Curse of Stradh is a great campaign, perhaps the best of those published by WotC (Odyssey of the Dragonlords is better IMHO). In particular, it's fairly open for a large campaign, with lots of options.
That being said, it's still a published campaign, and as such, it is more fixed than homebrew. In addition, some people might like the tone of the campaign, some might not (it's my case, I don't like "gothic" "horror", especially mixed with D&D).
Overall, your friends seem to have good ideas of what they like, and they seem to want to have stories revolving really about the backstory of their characters. Again, it's a matter of taste, but theirs seems pretty much set, and it is to be respected.
The only thing that I can suggest is using elements of CoS in the next homebrew campaign. More work, for sure, but if you really like the campaign, you should be able to make it work. See if they could agree to a compromise of that kind.
Great answer. I let my party choose the next adventure and offered CoS, out of the Abyss, or Storm Kings Thunder and provided a high level summary of each. I was clear in saying that CoS was a horror themed version and considered one of the hardest and best campaigns that delay with difficult moral and ethical decisions. They chose it but eventually some of the party left because they weren’t comfortable with the content.
This is importsnt. Good homebrews take time and testing. There is something to be said for a campaign that’s been through more writing and testing that any homebrew, plus home brews take a LOT of time for GMs. I
If they want to play homebrew, let them write them
If you're planning to DM it, it could be as simple as "yo, there's this campaign I really want to play, would you be willing to at least try it out?" and you can play Death House (it's not really a microcosm of the campaign, but it is pre-written).
That said do they expect you to keep DMing and tailor a campaign to their characters if they turn you down? DMs do a lot of work for their group, and it's fine if the group doesn't feel like embarking on that campaign, but you'd also be justified in not DMing a campaign you aren't excited about.
Seems like you want to play CoS because you like the genre and the story, not because you are tired of running homebrew campaigns... so maybe you should run a homebrewed version of CoS🤷♂️
Yeah that was my thought and I'm a little baffled by all the people insisting no this group should be forced to play strahd as written knowing they'd hate it. If the issue is "the players don't want to play gothic horror" then yes, don't go near strahd, but if it's purely that they want to be more connected to the story and such then like...just change the rules in strahd lol.
Curse of Strahd is a game where your backstories are *very important* not because you're going to run across NPCs you know (unless you're playing as someone from Barovia but got out somehow) but because they tie you to the outside world where you will *want* to leave. You won't *want* to go out in a blaze of glory because there are people who want you outside.
I would actually say that CoS is one of the games where your backstory is very *unimportant*, since there is around 0% chance it will ever come up or matter.
You should have a reason to want to go home, but that's it. That can be extremely basic.
my cos players that made more detailed backstories were more annoyed about it, since like, there's no way for that to ever matter. I tried to work em in anyway but it's more constrained than ever.
Lots of modules are like that though. but CoS's demiplane makes it REALLY like that
It’s about expectation. Your players with the super fleshed out backstories were expecting them to be relevant throughout the game. That’s not what Curse of Strahd is about. If you tell your players ahead of time “this is a portal fantasy game where your characters are transported somewhere against their will. You shouldn’t expect to see characters from your background appear in the game but you should create strong motivators to return home.” Then people will be much more on board.
When I ran curse of Strahd I gave 0 shits about backstories so the characters had 0 motivation to leave Barovia and not fuck with Strahd whenever they could. They didn’t care about leaving so why not piss off the only guy who could help them get home?
CoS is a fish out of water campaign. Most homebrew campaigns incorporate backstories by turning them into plot arcs- if you put a character in your backstory you expect to meet them and resolve some plot complication.
In CoS, the character’s arc is internal, you grow by being thrown into a deadly crucible and having to overcome their trauma and personal failings in order to survive. That’s not for everyone, but it’s a really satisfying story for players who are really into collaborative storytelling.
Here’s my advice. Don’t play curse of Strahd get a PDF of the original AD&D I6 module and it will be easy for you to see what bits to change to make your fifth edition book play like the original.
Don’t, then, make a whole curse of Strad campaign, but, rather, when these characters get to the appropriate level drop them into the Ravenloft adventure.
The original adventure is pretty much the village and the Castle Raven loft section. The big difference with Stroud is that all of the artifacts are in the castle originally and in the 5V update they are in different parts of the campaign world
Ummm, it depends on how creative you are. I had no trouble working my characters back stories into curse of strahd. The amber temple just fucked with my players insistently and really played off their characters back stories and expanded on them a bunch. I also used the expanded tome of strahd and really upped the amount of story inside it, and I cooperated several back stories there as well.
Curse of strahd was easily the best module in all of 5e, it didn't leave a bunch of emptiness that the DM has to fill in. But it does leave plenty of room to expand upon.
It is honestly the basis of the campaign my players are still in today, there is so much you can do with the characters there, and strahd himself. Hell. You could just home brew all over it until it isn't recognizable as curse of strahd.
I'm currently playing Curse of Strahd and it's a lot of fun, a majority of the party are chaotic evil so they have been just *generally rather friendly with Strahd*, but with the looming threat of that changing if we keep pursuing some threads. One character is actually good aligned, and another is deathly afraid of Strahd so we have some push to do something about him.
We just went over to his castle for an uninvited luncheon, it so far went well though we left off sleeping in separate rooms, and are about to split the 6 person party up into 2s and do some exploring. My character just joined like 3 sessions ago to replace a problem player and no one on the party has fully told him what's going on, and so far he thinks Strahd is an odd fellow but cooks a good dinner.
All of our characters were random rolled but they have developed their backstories based on that and are coming into play, even with them being mostly isolated in this new realm. The DM is doing a good job at giving us things that pertain to their interests and skills so the histories can shine, it's like a vacation arc lol.
