Village of Barovia (E)

The sparse light from this building spills out from behind drawn heavy curtains. A sign over the door, creaking on its hinges, reads "Bildrath's Mercantile"

• Bildrath Cantemir owns the building
• He sells items less than 25gp from the Adventuring Gear table or 10x the price
• He has no competition in the village

A single shaft of light thrusts illumination into the main square, its brightness looking like a solid pillar in the heavy fog. Above the gaping doorway, a sign hangs precariously askew, proclaiming this to be the Blood on the Vine tavern.

• Sign used to read "Blood of the Vine", but the f was scratched over
• There are a few people huddled within
  • Three Vistani sitting together (see Vistani Owners)
  • Arik the Barkeep tending bar
  • Ismark Kolyanovich sitting by himself and sipping wine (see Meeting Ismark)
• Glass of wine costs 1cp; pitcher: 1sp
• There is only wine in this world. No beer, no mead, no liquor
• Good place to meet new PCs if necessary

A moaning sob floats through the still, gray streets, coloring your thoughts with sadness. The sounds flow from a dark, two-story townhouse

• The house is boarded up and barricaded from the inside
  • DC 15 athletics check to open a door
• Mad Mary sits in the center of the floor in an upstairs bedroom clutching a malformed doll
• If inspected:
  • The doll has a strange leer and wears a sackcloth dress
  • Stitched into the hem of its dress is a frayed tag bearing the words "Is No Fun, Is No Blinsky!"

A weary-looking mansion squats behind a rusting iron fence. The iron gates are twisted and torn. The right gate lies cast aside, while the left swings lazily in the wind. The stuttering squeal and clang of the gate repeats with mindless precision. Weeds choke the grounds and press with menace upon the house itself. Yet, against the walls, the growth has been tramped down to create a path all about the domain. Heavy claw markings have stripped the once-beautiful finish of the walls. Great black marks tell of the fires that have assailed the mansion. Not a pane nor a shard of glass stands in any window. All the windows are barred with planks, each one marked with stains of evil omen.

• DC 11 Perception -> can discern trampled weeds all around the mansion as well as scores of wolf paw prints and human footprints

  • (the prints were made by zombies and ghouls under Strahd's control)
• Ireena Kolyana is inside and won't open the heavily-barred door to anyone unless she's convinced they don't have any allegiance to Strahd

  • Can convince with good roleplaying or DC 15 Deception/Persuasion
  • Or with Ismark Kolyanovich

• After entering:

  The interior of the mansion is well furnished, yet the fixtures show signs of great wear. Noticeable oddities are the boarded-up windows and the presence of holy symbols in every room. The burgomaster is in a side drawing room on the floor -- lying in a simple wooden coffin surrounded by wilting flowers and a faint odor of decay.

• Ismark Kolyanovich and Ireena made the coffin themselves

• Ismark will offer 50gp to the PCs if they escort Ireena to safety

  • {Not necessarily The Town of Vallaki (N), but wherever she's safe}
  • He will suggest The Town of Vallaki (N) though
• Ireena refuses to go until her father is buried

  • She asks the PCs to help Ismark deliver the body to Donavich
    • No one else in town has been brave enough to help
• They warn the PCs about the church before going

  • Donavich is in a bad way recently because of his son Doru
  • Have them tell the whole story

• The next morning, Ismark accompanies the party, but Ireena stays home (she wants to go, but Ismark fights her on it)

Atop a slight rise, against the roots of the pillar stone that supports Castle Ravenloft (K) stands a gray, sagging edifice of stone and wood. This church has obviously weathered the assaults of evil for centuries on end and is work and weary. A bell tower rises toward the back, and flickering light shines through holes in the shingled roof. The rafters strain feebly against their load

When approaching:

The heavy wooden doors of the church are covered with claw marks and scarred by fire.

• Read descriptions from book for other parts of church (p 45)

A fence of wrought iron with a rusty gate encloses a rectangular plot of land behind the dilapidated church. Tightly packed gravestones shrouded by fog bear the names of souls long passed. All seems quiet.

Mechanics of Dream Pastries

• Run this event when the players first leave Death House
• Read:

  You hear the sound of small, wooden wheels rolling across damp cobbles. You trace the lonely sound to a hunched figure huddled in rags, pushing a rickety wooden cart through the fog. The figure approaches the door of a nearby home and knocks

• if approaching:

  You catch a delicious smell on the air. You see that the figure is an old lady. She's just handed something to the person in the house, and he is thanking her profusely

• The players meet Morgantha selling her dream pastries
  • She's in the guise of an old woman and has come from Old Bonegrinder (O) to sell her pastries
• She has a small variety of pies (they don't have to be meat. Just contain kid parts like ground up bones)
  • Meat pies, maple nut pies, and a hearty pie with a potato base
  • if asked the type of meat:

    Oh, Barovians use all kinds of meat. Especially since we've a dreadful lack of sunlight for good fruits and veggies. I myself prefer chicken, but there's also goat, deer, pig, and wolf meat depending on where you go. You'd think wolf meat would be more of delicacy, huh? Not here, dearie! With Lord Strahd in charge there's more wolves in these woods than we know what to do with!

• The pastries normally cost 1gp each
  • but she will gift the party a pie to share for dinner (she won't take no for an answer)
    • She waves the fee because they're new to Barovia and their journey into town must have been hard
• When she explains why they're so expensive:
  • it's a bit of magic her mother taught her before the witch killed her
  • The pies bring the eaters only the sweetest of dreams, something poorly lacking in this dreary world (make her seem grief stricken by the state of the world)
• She'll point them to the Blood on the Vine Tavern, seeing how tired they seem to be after having just escaped Death House