I am about to run Curse of Strahd. My players are playing an elf rogue thief, a fighter gunslinger (Critical role), and a bear totem barbarian. This presents a problem: there are no clerics or paladins to use the holy symbol. I was just wondering what suggestions you all have for solving this issue. Should I make Van Richten their fated ally? Maybe one of the priests and add sidekick levels. Open to any suggestions.
You are the DM and thus have the power to change restrictions on attunement however you wish. For example, you want to keep the flavour relatively intact, you could homerule it to “requires attunement by a spiritual class or subclass.” That is a term you define on your own, but generally could be taken to include both the Clerics and Paladins it already covers… and a barbarian subclass based on totem magic.
You are the DM and to make this party work in CoS you will need to change things up a lot. They are three martial classes with no healing options. The rogue might be ok as a back up healer if they pick up the healer feat since they could get another character back on their feet in a fight at the cost of a bonus action.
CoS has a lot of undead and there are a number of encounters which can have a lot of creatures or have one or two really strong creatures. With a small party of martials you will need to adjust such encounters. You will also likely have to make healing potions far more commonly available than they are in the module since it will be the only way to get characters back on their feet in a fight (unless the rogue gets the healer feat) or you add some sort of healer as an NPC/sidekick.
In addition, as you mentioned there are several items that require attunement by a good cleric or paladin AND CoS has a very limited variety of magical weapons. If the characters are looking for specific weapons for specific character concepts, you will likely have to put them in explicitly or modify the Vistani to allow them to sell these sort of things at prices the players can afford (prices in Barovia are supposed to be something like 10x PHB values with a cap on the maximum price available). These magical weapons become important later since a number of the opponents are either resistant or immune to non-magical damage.
P.S. When I ran this I had Ezmeralda join the party (replaced the one fated by the cards - since they "saved" that one :) ). She is some sort of fighter/wizard hybrid but if you modified the spell list to swap in some basic healing spells (healing word, prayer of healing, lesser restoration) etc then that might work as well. If you need her in the plot earlier, you could introduce her early and level her up with the characters.
I personally think that COS kind of works better without a cleric or paladin because it makes radiant damage a little bit more scarce and makes other options for power boosts like dark gifts, making deals and searching for other items more attractive.
That said I also agree with he idea that a totem barbarian could use the symbol. The totem of the raven sounds cool.
You'll be fine. You can tweak some things if you want to, just to let the party have more fun, but when running a bought module it's ok for the PCs to fail at their quest.
Curse of Strahd is a total meatgrinder, and if you run it as written, their chances of surviving are practically nil. Most parties will die at Old Bonegrinder (a close to impossible encounter at the level characters reach it if you play the hags as intelligent), in Castle Ravenloft if they pop in for a visit early (the whelps that stop you leaving are an insta-TPK for low level parties), will be easily killed by Baba Lysaga and her hut (a party of 3 characters can probably take it once they reach level 9+ but they'll get there much earlier and die), or the overwhelming number of druids and berserkers on the hill. They shouldn't fail the door puzzle to Van Richten's tower, but with a party of 3 martial types, a young blue dragon might just be able to kill them by doing repeated fly-bys with its breath weapon. You definitely need to factor in the smaller party size.
With 3 martial classes, I'd change the Symbol of Ravenkind to be the Shield of Ravenkind and remove the holy symbol aspect. The requirement to be a pala/cleric has always been silly.
Give them Mordenkainen as the ally (he's easily the strongest and can compensate for the PCs lack of spellcasting), but remove the requirement to cast Greater Restoration on him. You might consider letting the PCs find something like a trinket he once lost, which when shown restores him to sanity, or a magical effect, otherwise he can play no part in the game (interestingly he never can anyway - even ignoring the ridiculous requirements needed to even attempt it, no PCs are going to have Greater Restoration at the point they encounter him, as they'll be hitting the Amber Temple around then after which they might as well go straight to Castle Ravenloft as they're over levelled to kill Strahd as it is).
I wouldn't worry about rebalancing the party. I mean... odds are pretty good on at least one of them dying at some point, but hey... then the dead guy might roll up a Cleric or something with healing powers and now everyone realizes how seriously dangerous the situation is.
You'll be fine. You can tweak some things if you want to, just to let the party have more fun, but when running a bought module it's ok for the PCs to fail at their quest.