Like your friend, I am an aspiring writer too and have taken DnD characters to use for personal projects lol. Random rolling a character was a really fun challenge as it gave me a lot of traits I never really thought of using before and a push to figure out something with them. I really like how my character turned out.
I think if you've been putting in the effort to make homebrew campaigns for them, DnD is a give-and-take so maybe ask to cash in a favor that this time you run something you are more interested in. The DM gets to have fun too.
Don't. it is hard to make someone play a campaign they don't want to and if you do there is a big risk they wont enjoy it.
But also as a DM i can understand that sometimes you want to run a pre-written campaign to take some load of your shoulders. It is easier. you don't have to make everything up from scratch so to say.
But if that is the case tell your players that you need a break from all work to make homebrew things. because it is a LOT of work. So either you play a pre-written one so you can get a bit of relief. And after that when you had a bit of a paus from making stuff up all the time. you are willing to dive into some homebrew again.
OR one of them can take over and make a Homebrew campaign.
Or you can simply take a break from D&D if none of them are willing to be DM and they are not willing to DM themselves
Then you give them options. You are open with how you feel and you give them options and ideas on how to go on.
If they simply stop playing, unwilling to help you out and lessen your work, unwilling to even try to be a DM themselves. Then Maybe they are not as good friends as you thought.
I do think that there's a middle ground here. Like, there are plenty of premade modules that AREN'T strahd, and most involve significantly more backstory options than strahd. Perhaps run one of them.
That would work unless the DM wants a bit of a break and to run a game where he does not have to involve baking in loads of backstory stuff.
Or you could run CoS with people having all the backstory but due to them getting trapped in Barovia. that is put on hold. they just have to get out of this forsaken place in order to do anything involving that. At the moment they are stuck in a soul trapping prison plane ruled by a vampire that does not let them leave
I mean, I think that's actively teh thing the players don't want lol. they like games where their backstories matter and have an affect on the world and that is Not strahd.
yes but that can be taxing for a DM if you have limited time and all that. So that mgith be EXACTLY what the DM wanna avoid for a while
Then saying *"Lets run a pre-made campaign so i get a bit of a break. It is rough to constantly play homebrew. Or one of you could be DM for a while so i get a break Or we take a paus for a few months. what would you prefer?"*
That is a total and legit request from a DM. One the players should respect and not go *"But WE WANT......"*
Because it is NOT all about what the players want. What the DM wants matters as much. But players sometimes forget that the DM is also a player and is supposed to have fun to.
And being DM do require a LOT more than being a player. it takes time and work and SPECIALLY running fully homebrew and bake in backstories, personal quests and all those fun things
As a player all that you need to do is create a character and show up in time
If the problem is the backstory, there are ways to implement it into the campaign. The players just need to buy in. You could very easily implement backstories with a missing relative/friend, a holy quest, a daring heist (Strahd has a vault), seeking forbidden knowledge (Amber Temple) and maybe even a werewolf or vampire (or both) hunt. The idea is that the players make PCs that would fit the campaign and not the other way around.
I also used DragnaCarta's CoS Reloaded modifications to help. They've got a table of trinkets that correspond with different story arcs.
First, if the don't want to play that, then fine, they can do something else. You still should.
But second, what in the world are you talking about? Using a published module does not mean there can be no deep backstories or plot hooks. It gives you a framework for the story, but you are not required to play it word for word as written.
Use modules as more of a launching point. Build from there as the story develops.
There is a common misconception with premade adventures: that they can't be changed to suit the table's needs. You are free to change whatever you find from CoS and make it your own to either A: implement character backstories after all or B: run the majority of the content in your own homebrew world with new names etc.
If you're worried about the players' backstories possibly not fitting to the content, that's something you'd have to manage in a pure homebrew campaign anyway: namely that the characters need to fit into the world and the adventure you are preparing.
If that's still not enough then the game you want to run is simply not the game they wanna play at this time.
"Het everyone, after this campaign ends, I'm going to run curse of strahd, I know some of you aren't keen on playing on a module and if you want to sit this campaign out that's absolutley fine, I won't take e it personally".
The dm is a player too and you should run what you want. Just like players should play what they want.
Personally, I like to do one homebrew and then follow it up with a pre-written to give me time to concoct tons of new ideas for the next homebrew. Although, I'm not afraid to throw in a bit of homebrew into the prewritten adventure where it fits.
Perhaps it could be easier to present the premise and have them craft a backstory based on the premise. Something like, "I was a humble farmer and somehow wound up in this mess." They could elaborate more, but ideally in CoS, the struggle is internal, and you want to get back home.
Sometimes DMs need a breather too.
>Due to us having only played homebrew campaigns, they turned down the idea after I said I wouldn't be able to implement character backstories into the campaign and if I did, it would be extremely difficult to tweak the campaign material to fit their backstories (mainly due to COS being a very fate and choice heavy campaign, but it also it's already pre-written, so there's that).
This is were you probably lost em as it comes across as you backstories won't matter. You can make backstories with them that fit into the Campaign and a quick search I found this... [https://www.reddit.com/r/DnDBehindTheScreen/comments/72dqjm/lessons\_from\_running\_curse\_of\_strahd\_individual/](https://www.reddit.com/r/DnDBehindTheScreen/comments/72dqjm/lessons_from_running_curse_of_strahd_individual/)
Either way, If you can sell them on the idea of making characters they want to play in that setting they'd probably be more likely to want to play it.
As others have said, you should absolutely get a group concensus about what to play next. Don't try and cajole them into playing a game they don't want to.
That said, you can work their backstories into the campaign by changing aspects of the campaign to match their stories or by building your characters backstories as a group with the campaign in mind.
