

Let’s turn my regrets into your benefits by listing them out one by one! Start reading the list below. I summarize lessons for my playstyle and focus on what I consider to be missed opportunities. Regrets and Lessons Learned! My Best 13 Curse of Strahd DM Tips In other words, my advice is quality over quantity. Of course, I could give far more Curse of Strahd DM advice than these lessons, but I want to focus on my tops points of advice to assist DMs with different playstyles broadly.

Berez was deadly, mysterious, and eerie.The Amber Temple was deadly, vast, and claustrophobic.They always felt urgency with their decisions and travels. They knew there were things happening on a timeline that they couldn’t see. He was visibly and vocally disappointed when he eventually wrote them all off. Strahd tried to find reasons to admire the player characters.Lord Strahd mediated their differences before Anastrasya drank the blood of Karl Wachter as everyone had to sit and watch. I had NPCs that the party had beef with at dinner (the Wachters). Have the players encounter Strahd early and then frequently after.They invested in beating him for the rest of the campaign. Players hated Strahd after their first encounter with him.The Abbot and Vasilka were creepy and compelling.They should only encounter creepy, unsettling sights at that point. Making travel seem risky, but stop doing random encounters for combat after level six.Here are several points of the campaign that I feel I did excellently before I get to my regrets:

I should probably mention details that I believe I got right when running Curse of Strahd. First, What Was I Proud of? Curse of Strahd DM Tips Please comment with your thoughts on whether my Curse of Strahd DM advice inspired or helped you. My missed opportunities (or “mist” opportunities, haha) are learning moments for my next campaign, but they can help you and your group, too! Don’t forget to take the poll to give me feedback at the end of the article. It turned out I had plenty of feedback on the subject! They asked me what I’ll change if I run CoS again. Several of my players have considered or started DMing their own Curse of Strahd campaigns. I’ve completed the campaign as a DM three times, and I’ve reflected on those campaigns in great detail. Featured image credit for Curse of Strahd DM tips to Wizards of the Coast’s D&D 5e Van Richten’s Guide to Ravenloft book.ĭisclaimer: This article contains affiliate links that add gold to our coffers.Ĭurse of Strahd is by far my favorite module.