Curse of Strahd is a total meatgrinder, and if you run it as written, their chances of surviving are practically nil. Most parties will die at Old Bonegrinder (a close to impossible encounter at the level characters reach it if you play the hags as intelligent), in Castle Ravenloft if they pop in for a visit early (the whelps that stop you leaving are an insta-TPK for low level parties), will be easily killed by Baba Lysaga and her hut (a party of 3 characters can probably take it once they reach level 9+ but they'll get there much earlier and die), or the overwhelming number of druids and berserkers on the hill. They shouldn't fail the door puzzle to Van Richten's tower, but with a party of 3 martial types, a young blue dragon might just be able to kill them by doing repeated fly-bys with its breath weapon. You definitely need to factor in the smaller party size.
Well, the PCs will only die at Old Bonegrinder if they actually attack; the hags have no particular motivation to kill the PCs if not disturbed. Other TPKs include waking up the vampire spawn in Vallaki and just walking through the front door of the Amber Temple.
Introduce an item that temporarily grants a level in Cleric to anyone with a high enough Wisdom to multiclass. If nobody fits that bill, make one for a high-Cha character that grants a level of Paladin. This allows them to use items for those classes and 'test-drive' a new class without having to commit to it fully. Tell them that once CoS is done, they can multiclass and just keep the level or ditch the item and go back to the way they were.
Some of the problems have sort of been solved. I talked to my players about not having a healer, and the barbarIan player volunteered to switch to a healer. He hasn't told me what class he'll be playing yet, but whatever it is I will probably be able to fit it under a spiritual class or subclass requirement. Thank you all for your help and insights.
You'll be fine. You can tweak some things if you want to, just to let the party have more fun, but when running a bought module it's ok for the PCs to fail at their quest.
Curse of Strahd is a total meatgrinder, and if you run it as written, their chances of surviving are practically nil. Most parties will die at Old Bonegrinder (a close to impossible encounter at the level characters reach it if you play the hags as intelligent), in Castle Ravenloft if they pop in for a visit early (the whelps that stop you leaving are an insta-TPK for low level parties), will be easily killed by Baba Lysaga and her hut (a party of 3 characters can probably take it once they reach level 9+ but they'll get there much earlier and die), or the overwhelming number of druids and berserkers on the hill. They shouldn't fail the door puzzle to Van Richten's tower, but with a party of 3 martial types, a young blue dragon might just be able to kill them by doing repeated fly-bys with its breath weapon. You definitely need to factor in the smaller party size.
Well, the PCs will only die at Old Bonegrinder if they actually attack; the hags have no particular motivation to kill the PCs if not disturbed. Other TPKs include waking up the vampire spawn in Vallaki and just walking through the front door of the Amber Temple.
Heh, yeah I remember those spawn... when the shopkeep guy whispered "There are five vampires in there..." our barbarian just kicked the door down and attacked. Ended up burning down a lot of the town but I think the DM went easy on us (we were level 4).
Re: the hags... While they are not immediately hostile, the encounter suffers from one of the many issues in CoS: there is no way for the PCs to know how dangerous the encounter would be (Baba Lysaga is similar - how on earth are players meant to know how powerful she is?), and it's way over-level for them. If the PCs have learned that the hags make the dream pastries out of children, there's a pretty good chance they'll fight them. The encounter is all set up so that the PCs discover that the hags get people addicted, then make their kids into food. It would be weirder if it didn't end in combat.
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I am about to run Curse of Strahd. My players are playing an elf rogue thief, a fighter gunslinger (Critical role), and a bear totem barbarian. This presents a problem: there are no clerics or paladins to use the holy symbol. I was just wondering what suggestions you all have for solving this issue. Should I make Van Richten their fated ally? Maybe one of the priests and add sidekick levels. Open to any suggestions.
"You have to be odd to be number one"
Dr. Seuss
You are the DM and thus have the power to change restrictions on attunement however you wish. For example, you want to keep the flavour relatively intact, you could homerule it to “requires attunement by a spiritual class or subclass.” That is a term you define on your own, but generally could be taken to include both the Clerics and Paladins it already covers… and a barbarian subclass based on totem magic.
You are the DM and to make this party work in CoS you will need to change things up a lot. They are three martial classes with no healing options. The rogue might be ok as a back up healer if they pick up the healer feat since they could get another character back on their feet in a fight at the cost of a bonus action.
CoS has a lot of undead and there are a number of encounters which can have a lot of creatures or have one or two really strong creatures. With a small party of martials you will need to adjust such encounters. You will also likely have to make healing potions far more commonly available than they are in the module since it will be the only way to get characters back on their feet in a fight (unless the rogue gets the healer feat) or you add some sort of healer as an NPC/sidekick.