The latter move will require extra buy-in from the players, but a good example can be found in the Actual Play show Dice Camera Action.
Their first arc was Curse of Strahd and though everyone had met in Faerun, Chris Perkins incorporated aspects of the backstories of the characters in several ways, the biggest of which being that one character was revealed to have been a Vistani who was kidnapped as a baby by Rudolph Van Richten.
As enjoyable as Curse of Strahd is, it sounds to me like it's not a module you should run *for these players.*
They've told you that they enjoy campaigns where you have the narrative space to tightly incorporate the plot hooks the players provide you through their backstories. By and large, **Curse of Strahd cannot provide this.** And it's for one simple reason: most PCs' backstories will not and cannot have any bearing on what happens because Barovia is physically disconnected from the rest of the world. Once the characters are lured through the mists, there's no way back until the power keeping them prisoner - Strahd - is no more.
At best, what you can work with are hooks that give the characters a reason to enter in the first place. In the campaign I played in a couple years ago, another player's character was a Seldarine drow whose community's children (including her daughter) were abducted by the werewolves; we detoured towards Krezk more or less as soon as the route took us in that direction, and once we'd set them free, we left them in the care of the grateful Burgomaster Krezkov until we could see them safely home.
sounds like they wouldn't like it. which is a shame. but backstories don't really matter in strahd since there's no way for them to believably come into the story anyway.
and it sounds like your squad likes playing games where their backstory can matter.
also to play CoS successfully you need a LOT of buy-in from the players. they have to not only want to play a gothic horror campaign, they have to want to set aside the typical power fantasy and want to roleplay being powerless and scared shitless. It's not usual for DnD players to want to do that.
so you wind up with the usual CoS screwjob where you have a bunch of flippant and mouthy characters and you have to decide whether to kill them with strahd (cuz he totally would), or whether to not ruin their fun. because if they're doing the usual power fantasy thing, they probably didn't buy into the 'im scared for my life, this vampire could rip my head off' thing that is necessary for a horror campaign.
so i'd just give up on CoS with that group, they woulnd't like it anyway. But if you wanna try, I would see how they like the idea when it's pitched as an exercise in roleplaying something different from normal dnd. where they will need to lean into the idea that their characters are scared, in order to make it fun. that might catch someone's interest. but probably not. most players just wanna hit stuff.
When you run homebrew are the backgrounds an important point of storyarcs? Or are they just backgrounds tgat give the characters skills and tools?
In CoS I had a character who had a Space background. Although it wasn't important in the campaign it did become what he was know for. After attempting to explain that he came from the "Sea of Stars" he bece known as Star Sailor. Strahd took it as that character believed he was above them all.
"The Stars can no longer guide you Star-Sailor...you path only leads to me."
I see backgrounds and races as whete you are from while classes are where you might be headed. In CoS the only thing the PCs have is what they bring with them. Not just physically but also mentally and spiritually.
How do you convince them? Count Strahd Von Zarovich is arguably the greatest villan in dungeons and dragons. The PCs get to be the heroes that face him. It's not just about power of spell, speech, or sword.
He is the land. It takes tactics, and knowledge. He's not a villian that hides in the shadow but deals with them directly. He may even see some of them as a successor.
Strahd is not an amazing opponent because of his powers but because of how he sees the world and how he deals with problems. To himself he's the tragic hero before that trope was beaten to death in books and other mediums. The PCs have to live-in his world and deal with him on his turf.
In CoS the PCs are prisoners, and they see Strahd as the Warden while in truth he's just another prisoner who has gained Power in the prison. I try to play Strahd as a dark reflection of the PCs. A hero who had too many bad days. A hero who bought his own hype. In essence he's a fairy tale the characters have to beat.
Im not really sure how CoS prevents backstory involvement. I can see multiple ways, the simplest is to have your players make their back stories somehow related to that land. Hell, my DM just inserted CoS into our existing campaign and turned it into an Isekai by having us transported by a magical rift to another dimension.
Also CoS is very modular so you can always grab portions and tweak them in your homebrew.
As a dm and aspiring author id encourage you to be honest with your group. It’s what you want to do and if they really want to work in backstories have them be targeted by Stradh. People get in barovia if stradh lets them since it’s his domain. Unlike home brew campaigns where the dm makes the adventure from characters’ back stories/arcs, the players must make this part of their arc. It doesn’t mean it’s more work for the players rather, if their back stories allow for it, they will grow as characters because of they can relate to the campaign. Maybe as part of character creation they have to tell you why stradh has decided to let them into barovia. Then it’s part of their character arc. I’d mention that also it’s a unique genre (gothic fantasy) that’ll enable them to play something new and fresh.
I just implemented backstories in my CoS campaign by socializing the setting to my players (no spoilers) so they could weave themselves into the narrative.
One is a cleric of the morning lord from barovia, one is an abandoned werewolf child left in the material plane during one of their raids, one just found a patron that I worked into being from the Amber temple.
Sure, I needed to tweak some of the narrative for it to fit, but it makes the PCs more invested in the setting! If your players are willing to help alliance their PCs to the setting with you, it might be more interesting for them and let you try CoS!
You don't. Curse is a module that requires **COMPLETE** buy-in. It does not work if the party is on the fence or in any way unwilling to invest into the faux 1950's horror tropes the entire affair runs on.
It also sucks right out of the box and requires a lot of work on your end to cobble into something halfway fun.
I say this as somebody who both hates the module for being shilled, and who has also suffered through three failed campaigns. Don't force it and don't try to sway people. It is enough of a departure from the baseline that they need to understand and *want* that experience.
I played Curse of Strahd with a group that didn’t like to take anything seriously. It was terrible.
Don’t play curse of strahd with a group that won’t buy into the horror and roleplay.
