Under raging storm clouds, a lone figure stands silhouetted against the ancient walls of Castle Ravenloft. The vampire Count Strahd von Zarovich stares down a sheer cliff at the village below. A cold, bitter wind spins dead leaves about him, billowing his cape in the darkness. Lightning splits the clouds overhead, casting stark white light across him. Strahd turns to the sky, revealing the angular muscles of his face and hands. He has a look of power-and of madness. His once handsome face is contorted by a tragedy darker than the night itself.
Rumbling thunder pounds the castle spires. The wind's howling increases as Strahd turns his gaze back to the village. Far below, yet not beyond his ken, a party of adventurers has just entered his domain. Strahd's face forms a twisted smile as his dark plan unfolds. He knew they were coming, and he knows why they have come-all according to his plan. He, the master of Ravenloft, will attend to them.
Another lightning flash rips through the darkness, its thunder echoing through the castle's towers. But Strahd is gone. Only the howling of the wind-or perhaps a lone wolf-fills the midnight air. The master of Raven loft is having guests for dinner. And you are invited.
Hello! I'm recruiting for a game of 5 players. Each player start at the very 1st level. You can use any official content (including UA). 3rd side content require my premission. For ability scores, you should roll 4d6 and remove the lowest. You can use any setting for your background.
I have read raving reviews for Curse of Strahd, and am interested! Ability scores:
101613121311
Okay. So basically Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Aasimar Monk, probably advance into Sun Soul.
Backstory:
Fiona grew up in the monastery, raised by her father, but also by many of the other monks. Visits from her mother were rare, and brief. Her longest visits were when she had been badly wounded in her tireless crusade against the creatures of darkness.
A time came when she never came back. It has now been a year since her mother passed into the mists, never to return. She knows in her heart that her mother must be dead, for she has now inherited the celestial birthright of their family; and taken upon herself, the mantle of Slayer.
She has trained for this her whole life, and it is her duty to shed light in the darkness, her turn to face the unnatural foes threatening the innocent.
Sure, I am very interested. I only played the optional "Deathhouse" introduction before. (By the way, will we start directly with curse of strahd or play that 1 first?)
Anyway, I planned on playing a Ranger falvored as a Monster Hunter (Monster Slayer Archetype), specializing in Creatures of the night such as Vampires and werewolves, wielding crossbows. Also he is a Dark Elf.
Background: Zorn fled the underdark at the young age of 101 years, despising the cruel and oppressive nature of his culture. After struggeling to the surface of the world, he found out a few things. One is, that most people feared and hated him for what he was, which he couldn't really hold against them having witnessed Drows behavior towards other races himself all his life. The second thing he noticed was the relative peace on the surface world, without the terrible terrors of the underdark. With them gone, people could live in peace, he thought and by slaying them he could earn their gratitude and maybe find a place he could call home. He already had the skills from his drow warrior training. So began his quest to hunt the creatures of darkness on this strange surface world.
We are going to start with the introduction adventure indeed. Now I see that more people want to join then places in the adventures. How does over DMs in the forum handle this problem?
Looks like only five of us have posted what character we want to play, so you could decide to go with us. Or as pro said, you can wait for the others to decide too and then decide which of us you want in the game.
We are going to start with the introduction adventure indeed. Now I see that more people want to join then places in the adventures. How does over DMs in the forum handle this problem?
Play by post 101! Here we go :-)
You will always have more adventurers applying for your call than DMs willing to provide them on any play-by-post forum. I would advise you against going the route of wanting to take as many people as possible, or as many people as provide you with a good application, and really stick to your guns and DM for what your adventure says you should have. For Curse of Strahd I think it's like 4-5 players, so don't accept more than the max number of players the adventure recommends into your team or you might be making things more difficult for yourself and lose interest in DM'ing the adventure.
Second of all, losing interest: Play-by-post always has a fairly high attrition rate. By that I mean you will have players dropping out because something comes up, they don't have the time, they lose interest, they get a new job or schedule or health problem, or whatever reason. Remember you will always have an army of people lining up to take their place if that happens, so don't worry about possibly losing one or two players during the course of the quest. But make sure you have dedicated players who've shown they will stick around for (at least) 2-3 weeks before you start sinking a lot of time and effort into making custom or personalized quests / backstory hooks for your chosen players.
