Session 39

Strahd retreats when he's like half out of HP

• so that he can regen
• stuff in the castle will delay the party; allow them to choose to stay in initiative
• he retreats as a mist up the stairs with the chink
• he goes to the spires or the parapets

From here, the party can see that Strahd's reinforcements are making their way across the drawbridge

• Wolves, bats, and vampire spawn (more than Vallaki)

  • hundreds of baddies
  • maybe a few run into the castle, and the party has to fight them
  • let it really set in that things are dire
• Then they see their own reinforcements:

  • A swarm of ravens flies in from the west, transforming into many familiar faces and many unfamiliar
    • it's the Martikovs (Urwin and Danika and Keepers of the Feather)
    • they transform to human and block the entrance for the wolves and vamps
  • Out of the woods comes Izek with three small wolves at his heel, and a couple dozen other full-grown werewolves
    • the boys that were transformed earlier
    • Izek has been keeping an eye on them
  • From the south, Ismark leads a small but determined group of ragged fighters from Barovia Village
  • More wereravens (The Martikovs from the winery) as well as Rictavio
  • Piccolo leading a group of little stick bois
• Each round on initiative 20, let the party roll to see how the battle is going downstairs

  • if they do something to help during the round, give them advantage

  • They can roll whatever makes sense for their last action (e.g. dex/str for throwing something off the wall) or cha by default (to see how inspired the fighters were by the messages Pelanil sent and their previous interactions with the party)

    • use a group check:
      • To make a group ability check, everyone in the group makes the ability check. If at least half the group succeeds, the whole group succeeds. Otherwise, the group fails.
  • The roll is against a Vampires str roll (to represent the strength of the other side)

    • every failure means another named NPC dies