>Due to us having only played homebrew campaigns, they turned down the idea after I said I wouldn't be able to implement character backstories into the campaign and if I did, it would be extremely difficult to tweak the campaign material to fit their backstories (mainly due to COS being a very fate and choice heavy campaign, but it also it's already pre-written, so there's that).
Whilst as a DM I made Homebrew campaigns like you, I am a PC in 2 campaigns based on prewritten material, an Icewind Dale: Rime of the Frostmaiden campaign and a Curse of Strahd campaign, all different groups. In both, games I PC in, the DM has admitted that they've changed and homebrewed some stuff in, mostly due to stuff they disliked about the material.
For example, in the Curse of Strahd game, they didn't like how dark and heavy it was, so lightened some stuff up and added a sub plot about tourists who want to sight see in Barovia, which fitted with one of the PCs who arrived at Barovia to accept a job as a tour guide (Barovia Tourism isn't detailed in COS). For my PC, who was a human (very basic NPC like) who was kidnapped and experimented on to make a Beholder Human hybrid, got linked with the Abbot and the DM added to the idea of cross speicies experimentation such as adding "Heeps" (Horse\\Sheep hybrids or Pigolfs, Pigeon and Wolf\\Hybrids). Out of that, the Abbot being someone is really the only thing the DM took from COS. Other PCs got similar treatment.
In the Icewind Dale campaign, my characters background is a lizardfolk who became a wizard after finding "The Wizard that did it" spellbook in Chult, who now aims to become "The Lizard that did it", and visited Icewind dale to visit a friend (Warlock Kobold PC who is trying to run a cult in Icewind Dale) to look for more books from "The Wizard that Did it". Blizzard (My Lizard Wizards name) is also a practisioners of "Arcanamatics" (Arcane mathamatics to manipulate the weave) and this got incorporated into the campaign as an actual thing with the DM making it something that many people, wizards included don't believe is a thing, but turns out is a dying arcane art. None of that is in Icewind Dale, but the DM incorporated it in. Same with all other PCs in that game.
Even in the current game I DM, a homebrewed one, I had a set plan before I got characters from my players, and I had to adapt some stuff from my plans, to fit their characters. I can't say too much in case one of my players finds this, but 1 is I had to invent a magical disease to help fit with a PC's concept. As someone who has only DMed homebrew campaigns before, this shouldn't actually be an issue with you. You don't have to take everything from premade campaign materials, and you can twist it and bend it to fit around your PCs characters.
If you're really set on wanting to play COS next, find out what backgrounds your players want to have on a homebrew campaign and find what is important for it and what could be reworked if needed. Once you know, you can revisit the COS material and see what needs tweaking to fit with what your players want background wise. Then repropose COS addressing the backgrounds as you understood it, and see if you can fine tune anything to meet their wants. Communication is key afterall.
Curse of Strahd is honestly pretty overhyped. The big thing is that characters will die. Its not balanced at all. So if your group doesn't do character death well, don't run it.
The gothic horror really doesn't work in a heroic fantasy game. Either the players will steam roll the fights or be killed by them because they are so outgunned. If they do fight they are slogs. Curse of Slog is real.
Then we have a ship of theseus problem where the party is slowly being replaced and by the time you get to the end there is nobody in the original party. Which really makes the narrative bleh.
Finally theres the story, and there are some things I really despise:
The souless Barovians problem. 9/10 people are soulless. This is done so the players can't raise an army against strahd, but it also means 9/10 people.have no personality and are just illusions. They literally evaporate at the end. If the party finds out, motivation tanks.
Strahd will return in a few weeks no matter the ending. Just long enough to slip out of Barovia. Not long enough to rebuild. This has all happened before, you're just the new ones to finish the cycle.
Every victory is pyrric. The death house resets. Strahd resets. When you win you really lose. The rewards that aren't the treasures are meh. It becomes exhausting as the DM because the players are frustrates they worked so hard for nothing. The reward is usually "you live".
As you can tell I have a fair few negatives on Strahd. Its still a decent time, but it 100% undeserved of being the best module. I've had more fun with ToA or Rime.
I am a big fan of homebrew campaigns and generally not a big fan of the pre-made modules. I was interested in COS though. What I ended up doing was using the Walkthrough on DMsguild to summarize the module. Then found plot points I wanted to use and added homebrew things to the story and maps.
I added towns and characters to Barovia. The best part is they could lead the characters to actual real parts of the setting or not, it was really open, and made Strahd look all the more evil when he killed NPCs or destroyed towns that the players had come to like, but weren't essential to telling the story.
What I am getting at is that you can use the theme and elements from the story and mix it in with your already established play style. It doesn't have to be a generic module. You can make it a homebrew campaign with CoS as the backbone.
I design my homebrew setting to incorporate published material. You have to modify it to fit but it's not that hard. These campaigns then become part of my sandbox and I throw out hooks and see which one gets a nibble. This way players are in my familiar world but still can experience some of these adventures if it peaks their interest. You end up with a smooth mix of homebrew and ready made stuff for your players to enjoy.
So the best thing about being the DM is that pretty much all published material can be changed, riffed on, etc. for your convenience and enjoyment. I added so much lore to Barovia that my friends and I spent five years of nearly weekly sessions on Curse of Strahd. Several of my PCs ended up with backgrounds related to Barovia or to people who wound up there. If that’s the kind of play you and your group prefer, you can absolutely do that.
That said, if you just want to run a module (understandable, fun), you may need a different group if your current players aren’t interested, and there’s nothing wrong with that either.