Thirdly: unless you really have a crack team that can absolutely promise to post once or twice a day, at least five days a week (and most people can't do that no matter what they say), your PBP will move slowly. What would take 2 hours in a VTT or in-person session will take 2 weeks. You can do things to speed this up: set rules about the frequency of players posting so people joining your game know what to expect. Roll initiative for the group, rather than waiting for every single person to roll their own initiative, is the biggest one I can think of. You can also roll for saves from your players during combat if you wanted to. Some people don't like that and want to roll for themselves. Be sure to let your players know your style and expectations before you start doing any rolls for their characters during combat. With great player autonomy comes great time delays, so find a compromise that works for everyone.
Lastly, weeding out the sea of applications: use your own method to do this. If you ask me, the most effective ones are under the spoiler:
Give people a very specific way to roll for their stats and automatically throw out applications that do not use this method.
Give people very specific demands for their race and class selection and automatically throw out all applications that do not use this method. Example: "Only warforged." "No artificers." "Half-elves must be from the PHB, none of the variants." "No Unearthed Arcana." etc.
Put a catch word into your description of the adventure and application instructions and throw out any applications that do not use that catch word. Example: "Insert the word 'wabbajack' into your backstory somewhere."
Even better, don't give a specific demand about whether or not players should provide any backstory at all, and automatically throw out applications that don't take the initiative to include a backstory on their own, unasked. This one's a killer, you will easily weed out so many players if you do this. :P
There's other things that you can do, but remember at the end of the day you make the selection. If you want to select a balanced party, go for it. If you want to select a party based on the strength of their writing, and run with it even if that results in a team of 5 bards, go for it. You're the DM, do your thing. :)
Anyway, good luck. If you happen to have space after this, I might be interested. Let me know though, since you seem to have a healthy amount of interest here already. I've never finished Curse of Strahd yet and I've been in two forum campaigns for it so far. DM attrition always struck before the campaigns could reach Strahd. :P
Thank you very much! I'm realy appreciate your advices, and may use some of them on the game.
For the players, I probaly use the following methods: -Rolling initiative and saves. A player who want to use abilities, like the absorb elemnts spells, who related to the attack or effects that hit them, can say it after I describe the effect. -One comment per day is realy enough for making the game run. I by myself will try to comment even more often.
probably the game will make us use more and more homerules, but that's it for now. I'll give time until tommorow, and then choose the PCs.
Class: Blood Hunter. I'm not sure if you count this as 3rd party content or not, but if you do, just pass this app over, I don't want to be anything but a blood hunter :D
The Magwyn family often claimed Falros was touched by the god Corellon himself. Despite the thinning of this blood due to his human mother, his unusual fleetness of foot and delicate, androgynous features would have many confusing him for a full elf, at least until he showed off his ears. Falros had attempted to fulfil his family’s expectations by studying as an acolyte for many of his 137 years prove his devotion to Corellon. But upon reaching maturity near his 115th birthday, he finally decided to leave the auspices of the temple and disappoint both friends and family by breaking from their expectations and becoming an adventurer. [A private background secret can be inserted here if necessary.] There Falros quickly found his true talent lay in wielding a blade… and using his own blood as a sacrifice to power his attacks. He now attempts to prove and redeem himself to his family in this new path by joining with a group of other adventurers and traveling as a mercenary, hoping to make a name for himself…
Oh my god, I'm taking those insanely good rolls and throwing them away. Part of my heart is dying on the inside, haha. But I just got accepted into a different Curse PBP game, so it wouldn't be right to fill up a warm body spot in this one. Hence, withdrawing the application. Good luck in Barovia, everybody!
Hook: When Lina was 17, she heard rumour of a unicorn roaming the Wilds. The horn would be worth a fortunate and set out to capture it. She was not the only one.
After several weeks hunting she finally came across it in a small glade, she raised her bow, but couldn't take the shot. The creature was just too beautiful. That's when she saw movement opposite her. A bow was similarly drawn and aiming for the Unicorn. She didn't hesitate and shouted spooking the unicorn enough that it shied and the arrow clipped the rear of the unicorn shearing off several hairs and embedded itself in the tree next to Lina. The unicorn moved faster than Lina thought possible and vanished into the woodland. A angry snarl came from the woods, and out stepped a man she had not seen since she was a child. Black and green hunting leathers, a longbow and filthy ginger beard. She snatched up the arrow and turned to run when she heard his voice "You girl, I'll hunt you to the end of your days for what you've cost me!" Lina fled using every trick she had developed to lose the man over several weeks.
