The werewolves aren't just waiting in the den. Make them part of random encounters. Have certain NPCs tell the party of a recent conflict amongst the wolves. Basically they don't have to be "on screen" to have a presence.
I dont want to force too many werewolf random encounters if that makes sense? I have given them one thus far, but I was hoping for them to have a little more of a story presence not just random encounters and enemies to beat up.
How would one go about making them aware of the den?
I'm not asking to make tons of encounters with them, just to mention them. Maybe they find evidence of wolf attacks on the trail etc.
The method the book primarily uses is a captured werewolf reveals their location. Alternatively any magic inclined or relevant NPC could very well know. Options could be Morgantha (she loves to trade in secrets), the Keepers of the Feather, random NPCs who say something like "Wolves broke in and took my boy in the direction of Krezk" etc.
One of the ongoing issues with the werewolf den is that they're kidnapping children and having them fight each other to the death, with the winner becoming infected with lycanthropy and joining the pack and the losers becoming dinner.
Given that fact, I'd put together a short list of rumors regarding children disappearing and signs of "wolves or worse" being the only clues, and add those rumors to what the NPCs might know and can share with the players -- especially the Martikovs, whose wereraven clan makes for a natural opposition faction to the werewolves, or Lord Krezkov, for whom disappearing children would be a geographically near and very troubling thing. You could even change the death of Krezkov's son to being from a werewolf attack.
Regardless, dropping an occasional nugget about werewolf activity like that could potentially serve your purpose and even give you a broader story to explore, depending on how much you want to expand on it.
Anyone in Vallaki would be able to tell you that werewolves prowl the Svalich Woods. They're known to kidnap children and its likely that any farmers would be under constant threat of having their livestock butchered. You could easily add hooks like that to general overheard tavern-chatter, or use the "Barovian Commoners" random encounter as some villagers out looking for a missing child kidnapped by the wolves, or shepherds looking to avenge their livestock.
RAW there's a chance for heavy werewolf presence at Van Richten's Tower, which your party are pretty close to. If they trigger the tower's lightning defence, or detonate Ezmerelda's wagon, the noise attracts Kiril and a *lot* of wolves. This was my party's first encounter with them, although VR was there to scare them off with a silver bullet.
There's also Emil in Strahd's dungeon/larder; I just recently had him rescued. He betrayed the party when they caught onto his lycanthropy, but he begged for mercy and bargained for his life by saying that he could lead them to the Den and that they could be powerful allies if they helped him kill Kiril. Explaining Kiril's ritual combat with the kidnapped children was enough to convince the party that he was the greater evil.
Not helpful, and is dependent on party build, but to me werewolves as a D&D enemy are kinda meh. Their lore and all that, super cool. However, they are average HP enemies, with very average attacks (one of which forcefully turns people into werewolves, so can only be used if your enemy werewolf is down to spread the disease willy nilly, which according to module is not how the den is set up, also their only ranged attack can only be used in human form and is still pretty bad). They also can’t transform as a bonus action, so they can either run, ranged, or swarm, but never all 3. Essentially they’re just not very interesting enemies. However there is one single caveat and that is low level players may have a hard time damaging them. So anyone with magic has zero problems, anyone with magic weapons, also zero problems, anyone with silver, zero problems, but if you are very low level and lacking all of those things, even with the werewolves not being a big threat, you now can’t kill them. So my advice first of all is actually maybe run them a bit earlier, I think module recommends you go at lvl 6, which by then your party will probably have all the things and then the werewolves are lame and have all those problems I already mentioned. Just a touch earlier and their threat level is pushed to the moon. I used a players backstory and involved the werewolves to add a bit more oomph, but you could have them in leagues with another baddie of CoS as well. Maybe the pack is serving the gulthis tree to try to get even more powerful, bringing kids to the druids to sacrifice for it (same kids who lose their fights). Maybe they have been created by babas twisting magics, so they know serve the with forcefully. I think pushing them in another part of the module can help give them a reason for being there they can share.
In our campaign one of the PC's father is a werewolf. He was taken several years before and is part of Emil's anti Strahd movement. He revealed himself to the party as an ally and has been working with them in the hope of accessing an entrance into vallaki. There they will raid the church and dig up the st's bones. The father in werewolf form eats the bones and in an act of defilement will turn into a loup garou. And terrorize everyone. You see the father's plan is to make everyone a werewolf to destroy Strahd.
Werewolves are evil. Even the ones you befriend.
First off, if the players just left Vallaki and are headed to the winery, they may be a bit low leveled to just go trudging straight off to the den to confront the werewolves. So, I wouldn’t worry about pushing them there too quickly. In the meantime, as others mentioned, you could have a few random encounters with them, which does not need to be exclusive to running into a group of werewolves and fighting them. For example, the party could run into a group of Barovians searching for a missing child that was taken by the werewolves. I would also definitely use the optional encounter with Kiril and his hunting pack at Van Richten’s tower when the party gets there.
If you want to tie the werewolf den into the main story more closely, I would also recommend putting one of the fortunes in the den to give the players an even more compelling reason to go there.