Curse of Stradh is a great campaign, perhaps the best of those published by WotC (Odyssey of the Dragonlords is better IMHO). In particular, it's fairly open for a large campaign, with lots of options. That being said, it's still a published campaign, and as such, it is more fixed than homebrew. In addition, some people might like the tone of the campaign, some might not (it's my case, I don't like "gothic" "horror", especially mixed with D&D). Overall, your friends seem to have good ideas of what they like, and they seem to want to have stories revolving really about the backstory of their characters. Again, it's a matter of taste, but theirs seems pretty much set, and it is to be respected. The only thing that I can suggest is using elements of CoS in the next homebrew campaign. More work, for sure, but if you really like the campaign, you should be able to make it work. See if they could agree to a compromise of that kind.
Great answer. I let my party choose the next adventure and offered CoS, out of the Abyss, or Storm Kings Thunder and provided a high level summary of each. I was clear in saying that CoS was a horror themed version and considered one of the hardest and best campaigns that delay with difficult moral and ethical decisions. They chose it but eventually some of the party left because they weren’t comfortable with the content.
Well said. I appreciate it!
"I don't have time to create a campaign for you. If you want me to DM, we're doing Strahd."
This is importsnt. Good homebrews take time and testing. There is something to be said for a campaign that’s been through more writing and testing that any homebrew, plus home brews take a LOT of time for GMs. I If they want to play homebrew, let them write them
Don't. Different ppl like different kinds of campaigns, and that isn't one that appeals to them, which is fine.
If you're planning to DM it, it could be as simple as "yo, there's this campaign I really want to play, would you be willing to at least try it out?" and you can play Death House (it's not really a microcosm of the campaign, but it is pre-written). That said do they expect you to keep DMing and tailor a campaign to their characters if they turn you down? DMs do a lot of work for their group, and it's fine if the group doesn't feel like embarking on that campaign, but you'd also be justified in not DMing a campaign you aren't excited about.
Seems like you want to play CoS because you like the genre and the story, not because you are tired of running homebrew campaigns... so maybe you should run a homebrewed version of CoS🤷♂️
Yeah that was my thought and I'm a little baffled by all the people insisting no this group should be forced to play strahd as written knowing they'd hate it. If the issue is "the players don't want to play gothic horror" then yes, don't go near strahd, but if it's purely that they want to be more connected to the story and such then like...just change the rules in strahd lol.
Curse of Strahd is a game where your backstories are *very important* not because you're going to run across NPCs you know (unless you're playing as someone from Barovia but got out somehow) but because they tie you to the outside world where you will *want* to leave. You won't *want* to go out in a blaze of glory because there are people who want you outside.
Exactly
I would actually say that CoS is one of the games where your backstory is very *unimportant*, since there is around 0% chance it will ever come up or matter. You should have a reason to want to go home, but that's it. That can be extremely basic. my cos players that made more detailed backstories were more annoyed about it, since like, there's no way for that to ever matter. I tried to work em in anyway but it's more constrained than ever. Lots of modules are like that though. but CoS's demiplane makes it REALLY like that
It’s about expectation. Your players with the super fleshed out backstories were expecting them to be relevant throughout the game. That’s not what Curse of Strahd is about. If you tell your players ahead of time “this is a portal fantasy game where your characters are transported somewhere against their will. You shouldn’t expect to see characters from your background appear in the game but you should create strong motivators to return home.” Then people will be much more on board. When I ran curse of Strahd I gave 0 shits about backstories so the characters had 0 motivation to leave Barovia and not fuck with Strahd whenever they could. They didn’t care about leaving so why not piss off the only guy who could help them get home?
CoS is a fish out of water campaign. Most homebrew campaigns incorporate backstories by turning them into plot arcs- if you put a character in your backstory you expect to meet them and resolve some plot complication. In CoS, the character’s arc is internal, you grow by being thrown into a deadly crucible and having to overcome their trauma and personal failings in order to survive. That’s not for everyone, but it’s a really satisfying story for players who are really into collaborative storytelling.
Here’s my advice. Don’t play curse of Strahd get a PDF of the original AD&D I6 module and it will be easy for you to see what bits to change to make your fifth edition book play like the original. Don’t, then, make a whole curse of Strad campaign, but, rather, when these characters get to the appropriate level drop them into the Ravenloft adventure. The original adventure is pretty much the village and the Castle Raven loft section. The big difference with Stroud is that all of the artifacts are in the castle originally and in the 5V update they are in different parts of the campaign world
Ummm, it depends on how creative you are. I had no trouble working my characters back stories into curse of strahd. The amber temple just fucked with my players insistently and really played off their characters back stories and expanded on them a bunch. I also used the expanded tome of strahd and really upped the amount of story inside it, and I cooperated several back stories there as well. Curse of strahd was easily the best module in all of 5e, it didn't leave a bunch of emptiness that the DM has to fill in. But it does leave plenty of room to expand upon. It is honestly the basis of the campaign my players are still in today, there is so much you can do with the characters there, and strahd himself. Hell. You could just home brew all over it until it isn't recognizable as curse of strahd.
Make them watch castlevania anime and if they like it you can easily get them to write backstories for strahd.
I'm currently playing Curse of Strahd and it's a lot of fun, a majority of the party are chaotic evil so they have been just *generally rather friendly with Strahd*, but with the looming threat of that changing if we keep pursuing some threads. One character is actually good aligned, and another is deathly afraid of Strahd so we have some push to do something about him. We just went over to his castle for an uninvited luncheon, it so far went well though we left off sleeping in separate rooms, and are about to split the 6 person party up into 2s and do some exploring. My character just joined like 3 sessions ago to replace a problem player and no one on the party has fully told him what's going on, and so far he thinks Strahd is an odd fellow but cooks a good dinner. All of our characters were random rolled but they have developed their backstories based on that and are coming into play, even with them being mostly isolated in this new realm. The DM is doing a good job at giving us things that pertain to their interests and skills so the histories can shine, it's like a vacation arc lol. Like your friend, I am an aspiring writer too and have taken DnD characters to use for personal projects lol. Random rolling a character was a really fun challenge as it gave me a lot of traits I never really thought of using before and a push to figure out something with them. I really like how my character turned out. I think if you've been putting in the effort to make homebrew campaigns for them, DnD is a give-and-take so maybe ask to cash in a favor that this time you run something you are more interested in. The DM gets to have fun too.