When she was sure he had finally lost her trail, she headed to a local trader and friend, Anita. Anita told her his name was Marc and that he would hunt her until the mountains fell. Last she heard he was hunting where she had grown up and would be better off far from here. Anita recommended heading to a nearby town and losing herself and any chance Marc had of finding her. Lina packed her bag, armed herself and headed for the nearest town.
When she arrived, the World was very different to the Wilds she had grown up in. But her hands were fast and she could move quieter than a cat, so she survived on the streets picking pockets and trading her gains. Many folk didn't trust her due to her strange appearance so she constantly had to move around to avoid trouble. On one such occasion she spied a wealthy looking target who she was sure would be obliged to put a hot meal in her belly. With practiced stealth she tailed the target waiting for just the right moment to acquire the contents of his jacket pocket he kept patting. A horse neighed loudly nearby causing the man to turn and look, and Lina took the opportunity to empty the man's pocket before disappearing around a corner and away. She returned to her current hiding hole, a loft above an inn. And examined her find. To her dismay it was a letter, she threw it down in disgust, and wondered what to do next. Out of boredom, she opened the letter and was surprised to find it was invitation to the bearer to dinner with the Master of Raven loft. Well she was now the bearer and as her grumbling stomach reminded her, she needed dinner. She glanced at the date and saw it was tonight. Smiling at her turn of fortunate, she donned her cleanest clothes and headed towards this mysterious Master of Raven loft.
Koratana is a Kalashtar Druid who left her Hermitage to help bring light to the parts that were covered in darkness and shadow. In this pursuit, it led her to Barovia.
Under raging storm clouds, a lone figure stands silhouetted against the ancient walls of Castle Ravenloft. The vampire Count Strahd von Zarovich stares down a sheer cliff at the village below. A cold, bitter wind spins dead leaves about him, billowing his cape in the darkness. Lightning splits the clouds overhead, casting stark white light across him. Strahd turns to the sky, revealing the angular muscles of his face and hands. He has a look of power-and of madness. His once handsome face is contorted by a tragedy darker than the night itself.
Rumbling thunder pounds the castle spires. The wind's howling increases as Strahd turns his gaze back to the village. Far below, yet not beyond his ken, a party of adventurers has just entered his domain. Strahd's face forms a twisted smile as his dark plan unfolds. He knew they were coming, and he knows why they have come-all according to his plan. He, the master of Ravenloft, will attend to them.
Another lightning flash rips through the darkness, its thunder echoing through the castle's towers. But Strahd is gone. Only the howling of the wind-or perhaps a lone wolf-fills the midnight air. The master of Raven loft is having guests for dinner. And you are invited.
Hello! I'm recruiting for a game of 5 players. Each player start at the very 1st level.
You can use any official content (including UA). 3rd side content require my premission.
For ability scores, you should roll 4d6 and remove the lowest.
You can use any setting for your background.
And remember. Barovia needs you.
I have read raving reviews for Curse of Strahd, and am interested! Ability scores:
10 16 13 12 13 11
Okay. So basically Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Aasimar Monk, probably advance into Sun Soul.
Backstory:
Fiona grew up in the monastery, raised by her father, but also by many of the other monks. Visits from her mother were rare, and brief. Her longest visits were when she had been badly wounded in her tireless crusade against the creatures of darkness.
https://ddb.ac/characters/44989042/65xn4b
I'm interested! I have an unused character and a desire to play some fun PbP D&D! Can I join?
Of Course! Can't wait.
There's a character I've been wanting to play: Siltis Kerosyth, a Triton Stone Sorcerer.
Ability scores: 15 8 13 17 12 9
https://ddb.ac/characters/34584292/V8wpvU
Ability Scores: 14 16 9 17 10 12
Ability scores: 17 14 11 15 13 7
and character https://ddb.ac/characters/37469635/uzUkKG
Tiefling Bard Haunted one
Sure, I am very interested. I only played the optional "Deathhouse" introduction before. (By the way, will we start directly with curse of strahd or play that 1 first?)
Anyway, I planned on playing a Ranger falvored as a Monster Hunter (Monster Slayer Archetype), specializing in Creatures of the night such as Vampires and werewolves, wielding crossbows. Also he is a Dark Elf.
