Context: I run a very small game with just me and my younger brother as a sibling/cousin (when they're there) bonding activity. Since he's still pretty young, new to DnD, and the only Player most of the time, I created a bunch of DM PCs for him to pick and choose to accompany his own character on adventures. To make things more balanced, he gets to control them in combat, but I would roleplay these additional characters for him and nudge him when he needs a little help figuring out the plot/story.
So recently, (over the summer), to keep our winter break's campaign interesting, we decided to take the Party on a detour to Barovia.
The problem is, my brother is 10. And Curse of Strahd is not a very child-friendly campaign.
While I don't plan on giving him the full CoS horror treatment, he is very into mysteries and the "dark and gloomy" atmosphere of Barovia. He's totally fine with killing monsters (he loved monster-hunting in the Svalich woods) and is not fazed by betrayal, political intrigue (exploitation, fearmongering), and very nasty personalities so long as the death is not so explicit or not directly on camera, or there is some kind of hope for completely reversing the terrible thing. Oh, and no sex stuff or anything similar to the entirely inbred mongrel-kind species. Because he's a child.
For example:
I can explicitly tell and show him how most people don't have souls in Barovia, so long as I offer the option for him to (eventually) get everyone's souls back.
I can also show him Strahd regularly kidnapping people and his torture victims, but I can't make Strahd kill or torture anyone explicitly (blood, knives, psychic and magic stuff is fair game) on screen or make the hags eat children
I started him on the opposite side of the map (in Krezk) with the Call for Help hook, skipping Barovia and Death House so he can start off without being inundiated in way too much horror from the start. So far, he's beat up a bunch of twig blights, druids, and cultists, but he's getting close to the point where the campaign introduces the dumpster fire that is the Von Zarovich household, especially the relationship between Strahd and his brides + Esther or the whole Ireena/Tatyana obsession and subsequent abduction plotline. I can't think of any child-friendly way of maintaining Strahd's character as the cruel and cunning BBEG with a very twisted motivations without making him a cartoonish or fairytale villain.
One way to make make Ireena a goal of strahd without the obsession is to have her be a descendant of a powerful spell caster who cursed him because he was an evil tryrant. He has to convince Ireena to release the curse on him and plans to kidnap her to do so while pretending to love her. For his vampire spawns instead of his lovers they can be his spoiled relatives that benefited from his tyranny.
Another ideas is you can play up the role of the shadow fell and say that most of the realm is actually a kind of magical illusion designed to punish strahd for his wrong doing. Most of the people there ( - a few magical interlopers) are in effect ghosts sent to haunt him. You can either make it so that the heroes are also part of the magical punishment or they can be brought there to finally end him and put the ghosts to rest.
The final option is to simply leave allot of the details really vague allot of the worst stuff is in the dm information and is meant to be uncovered by players. You can simply make some of that information unfindable. Text gets blotted out, books are ruined ect...
You could play up the folk tale aspect, so things like the hag's lair is more of a Hansel & Gretel kind of witch's house, with maybe kids in cages rather than butchered remains. You could play up the stereotypical Dracula vampire story with Strahd vs the more book-accurate reincarnated love story angle, stuff like that
One way to make make Ireena a goal of strahd without the obsession is to have her be a descendant of a powerful spell caster who cursed him because he was an evil tryrant. He has to convince Ireena to release the curse on him and plans to kidnap her to do so while pretending to love her. For his vampire spawns instead of his lovers they can be his spoiled relatives that benefited from his tyranny.
That... basically solves the entire Strahd-Ireena problem. Strahd still keeps his personality, most of his early backstory (such as his former career as "conquerer"), and he can still be a shitty bastard to everyone in Barovia. Thanks! I'm definitely incorporating that into my campaign.
Another ideas is you can play up the role of the shadow fell and say that most of the realm is actually a kind of magical illusion designed to punish strahd for his wrong doing. Most of the people there ( - a few magical interlopers) are in effect ghosts sent to haunt him. You can either make it so that the heroes are also part of the magical punishment or they can be brought there to finally end him and put the ghosts to rest.
Hmm... the Shadowfell aspect is also quite intriguing. However, I'm hesitant on making all of the civilian inhabitants of Barovia "essentially ghosts" to haunt/punish Strahd - I fear it will lessen the impact of their suffering. Strahd is a terrible person, and I think the living, real villagers are very useful as direct evidence of his tyranny and "human emotional hooks" for the adventure.
While I'm not so well versed in the lore of Shadowfell (I entirely skipped 4e and the whole Spellplague/continental upheaval lore), that does sound like a very interesting twist, perhaps for the revenants of Argynvost, or even the ghosts of his parents - I could have them periodically (monthly) appear in Strahd's castle to cause him inconvenience or cast disappointing looks at the local vampiric overlord. Thanks for another great idea!