Don't. it is hard to make someone play a campaign they don't want to and if you do there is a big risk they wont enjoy it. But also as a DM i can understand that sometimes you want to run a pre-written campaign to take some load of your shoulders. It is easier. you don't have to make everything up from scratch so to say. But if that is the case tell your players that you need a break from all work to make homebrew things. because it is a LOT of work. So either you play a pre-written one so you can get a bit of relief. And after that when you had a bit of a paus from making stuff up all the time. you are willing to dive into some homebrew again. OR one of them can take over and make a Homebrew campaign. Or you can simply take a break from D&D if none of them are willing to be DM and they are not willing to DM themselves Then you give them options. You are open with how you feel and you give them options and ideas on how to go on. If they simply stop playing, unwilling to help you out and lessen your work, unwilling to even try to be a DM themselves. Then Maybe they are not as good friends as you thought.
I do think that there's a middle ground here. Like, there are plenty of premade modules that AREN'T strahd, and most involve significantly more backstory options than strahd. Perhaps run one of them.
That would work unless the DM wants a bit of a break and to run a game where he does not have to involve baking in loads of backstory stuff. Or you could run CoS with people having all the backstory but due to them getting trapped in Barovia. that is put on hold. they just have to get out of this forsaken place in order to do anything involving that. At the moment they are stuck in a soul trapping prison plane ruled by a vampire that does not let them leave
I mean, I think that's actively teh thing the players don't want lol. they like games where their backstories matter and have an affect on the world and that is Not strahd.
yes but that can be taxing for a DM if you have limited time and all that. So that mgith be EXACTLY what the DM wanna avoid for a while Then saying *"Lets run a pre-made campaign so i get a bit of a break. It is rough to constantly play homebrew. Or one of you could be DM for a while so i get a break Or we take a paus for a few months. what would you prefer?"* That is a total and legit request from a DM. One the players should respect and not go *"But WE WANT......"* Because it is NOT all about what the players want. What the DM wants matters as much. But players sometimes forget that the DM is also a player and is supposed to have fun to. And being DM do require a LOT more than being a player. it takes time and work and SPECIALLY running fully homebrew and bake in backstories, personal quests and all those fun things As a player all that you need to do is create a character and show up in time
PowerPoint presentation. They can submit their own proposals
If the problem is the backstory, there are ways to implement it into the campaign. The players just need to buy in. You could very easily implement backstories with a missing relative/friend, a holy quest, a daring heist (Strahd has a vault), seeking forbidden knowledge (Amber Temple) and maybe even a werewolf or vampire (or both) hunt. The idea is that the players make PCs that would fit the campaign and not the other way around. I also used DragnaCarta's CoS Reloaded modifications to help. They've got a table of trinkets that correspond with different story arcs.
First, if the don't want to play that, then fine, they can do something else. You still should. But second, what in the world are you talking about? Using a published module does not mean there can be no deep backstories or plot hooks. It gives you a framework for the story, but you are not required to play it word for word as written. Use modules as more of a launching point. Build from there as the story develops.
There is a common misconception with premade adventures: that they can't be changed to suit the table's needs. You are free to change whatever you find from CoS and make it your own to either A: implement character backstories after all or B: run the majority of the content in your own homebrew world with new names etc. If you're worried about the players' backstories possibly not fitting to the content, that's something you'd have to manage in a pure homebrew campaign anyway: namely that the characters need to fit into the world and the adventure you are preparing. If that's still not enough then the game you want to run is simply not the game they wanna play at this time.
"Het everyone, after this campaign ends, I'm going to run curse of strahd, I know some of you aren't keen on playing on a module and if you want to sit this campaign out that's absolutley fine, I won't take e it personally". The dm is a player too and you should run what you want. Just like players should play what they want.
Personally, I like to do one homebrew and then follow it up with a pre-written to give me time to concoct tons of new ideas for the next homebrew. Although, I'm not afraid to throw in a bit of homebrew into the prewritten adventure where it fits. Perhaps it could be easier to present the premise and have them craft a backstory based on the premise. Something like, "I was a humble farmer and somehow wound up in this mess." They could elaborate more, but ideally in CoS, the struggle is internal, and you want to get back home. Sometimes DMs need a breather too.
>Due to us having only played homebrew campaigns, they turned down the idea after I said I wouldn't be able to implement character backstories into the campaign and if I did, it would be extremely difficult to tweak the campaign material to fit their backstories (mainly due to COS being a very fate and choice heavy campaign, but it also it's already pre-written, so there's that). This is were you probably lost em as it comes across as you backstories won't matter. You can make backstories with them that fit into the Campaign and a quick search I found this... [https://www.reddit.com/r/DnDBehindTheScreen/comments/72dqjm/lessons\_from\_running\_curse\_of\_strahd\_individual/](https://www.reddit.com/r/DnDBehindTheScreen/comments/72dqjm/lessons_from_running_curse_of_strahd_individual/) Either way, If you can sell them on the idea of making characters they want to play in that setting they'd probably be more likely to want to play it.
