I haven't run this yet but our DM, when my group played CoS, pulled the player who came into contact with the Dark Powers into another room and had a conversation with them privately. He also did this to any player to randomly had an encounter with Strahd, so in combination with notes being passed, we all were on edge but no one knew anything. I think that made roleplaying very natural for that campaign.
I mostly narrated it for the group. Any of them could choose to communicate with the dark power remnants to see what they offered ... and knowing this group they would do so. There is no penalty for talking. However, there are also far too many dark powers to run each separately for each character. On the other hand, any deals the characters decided to make were handled privately so that the other characters might not be aware that a deal had been made with the dark powers. (As it turned out, only one character in the party was interested in a deal).
Depends on the group. I have one group that is pretty good at sticking to their character's direct knowledge. I have another group that has some major metagamers that just can't wrap their head around what they as players know compared to what their characters know. I made the mistake of narrating one of the dark powers aloud to that second group and it caused a lot of problems when the person who took the gift wanted to role play the effect but the others already knew what happened and were already strategizing about how to use it.
My other group did fine hearing them narrated aloud but they would also have done just fine if I kept them private.
So my advice is to do them privately. I think that would make it more fun.
I'm a player in this particular campaign, and the dm is doing it via discord conversations. We each were contacted but no one has openly brought it up in game. (My gf is th dm so I got a little of the inside scoop). Secret notes is def the way to go imo
So my advice is to do them privately. I think that would make it more fun.
I would second this recommendation. Or, at the very least, pass a private/secret note concerning the specifics of the dark power's gift and drawback. I had a fairly veteran group of players for a Curse of Strahd campaign that I was running, so it seemed reasonable to play out the interactions that the players were having with the various entities in the temple. However, as soon as somebody agreed to a deal, everybody started shopping around to try to attain the best gifts that they could get...
Not a problem per se, but it lost a bit of the gothic horror feel when the interactions with these dark powers became more of a shopping spree.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
How are you guys communicating the Dark powers options in-game to your players?
I haven't run this yet but our DM, when my group played CoS, pulled the player who came into contact with the Dark Powers into another room and had a conversation with them privately. He also did this to any player to randomly had an encounter with Strahd, so in combination with notes being passed, we all were on edge but no one knew anything. I think that made roleplaying very natural for that campaign.
mostly narrating it for the group. secret note for player, hints of things for the others.
love the dark powers.
DM - And In The Darkness, Rot: The Sunless Citadel
DM - Our Little Lives Kept In Equipoise: Curse of Strahd
DM - Misprize Thou Not These Shadows That Belong: The Lost Mines of Phandelver
PC - Azzure - Tyranny of Dragons
I mostly narrated it for the group. Any of them could choose to communicate with the dark power remnants to see what they offered ... and knowing this group they would do so. There is no penalty for talking. However, there are also far too many dark powers to run each separately for each character. On the other hand, any deals the characters decided to make were handled privately so that the other characters might not be aware that a deal had been made with the dark powers. (As it turned out, only one character in the party was interested in a deal).
Depends on the group. I have one group that is pretty good at sticking to their character's direct knowledge. I have another group that has some major metagamers that just can't wrap their head around what they as players know compared to what their characters know. I made the mistake of narrating one of the dark powers aloud to that second group and it caused a lot of problems when the person who took the gift wanted to role play the effect but the others already knew what happened and were already strategizing about how to use it.
My other group did fine hearing them narrated aloud but they would also have done just fine if I kept them private.
So my advice is to do them privately. I think that would make it more fun.
I'm a player in this particular campaign, and the dm is doing it via discord conversations. We each were contacted but no one has openly brought it up in game. (My gf is th dm so I got a little of the inside scoop). Secret notes is def the way to go imo
Call me Knives.
I would second this recommendation. Or, at the very least, pass a private/secret note concerning the specifics of the dark power's gift and drawback. I had a fairly veteran group of players for a Curse of Strahd campaign that I was running, so it seemed reasonable to play out the interactions that the players were having with the various entities in the temple. However, as soon as somebody agreed to a deal, everybody started shopping around to try to attain the best gifts that they could get...
Not a problem per se, but it lost a bit of the gothic horror feel when the interactions with these dark powers became more of a shopping spree.