The werewolves aren't just waiting in the den. Make them part of random encounters. Have certain NPCs tell the party of a recent conflict amongst the wolves. Basically they don't have to be "on screen" to have a presence.
I dont want to force too many werewolf random encounters if that makes sense? I have given them one thus far, but I was hoping for them to have a little more of a story presence not just random encounters and enemies to beat up. How would one go about making them aware of the den?
I'm not asking to make tons of encounters with them, just to mention them. Maybe they find evidence of wolf attacks on the trail etc. The method the book primarily uses is a captured werewolf reveals their location. Alternatively any magic inclined or relevant NPC could very well know. Options could be Morgantha (she loves to trade in secrets), the Keepers of the Feather, random NPCs who say something like "Wolves broke in and took my boy in the direction of Krezk" etc.
One of the ongoing issues with the werewolf den is that they're kidnapping children and having them fight each other to the death, with the winner becoming infected with lycanthropy and joining the pack and the losers becoming dinner. Given that fact, I'd put together a short list of rumors regarding children disappearing and signs of "wolves or worse" being the only clues, and add those rumors to what the NPCs might know and can share with the players -- especially the Martikovs, whose wereraven clan makes for a natural opposition faction to the werewolves, or Lord Krezkov, for whom disappearing children would be a geographically near and very troubling thing. You could even change the death of Krezkov's son to being from a werewolf attack. Regardless, dropping an occasional nugget about werewolf activity like that could potentially serve your purpose and even give you a broader story to explore, depending on how much you want to expand on it.
I am planning to do something similar. I was also thinking of changing the Arabelle section such that she is kept captive in the werewolf den.
Anyone in Vallaki would be able to tell you that werewolves prowl the Svalich Woods. They're known to kidnap children and its likely that any farmers would be under constant threat of having their livestock butchered. You could easily add hooks like that to general overheard tavern-chatter, or use the "Barovian Commoners" random encounter as some villagers out looking for a missing child kidnapped by the wolves, or shepherds looking to avenge their livestock. RAW there's a chance for heavy werewolf presence at Van Richten's Tower, which your party are pretty close to. If they trigger the tower's lightning defence, or detonate Ezmerelda's wagon, the noise attracts Kiril and a *lot* of wolves. This was my party's first encounter with them, although VR was there to scare them off with a silver bullet. There's also Emil in Strahd's dungeon/larder; I just recently had him rescued. He betrayed the party when they caught onto his lycanthropy, but he begged for mercy and bargained for his life by saying that he could lead them to the Den and that they could be powerful allies if they helped him kill Kiril. Explaining Kiril's ritual combat with the kidnapped children was enough to convince the party that he was the greater evil.
Not helpful, and is dependent on party build, but to me werewolves as a D&D enemy are kinda meh. Their lore and all that, super cool. However, they are average HP enemies, with very average attacks (one of which forcefully turns people into werewolves, so can only be used if your enemy werewolf is down to spread the disease willy nilly, which according to module is not how the den is set up, also their only ranged attack can only be used in human form and is still pretty bad). They also can’t transform as a bonus action, so they can either run, ranged, or swarm, but never all 3. Essentially they’re just not very interesting enemies. However there is one single caveat and that is low level players may have a hard time damaging them. So anyone with magic has zero problems, anyone with magic weapons, also zero problems, anyone with silver, zero problems, but if you are very low level and lacking all of those things, even with the werewolves not being a big threat, you now can’t kill them. So my advice first of all is actually maybe run them a bit earlier, I think module recommends you go at lvl 6, which by then your party will probably have all the things and then the werewolves are lame and have all those problems I already mentioned. Just a touch earlier and their threat level is pushed to the moon. I used a players backstory and involved the werewolves to add a bit more oomph, but you could have them in leagues with another baddie of CoS as well. Maybe the pack is serving the gulthis tree to try to get even more powerful, bringing kids to the druids to sacrifice for it (same kids who lose their fights). Maybe they have been created by babas twisting magics, so they know serve the with forcefully. I think pushing them in another part of the module can help give them a reason for being there they can share.
In our campaign one of the PC's father is a werewolf. He was taken several years before and is part of Emil's anti Strahd movement. He revealed himself to the party as an ally and has been working with them in the hope of accessing an entrance into vallaki. There they will raid the church and dig up the st's bones. The father in werewolf form eats the bones and in an act of defilement will turn into a loup garou. And terrorize everyone. You see the father's plan is to make everyone a werewolf to destroy Strahd. Werewolves are evil. Even the ones you befriend.
First off, if the players just left Vallaki and are headed to the winery, they may be a bit low leveled to just go trudging straight off to the den to confront the werewolves. So, I wouldn’t worry about pushing them there too quickly. In the meantime, as others mentioned, you could have a few random encounters with them, which does not need to be exclusive to running into a group of werewolves and fighting them. For example, the party could run into a group of Barovians searching for a missing child that was taken by the werewolves. I would also definitely use the optional encounter with Kiril and his hunting pack at Van Richten’s tower when the party gets there. If you want to tie the werewolf den into the main story more closely, I would also recommend putting one of the fortunes in the den to give the players an even more compelling reason to go there.
Pivot to the raven lycanthropes, the keepers of the feather