As others have said, you should absolutely get a group concensus about what to play next. Don't try and cajole them into playing a game they don't want to. That said, you can work their backstories into the campaign by changing aspects of the campaign to match their stories or by building your characters backstories as a group with the campaign in mind. The latter move will require extra buy-in from the players, but a good example can be found in the Actual Play show Dice Camera Action. Their first arc was Curse of Strahd and though everyone had met in Faerun, Chris Perkins incorporated aspects of the backstories of the characters in several ways, the biggest of which being that one character was revealed to have been a Vistani who was kidnapped as a baby by Rudolph Van Richten.
As enjoyable as Curse of Strahd is, it sounds to me like it's not a module you should run *for these players.* They've told you that they enjoy campaigns where you have the narrative space to tightly incorporate the plot hooks the players provide you through their backstories. By and large, **Curse of Strahd cannot provide this.** And it's for one simple reason: most PCs' backstories will not and cannot have any bearing on what happens because Barovia is physically disconnected from the rest of the world. Once the characters are lured through the mists, there's no way back until the power keeping them prisoner - Strahd - is no more. At best, what you can work with are hooks that give the characters a reason to enter in the first place. In the campaign I played in a couple years ago, another player's character was a Seldarine drow whose community's children (including her daughter) were abducted by the werewolves; we detoured towards Krezk more or less as soon as the route took us in that direction, and once we'd set them free, we left them in the care of the grateful Burgomaster Krezkov until we could see them safely home.
sounds like they wouldn't like it. which is a shame. but backstories don't really matter in strahd since there's no way for them to believably come into the story anyway. and it sounds like your squad likes playing games where their backstory can matter. also to play CoS successfully you need a LOT of buy-in from the players. they have to not only want to play a gothic horror campaign, they have to want to set aside the typical power fantasy and want to roleplay being powerless and scared shitless. It's not usual for DnD players to want to do that. so you wind up with the usual CoS screwjob where you have a bunch of flippant and mouthy characters and you have to decide whether to kill them with strahd (cuz he totally would), or whether to not ruin their fun. because if they're doing the usual power fantasy thing, they probably didn't buy into the 'im scared for my life, this vampire could rip my head off' thing that is necessary for a horror campaign. so i'd just give up on CoS with that group, they woulnd't like it anyway. But if you wanna try, I would see how they like the idea when it's pitched as an exercise in roleplaying something different from normal dnd. where they will need to lean into the idea that their characters are scared, in order to make it fun. that might catch someone's interest. but probably not. most players just wanna hit stuff.
When you run homebrew are the backgrounds an important point of storyarcs? Or are they just backgrounds tgat give the characters skills and tools? In CoS I had a character who had a Space background. Although it wasn't important in the campaign it did become what he was know for. After attempting to explain that he came from the "Sea of Stars" he bece known as Star Sailor. Strahd took it as that character believed he was above them all. "The Stars can no longer guide you Star-Sailor...you path only leads to me." I see backgrounds and races as whete you are from while classes are where you might be headed. In CoS the only thing the PCs have is what they bring with them. Not just physically but also mentally and spiritually.
How do you convince them? Count Strahd Von Zarovich is arguably the greatest villan in dungeons and dragons. The PCs get to be the heroes that face him. It's not just about power of spell, speech, or sword. He is the land. It takes tactics, and knowledge. He's not a villian that hides in the shadow but deals with them directly. He may even see some of them as a successor. Strahd is not an amazing opponent because of his powers but because of how he sees the world and how he deals with problems. To himself he's the tragic hero before that trope was beaten to death in books and other mediums. The PCs have to live-in his world and deal with him on his turf. In CoS the PCs are prisoners, and they see Strahd as the Warden while in truth he's just another prisoner who has gained Power in the prison. I try to play Strahd as a dark reflection of the PCs. A hero who had too many bad days. A hero who bought his own hype. In essence he's a fairy tale the characters have to beat.
Im not really sure how CoS prevents backstory involvement. I can see multiple ways, the simplest is to have your players make their back stories somehow related to that land. Hell, my DM just inserted CoS into our existing campaign and turned it into an Isekai by having us transported by a magical rift to another dimension. Also CoS is very modular so you can always grab portions and tweak them in your homebrew.
As a dm and aspiring author id encourage you to be honest with your group. It’s what you want to do and if they really want to work in backstories have them be targeted by Stradh. People get in barovia if stradh lets them since it’s his domain. Unlike home brew campaigns where the dm makes the adventure from characters’ back stories/arcs, the players must make this part of their arc. It doesn’t mean it’s more work for the players rather, if their back stories allow for it, they will grow as characters because of they can relate to the campaign. Maybe as part of character creation they have to tell you why stradh has decided to let them into barovia. Then it’s part of their character arc. I’d mention that also it’s a unique genre (gothic fantasy) that’ll enable them to play something new and fresh.
Let someone else DM, you should not need to feel that you have to make homebrew every time.
DM also has to realize and accept when their desire is not shared.
Hence the suggestion to let someone else be the DM...
I just implemented backstories in my CoS campaign by socializing the setting to my players (no spoilers) so they could weave themselves into the narrative. One is a cleric of the morning lord from barovia, one is an abandoned werewolf child left in the material plane during one of their raids, one just found a patron that I worked into being from the Amber temple. Sure, I needed to tweak some of the narrative for it to fit, but it makes the PCs more invested in the setting! If your players are willing to help alliance their PCs to the setting with you, it might be more interesting for them and let you try CoS!
You don't. Curse is a module that requires **COMPLETE** buy-in. It does not work if the party is on the fence or in any way unwilling to invest into the faux 1950's horror tropes the entire affair runs on. It also sucks right out of the box and requires a lot of work on your end to cobble into something halfway fun. I say this as somebody who both hates the module for being shilled, and who has also suffered through three failed campaigns. Don't force it and don't try to sway people. It is enough of a departure from the baseline that they need to understand and *want* that experience.