You could play up the folk tale aspect, so things like the hag's lair is more of a Hansel & Gretel kind of witch's house, with maybe kids in cages rather than butchered remains. You could play up the stereotypical Dracula vampire story with Strahd vs the more book-accurate reincarnated love story angle, stuff like that
The Hansel & Gretel Hag's lair sounds like a great idea for next next session. Though I'm not quite sure what a stereotypical Dracula vampire story is...?
I did check the original novel for inspiration, but it wasn't much help. Dracula did way too much stalking for me to be running in a campaign for children and Dracula is essentially a cryptid - that's quite a ways different from the infamous reputation Strahd has built up in Barovia.
Context: I run a very small game with just me and my younger brother as a sibling/cousin (when they're there) bonding activity. Since he's still pretty young, new to DnD, and the only Player most of the time, I created a bunch of DM PCs for him to pick and choose to accompany his own character on adventures. To make things more balanced, he gets to control them in combat, but I would roleplay these additional characters for him and nudge him when he needs a little help figuring out the plot/story.
So recently, (over the summer), to keep our winter break's campaign interesting, we decided to take the Party on a detour to Barovia.
The problem is, my brother is 10. And Curse of Strahd is not a very child-friendly campaign.
While I don't plan on giving him the full CoS horror treatment, he is very into mysteries and the "dark and gloomy" atmosphere of Barovia. He's totally fine with killing monsters (he loved monster-hunting in the Svalich woods) and is not fazed by betrayal, political intrigue (exploitation, fearmongering), and very nasty personalities so long as the death is not so explicit or not directly on camera, or there is some kind of hope for completely reversing the terrible thing.
Oh, and no sex stuff or anything similar to the entirely inbred mongrel-kind species. Because he's a child.
For example:
I started him on the opposite side of the map (in Krezk) with the Call for Help hook, skipping Barovia and Death House so he can start off without being inundiated in way too much horror from the start. So far, he's beat up a bunch of twig blights, druids, and cultists, but he's getting close to the point where the campaign introduces the dumpster fire that is the Von Zarovich household, especially the relationship between Strahd and his brides + Esther or the whole Ireena/Tatyana obsession and subsequent abduction plotline. I can't think of any child-friendly way of maintaining Strahd's character as the cruel and cunning BBEG with a very twisted motivations without making him a cartoonish or fairytale villain.
So... yeah. Please send help.
I have some ideas
One way to make make Ireena a goal of strahd without the obsession is to have her be a descendant of a powerful spell caster who cursed him because he was an evil tryrant. He has to convince Ireena to release the curse on him and plans to kidnap her to do so while pretending to love her. For his vampire spawns instead of his lovers they can be his spoiled relatives that benefited from his tyranny.
Another ideas is you can play up the role of the shadow fell and say that most of the realm is actually a kind of magical illusion designed to punish strahd for his wrong doing. Most of the people there ( - a few magical interlopers) are in effect ghosts sent to haunt him. You can either make it so that the heroes are also part of the magical punishment or they can be brought there to finally end him and put the ghosts to rest.
The final option is to simply leave allot of the details really vague allot of the worst stuff is in the dm information and is meant to be uncovered by players. You can simply make some of that information unfindable. Text gets blotted out, books are ruined ect...
You could play up the folk tale aspect, so things like the hag's lair is more of a Hansel & Gretel kind of witch's house, with maybe kids in cages rather than butchered remains. You could play up the stereotypical Dracula vampire story with Strahd vs the more book-accurate reincarnated love story angle, stuff like that
That... basically solves the entire Strahd-Ireena problem. Strahd still keeps his personality, most of his early backstory (such as his former career as "conquerer"), and he can still be a shitty bastard to everyone in Barovia. Thanks! I'm definitely incorporating that into my campaign.
Hmm... the Shadowfell aspect is also quite intriguing. However, I'm hesitant on making all of the civilian inhabitants of Barovia "essentially ghosts" to haunt/punish Strahd - I fear it will lessen the impact of their suffering. Strahd is a terrible person, and I think the living, real villagers are very useful as direct evidence of his tyranny and "human emotional hooks" for the adventure.
While I'm not so well versed in the lore of Shadowfell (I entirely skipped 4e and the whole Spellplague/continental upheaval lore), that does sound like a very interesting twist, perhaps for the revenants of Argynvost, or even the ghosts of his parents - I could have them periodically (monthly) appear in Strahd's castle to cause him inconvenience or cast disappointing looks at the local vampiric overlord. Thanks for another great idea!
The Hansel & Gretel Hag's lair sounds like a great idea for next next session. Though I'm not quite sure what a stereotypical Dracula vampire story is...?
I did check the original novel for inspiration, but it wasn't much help. Dracula did way too much stalking for me to be running in a campaign for children and Dracula is essentially a cryptid - that's quite a ways different from the infamous reputation Strahd has built up in Barovia.