Background: Zorn fled the underdark at the young age of 101 years, despising the cruel and oppressive nature of his culture. After struggeling to the surface of the world, he found out a few things. One is, that most people feared and hated him for what he was, which he couldn't really hold against them having witnessed Drows behavior towards other races himself all his life. The second thing he noticed was the relative peace on the surface world, without the terrible terrors of the underdark. With them gone, people could live in peace, he thought and by slaying them he could earn their gratitude and maybe find a place he could call home. He already had the skills from his drow warrior training. So began his quest to hunt the creatures of darkness on this strange surface world.
Stats: 8 11 16 13 8 14
Hi, very interested, I'd like to play a human variant paladin, with these scores : Ability scores: 17 13 15 10 8 12
and my charcter https://www.dndbeyond.com/profile/dndpro100/characters/2084677
We are going to start with the introduction adventure indeed.
Now I see that more people want to join then places in the adventures. How does over DMs in the forum handle this problem?
well, simply pick the ones you think best (and me)
Looks like only five of us have posted what character we want to play, so you could decide to go with us. Or as pro said, you can wait for the others to decide too and then decide which of us you want in the game.
Play by post 101! Here we go :-)
You will always have more adventurers applying for your call than DMs willing to provide them on any play-by-post forum. I would advise you against going the route of wanting to take as many people as possible, or as many people as provide you with a good application, and really stick to your guns and DM for what your adventure says you should have. For Curse of Strahd I think it's like 4-5 players, so don't accept more than the max number of players the adventure recommends into your team or you might be making things more difficult for yourself and lose interest in DM'ing the adventure.
Second of all, losing interest: Play-by-post always has a fairly high attrition rate. By that I mean you will have players dropping out because something comes up, they don't have the time, they lose interest, they get a new job or schedule or health problem, or whatever reason. Remember you will always have an army of people lining up to take their place if that happens, so don't worry about possibly losing one or two players during the course of the quest. But make sure you have dedicated players who've shown they will stick around for (at least) 2-3 weeks before you start sinking a lot of time and effort into making custom or personalized quests / backstory hooks for your chosen players.
Thirdly: unless you really have a crack team that can absolutely promise to post once or twice a day, at least five days a week (and most people can't do that no matter what they say), your PBP will move slowly. What would take 2 hours in a VTT or in-person session will take 2 weeks. You can do things to speed this up: set rules about the frequency of players posting so people joining your game know what to expect. Roll initiative for the group, rather than waiting for every single person to roll their own initiative, is the biggest one I can think of. You can also roll for saves from your players during combat if you wanted to. Some people don't like that and want to roll for themselves. Be sure to let your players know your style and expectations before you start doing any rolls for their characters during combat. With great player autonomy comes great time delays, so find a compromise that works for everyone.
Lastly, weeding out the sea of applications: use your own method to do this. If you ask me, the most effective ones are under the spoiler:
There's other things that you can do, but remember at the end of the day you make the selection. If you want to select a balanced party, go for it. If you want to select a party based on the strength of their writing, and run with it even if that results in a team of 5 bards, go for it. You're the DM, do your thing. :)
Anyway, good luck. If you happen to have space after this, I might be interested. Let me know though, since you seem to have a healthy amount of interest here already. I've never finished Curse of Strahd yet and I've been in two forum campaigns for it so far. DM attrition always struck before the campaigns could reach Strahd. :P
Thank you very much! I'm realy appreciate your advices, and may use some of them on the game.
For the players, I probaly use the following methods:
-Rolling initiative and saves. A player who want to use abilities, like the absorb elemnts spells, who related to the attack or effects that hit them, can say it after I describe the effect.
-One comment per day is realy enough for making the game run. I by myself will try to comment even more often.
probably the game will make us use more and more homerules, but that's it for now.
I'll give time until tommorow, and then choose the PCs.