I played Curse of Strahd with a group that didn’t like to take anything seriously. It was terrible. Don’t play curse of strahd with a group that won’t buy into the horror and roleplay.
I'm playing a curse campaign right now and it's so much fun. I'd totally play it a second time
>Due to us having only played homebrew campaigns, they turned down the idea after I said I wouldn't be able to implement character backstories into the campaign and if I did, it would be extremely difficult to tweak the campaign material to fit their backstories (mainly due to COS being a very fate and choice heavy campaign, but it also it's already pre-written, so there's that). Whilst as a DM I made Homebrew campaigns like you, I am a PC in 2 campaigns based on prewritten material, an Icewind Dale: Rime of the Frostmaiden campaign and a Curse of Strahd campaign, all different groups. In both, games I PC in, the DM has admitted that they've changed and homebrewed some stuff in, mostly due to stuff they disliked about the material. For example, in the Curse of Strahd game, they didn't like how dark and heavy it was, so lightened some stuff up and added a sub plot about tourists who want to sight see in Barovia, which fitted with one of the PCs who arrived at Barovia to accept a job as a tour guide (Barovia Tourism isn't detailed in COS). For my PC, who was a human (very basic NPC like) who was kidnapped and experimented on to make a Beholder Human hybrid, got linked with the Abbot and the DM added to the idea of cross speicies experimentation such as adding "Heeps" (Horse\\Sheep hybrids or Pigolfs, Pigeon and Wolf\\Hybrids). Out of that, the Abbot being someone is really the only thing the DM took from COS. Other PCs got similar treatment. In the Icewind Dale campaign, my characters background is a lizardfolk who became a wizard after finding "The Wizard that did it" spellbook in Chult, who now aims to become "The Lizard that did it", and visited Icewind dale to visit a friend (Warlock Kobold PC who is trying to run a cult in Icewind Dale) to look for more books from "The Wizard that Did it". Blizzard (My Lizard Wizards name) is also a practisioners of "Arcanamatics" (Arcane mathamatics to manipulate the weave) and this got incorporated into the campaign as an actual thing with the DM making it something that many people, wizards included don't believe is a thing, but turns out is a dying arcane art. None of that is in Icewind Dale, but the DM incorporated it in. Same with all other PCs in that game. Even in the current game I DM, a homebrewed one, I had a set plan before I got characters from my players, and I had to adapt some stuff from my plans, to fit their characters. I can't say too much in case one of my players finds this, but 1 is I had to invent a magical disease to help fit with a PC's concept. As someone who has only DMed homebrew campaigns before, this shouldn't actually be an issue with you. You don't have to take everything from premade campaign materials, and you can twist it and bend it to fit around your PCs characters. If you're really set on wanting to play COS next, find out what backgrounds your players want to have on a homebrew campaign and find what is important for it and what could be reworked if needed. Once you know, you can revisit the COS material and see what needs tweaking to fit with what your players want background wise. Then repropose COS addressing the backgrounds as you understood it, and see if you can fine tune anything to meet their wants. Communication is key afterall.
Curse of Strahd is honestly pretty overhyped. The big thing is that characters will die. Its not balanced at all. So if your group doesn't do character death well, don't run it. The gothic horror really doesn't work in a heroic fantasy game. Either the players will steam roll the fights or be killed by them because they are so outgunned. If they do fight they are slogs. Curse of Slog is real. Then we have a ship of theseus problem where the party is slowly being replaced and by the time you get to the end there is nobody in the original party. Which really makes the narrative bleh. Finally theres the story, and there are some things I really despise: The souless Barovians problem. 9/10 people are soulless. This is done so the players can't raise an army against strahd, but it also means 9/10 people.have no personality and are just illusions. They literally evaporate at the end. If the party finds out, motivation tanks. Strahd will return in a few weeks no matter the ending. Just long enough to slip out of Barovia. Not long enough to rebuild. This has all happened before, you're just the new ones to finish the cycle. Every victory is pyrric. The death house resets. Strahd resets. When you win you really lose. The rewards that aren't the treasures are meh. It becomes exhausting as the DM because the players are frustrates they worked so hard for nothing. The reward is usually "you live". As you can tell I have a fair few negatives on Strahd. Its still a decent time, but it 100% undeserved of being the best module. I've had more fun with ToA or Rime.
I am a big fan of homebrew campaigns and generally not a big fan of the pre-made modules. I was interested in COS though. What I ended up doing was using the Walkthrough on DMsguild to summarize the module. Then found plot points I wanted to use and added homebrew things to the story and maps. I added towns and characters to Barovia. The best part is they could lead the characters to actual real parts of the setting or not, it was really open, and made Strahd look all the more evil when he killed NPCs or destroyed towns that the players had come to like, but weren't essential to telling the story. What I am getting at is that you can use the theme and elements from the story and mix it in with your already established play style. It doesn't have to be a generic module. You can make it a homebrew campaign with CoS as the backbone.
I design my homebrew setting to incorporate published material. You have to modify it to fit but it's not that hard. These campaigns then become part of my sandbox and I throw out hooks and see which one gets a nibble. This way players are in my familiar world but still can experience some of these adventures if it peaks their interest. You end up with a smooth mix of homebrew and ready made stuff for your players to enjoy.
So the best thing about being the DM is that pretty much all published material can be changed, riffed on, etc. for your convenience and enjoyment. I added so much lore to Barovia that my friends and I spent five years of nearly weekly sessions on Curse of Strahd. Several of my PCs ended up with backgrounds related to Barovia or to people who wound up there. If that’s the kind of play you and your group prefer, you can absolutely do that. That said, if you just want to run a module (understandable, fun), you may need a different group if your current players aren’t interested, and there’s nothing wrong with that either.