In addition, as you mentioned there are several items that require attunement by a good cleric or paladin AND CoS has a very limited variety of magical weapons. If the characters are looking for specific weapons for specific character concepts, you will likely have to put them in explicitly or modify the Vistani to allow them to sell these sort of things at prices the players can afford (prices in Barovia are supposed to be something like 10x PHB values with a cap on the maximum price available). These magical weapons become important later since a number of the opponents are either resistant or immune to non-magical damage.
P.S. When I ran this I had Ezmeralda join the party (replaced the one fated by the cards - since they "saved" that one :) ). She is some sort of fighter/wizard hybrid but if you modified the spell list to swap in some basic healing spells (healing word, prayer of healing, lesser restoration) etc then that might work as well. If you need her in the plot earlier, you could introduce her early and level her up with the characters.
I would seriously reconsider running Curse of Strahd without any cleric or Paladin.
It's kind of like ordering the Navy to attack a land locked country. Not entirely impossible, but why?
I personally think that COS kind of works better without a cleric or paladin because it makes radiant damage a little bit more scarce and makes other options for power boosts like dark gifts, making deals and searching for other items more attractive.
That said I also agree with he idea that a totem barbarian could use the symbol. The totem of the raven sounds cool.
You'll be fine. You can tweak some things if you want to, just to let the party have more fun, but when running a bought module it's ok for the PCs to fail at their quest.
Curse of Strahd is a total meatgrinder, and if you run it as written, their chances of surviving are practically nil. Most parties will die at Old Bonegrinder (a close to impossible encounter at the level characters reach it if you play the hags as intelligent), in Castle Ravenloft if they pop in for a visit early (the whelps that stop you leaving are an insta-TPK for low level parties), will be easily killed by Baba Lysaga and her hut (a party of 3 characters can probably take it once they reach level 9+ but they'll get there much earlier and die), or the overwhelming number of druids and berserkers on the hill. They shouldn't fail the door puzzle to Van Richten's tower, but with a party of 3 martial types, a young blue dragon might just be able to kill them by doing repeated fly-bys with its breath weapon. You definitely need to factor in the smaller party size.
With 3 martial classes, I'd change the Symbol of Ravenkind to be the Shield of Ravenkind and remove the holy symbol aspect. The requirement to be a pala/cleric has always been silly.
Give them Mordenkainen as the ally (he's easily the strongest and can compensate for the PCs lack of spellcasting), but remove the requirement to cast Greater Restoration on him. You might consider letting the PCs find something like a trinket he once lost, which when shown restores him to sanity, or a magical effect, otherwise he can play no part in the game (interestingly he never can anyway - even ignoring the ridiculous requirements needed to even attempt it, no PCs are going to have Greater Restoration at the point they encounter him, as they'll be hitting the Amber Temple around then after which they might as well go straight to Castle Ravenloft as they're over levelled to kill Strahd as it is).
I wouldn't worry about rebalancing the party. I mean... odds are pretty good on at least one of them dying at some point, but hey... then the dead guy might roll up a Cleric or something with healing powers and now everyone realizes how seriously dangerous the situation is.
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Well, the PCs will only die at Old Bonegrinder if they actually attack; the hags have no particular motivation to kill the PCs if not disturbed. Other TPKs include waking up the vampire spawn in Vallaki and just walking through the front door of the Amber Temple.
Introduce an item that temporarily grants a level in Cleric to anyone with a high enough Wisdom to multiclass. If nobody fits that bill, make one for a high-Cha character that grants a level of Paladin. This allows them to use items for those classes and 'test-drive' a new class without having to commit to it fully. Tell them that once CoS is done, they can multiclass and just keep the level or ditch the item and go back to the way they were.
Some of the problems have sort of been solved. I talked to my players about not having a healer, and the barbarIan player volunteered to switch to a healer. He hasn't told me what class he'll be playing yet, but whatever it is I will probably be able to fit it under a spiritual class or subclass requirement. Thank you all for your help and insights.
"You have to be odd to be number one"
Dr. Seuss
Heh, yeah I remember those spawn... when the shopkeep guy whispered "There are five vampires in there..." our barbarian just kicked the door down and attacked. Ended up burning down a lot of the town but I think the DM went easy on us (we were level 4).
Re: the hags... While they are not immediately hostile, the encounter suffers from one of the many issues in CoS: there is no way for the PCs to know how dangerous the encounter would be (Baba Lysaga is similar - how on earth are players meant to know how powerful she is?), and it's way over-level for them. If the PCs have learned that the hags make the dream pastries out of children, there's a pretty good chance they'll fight them. The encounter is all set up so that the PCs discover that the hags get people addicted, then make their kids into food. It would be weirder if it didn't end in combat.