Curse of Strahd D&D 5e 2024 (Beginning with Session 0) Come All!
Who you were before doesn't mater, from princess to pauper, from hero to villain. Taken by the Mists, all are bonded to survive. Welcome to Barovia...
$16.00
/ Session
Details
Bi-weekly / Monday - 5:00 PM UTC
Session Duration / 3–4 hours
Campaign Length / 2+ Sessions
0 / 5 Seats Filled
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About the adventure
Curse of Strahd is a atmospheric Gothic Horror Campaign. Set in the Realm of Barovia, a land sealed off from every realm and world due to its connection to the first vampire, Strahd von Zarovich. It is a land of horrors and this game is played by as such. For this reason, roleplay is very important to this campaign, where fear should be ever-present. No one is required to speak in character, but I encourage talking about what characters would be feeling and thinking to influence your decisions. Challenging battles are throughout the land that may need to be run away from at times as you build your power and collect artifacts of power. Exploration is a key aspect of this adventure to find these artifacts. First time players are welcome and I am happy to help those people. We will have a Discord channel to discuss and a session Zero to make everyone's characters, discuss rules that the group may or may not want, and learn about any triggers we need to employ and safety rules to be implemented. I have D&D Beyond where the Group can make characters and share my books. If you decide to join, bring two or three Character concepts (theming towards gothic horror) made of 2-3 sentences and we will expand them together to A flaw that compels you have an ideal that centers them, afear that shakes you and a couple of personality traits.
Game style
Roleplay Heavy
Rule of Cool (RoC)
Sandbox / Open World
Combat Lite
Game themes
Meet the Game Master
5.0
(5)
1 year on StartPlaying
Highly rated for: Voices, Teacher, World Builder
Average response time: 24+ hours
Response rate: 100%
About me
I've enjoyed exploring and making stories my entire life, finding the exploration of heroes and drama of their plights a passion. It began with reading, and it grew to boardgames and video games. When I discovered TTRPG's there was no going back. I've been a player and a GM, enjoying both equally. I love creating worlds and getting people to experience the magic of them. As a GM I very much encourage and focus on an engaging story while empowering player's to make choices and take risks. For me that means roleplay that has consequences and combat is challenging. This is one way I make success matter and victory sweet. I also love to reward my players for doing a good job, thinking up clever plans, having epic roleplay moments and being true to their characters. I work hard to include everyone in ever aspect of play, encouraging participation from everyone. I prefer longer campaigns, so that we can get to know the players characters and have those epic moments but I am quite comfortable with shorter sessions like a one shots or 3-4 session campaigns. I am quite proficient in Discord and Owlbear, doing several play by posts as a player and GM. I have a few premade campaigns that I am familiar with including Curse of Strahd. I also have my own homebrew world I am quite proud of!
View Profile →Character creation
Creating your character
You can submit a backstory to me beforehand or we can create our characters together. If so, come two session zero with three general ideas for a gothic horror character and our first session will be spent fleshing out these characters, getting to know one another and finding out where everyone fits. We will be using D&D Beyond to create characters, and you will have access to the books in my possession or if you have an official book on beyond, you can use some of that based on what it is. D&D 2024 is the book we will be working with the most. We will roll for stats , roll 4d6 and drop the lowest, and be starting at level one.
Druids, paladins, clerics, Wizards, bloodhunters, anyone with a long sword, warlocks all have ingrained story making opportunities. I also work hard to make sure everyone has storymaking opportunities despite that. Choose what you want!
What to expect
Preparing for the session
Having a discord account, a D&D beyond account, and an owlbear rodeo account is all that is needed. They are all free to use.
What Elijah brings to the table
I encourage character decisions and good planning. I encourage when this world is taken seriously and reward good planning. I make combat tough and rewarding to overcome or escape from. The rule of cool is always an option if you can give me a path that it would happen. I have several hombrew rules that both encourage roleplay and make the world scarier and I am not a voice actor I try to give the Npc's have their own voice.
Homebrew rules
1st)New ways to get exhaustion occur when knocked unconscious, or crit fail a death save results in 2024 exhaustion (-2 to all checks per level) Gain a scar on getting knocked down, as described by me (open to notes from the player) 2nd)Campfire card game/ Campfire stories: during every long rest everyone will tell a story of love, a story of pain, a story of loss, or a story of gain from character's life based on card draw/ Rolling a D4 1) Hearts, 2)club, 3)Spade, 4)diamond 3rd) Rule of three on persuasion, deception, intimidation will be implemented when appropriate. This is mostly to say Charisma is not mind control, these are people. 4th) Critical hits are Max DMG of the dice plus role the dice plus any modifiers For example, a critical hit with a long sword equals 8 damage plus 1d8 plus your strength modifier 5th)Bullet time You are all exceptional, having an awareness of each other and knowledge of what the others and you yourself can do, Take 3 minutes after initiative is rolled for everyone to strategize together 6th) Fears! You guys are in a Gothic horror campaign and so being scared of something really feels appropriate. Chose a fear for your character and when they come up you will be given difficulty checks to try to resist your fears. If you succeed you will get a bonus or reward of some kind. If you fail, you will suffer (not that much, but enough)! 7th) If you need a hint you can ask and I will give you a skill check to roll 8th) Not a rule per say, but very helpful. Ask what your character might know. You may roll something or I might just tell you! 9th) If you need a hint or a reminder on what is happening or where you may need to go I may ask for a roll or tell you. I try not to be intrusive but sometimes you need a hint 10th)Death is not the end! You have three chances to survive this adventure. If you do die, the corruption of Barovia will change you race or force you into a dark pact, but your characters story will still continue.
Equipment needed to play
Internet
Computer
Microphone
Platforms used
Safety
How Elijah creates a safe table
We are doing a session Zero To create characters, get a vibe for each other and to lay down any hard limits we wont have in game and stuff that exists, but only in an implied sense. After every session everyone will be free to talk about what went well and what didn't. Anyone can bring up anything during this time. I also employ the word Rutabaga. On the discord i will have a channel called Stars and Wishes. Stars are things you enjoyed and Wishes are thing you wish would happen. Writing it down there will help me and the group encourage each other and adapt to each other's desire for the game. It's a type of vegetable that is very rare for most people to talk about and a funny word. In the context of my game, it can be called out any time a player or DM needs a halt to whatever is happening. Weather people are off track and the speaker wants to get back to it or they are uncomfortable / scared and need things stopped or anything in between, all is acceptable.
Content warnings
Safety tools used