can easily find themselves well over there head. There is one particular early encounter that is well above the players level and 100% deadly if the players are not discerning.The most unique part of this adventure is an early encounter that randomly determines the location of 3 story items, which will then determine some of the locations the players explore and even the pacing of the overall game. This allows room for repeat sessions without retreading too much. There is still a good bit of retread for return players, but a DM will find freshness with multiple play throughs.Additionally, there is a lot room for DM improvisation. In the 3 runs I have DMed, I have added a great bit of content of my own. In my 2nd game, I even had the players working directly for Strahd to rid his land of rivals.The biggest grip is that there are parts of the land that will likely go unexplored if the players do no draw the properly random adventure hooks. Another small grip is that there little reason why escorting a vampire victim to a neighboring town is safer than where she is. This is doubly a problem considering this adventure is the hook that sets the adventure. This can be reasoned when its presented in a later chapter that the church in the town has a permanent protection against evil that repels vampires.Overall, Curse of Strahd is a very dynamic adventure that can easily serve as a Campaign setting with near endless potential for DM expansion and creativity.