Hah! Well why not. Let's see if I can get an app in under the wire XD Ability scores first---
Ability scores: 13 12 18 12 14 18
With those scores, how can you not
Character name: Falros Magwyn
Race: High Half-Elf
Class: Blood Hunter. I'm not sure if you count this as 3rd party content or not, but if you do, just pass this app over, I don't want to be anything but a blood hunter :D
Background: Customized Urban Bounty Hunter
Sheet: https://ddb.ac/characters/45003411/XBtBKi
Hook:
The Magwyn family often claimed Falros was touched by the god Corellon himself. Despite the thinning of this blood due to his human mother, his unusual fleetness of foot and delicate, androgynous features would have many confusing him for a full elf, at least until he showed off his ears. Falros had attempted to fulfil his family’s expectations by studying as an acolyte for many of his 137 years prove his devotion to Corellon. But upon reaching maturity near his 115th birthday, he finally decided to leave the auspices of the temple and disappoint both friends and family by breaking from their expectations and becoming an adventurer. [A private background secret can be inserted here if necessary.] There Falros quickly found his true talent lay in wielding a blade… and using his own blood as a sacrifice to power his attacks. He now attempts to prove and redeem himself to his family in this new path by joining with a group of other adventurers and traveling as a mercenary, hoping to make a name for himself…
Equipment: Sold Scale Mail, Double-bladed scimitar, fine clothes, hand crossbow, bolts, 6 torches. Bought Studded Leather, Shield, Rapier, Traveler's Clothes, Mirror, Hooded Lantern, 5x oil flask, Healer's Kit, Dagger, 5x caltrops, 6x pitons, light hammer, thieves' tools
Oh my god, I'm taking those insanely good rolls and throwing them away. Part of my heart is dying on the inside, haha. But I just got accepted into a different Curse PBP game, so it wouldn't be right to fill up a warm body spot in this one. Hence, withdrawing the application. Good luck in Barovia, everybody!
Sounds intriguing, let's see what the dice gods have installed for my character...
Ability scores: 12 11 12 13 13 16
Ok then, following on from that roll, please meet: Lina Le Sigh, an Air Genasi Rogue
Character name: Lina Le Sigh
Race: Air Genasi
Class: Rogue
Background: Outlander (Feature: Wanderer)
Sheet: https://www.dndbeyond.com/characters/45004214
Hook: When Lina was 17, she heard rumour of a unicorn roaming the Wilds. The horn would be worth a fortunate and set out to capture it. She was not the only one.
After several weeks hunting she finally came across it in a small glade, she raised her bow, but couldn't take the shot. The creature was just too beautiful. That's when she saw movement opposite her. A bow was similarly drawn and aiming for the Unicorn. She didn't hesitate and shouted spooking the unicorn enough that it shied and the arrow clipped the rear of the unicorn shearing off several hairs and embedded itself in the tree next to Lina. The unicorn moved faster than Lina thought possible and vanished into the woodland. A angry snarl came from the woods, and out stepped a man she had not seen since she was a child. Black and green hunting leathers, a longbow and filthy ginger beard. She snatched up the arrow and turned to run when she heard his voice "You girl, I'll hunt you to the end of your days for what you've cost me!" Lina fled using every trick she had developed to lose the man over several weeks.
When she was sure he had finally lost her trail, she headed to a local trader and friend, Anita. Anita told her his name was Marc and that he would hunt her until the mountains fell. Last she heard he was hunting where she had grown up and would be better off far from here. Anita recommended heading to a nearby town and losing herself and any chance Marc had of finding her. Lina packed her bag, armed herself and headed for the nearest town.
When she arrived, the World was very different to the Wilds she had grown up in. But her hands were fast and she could move quieter than a cat, so she survived on the streets picking pockets and trading her gains. Many folk didn't trust her due to her strange appearance so she constantly had to move around to avoid trouble. On one such occasion she spied a wealthy looking target who she was sure would be obliged to put a hot meal in her belly. With practiced stealth she tailed the target waiting for just the right moment to acquire the contents of his jacket pocket he kept patting. A horse neighed loudly nearby causing the man to turn and look, and Lina took the opportunity to empty the man's pocket before disappearing around a corner and away. She returned to her current hiding hole, a loft above an inn. And examined her find. To her dismay it was a letter, she threw it down in disgust, and wondered what to do next. Out of boredom, she opened the letter and was surprised to find it was invitation to the bearer to dinner with the Master of Raven loft. Well she was now the bearer and as her grumbling stomach reminded her, she needed dinner. She glanced at the date and saw it was tonight. Smiling at her turn of fortunate, she donned her cleanest clothes and headed towards this mysterious Master of Raven loft.
I've always only been a DM, so I'd love to be a player. Here are my ability scores.
Ability scores: 10 14 11 13 15 7
And meet Koratana Ashana - D&D Beyond (dndbeyond.com)
Koratana is a Kalashtar Druid who left her Hermitage to help bring light to the parts that were covered in darkness and shadow. In this pursuit, it led her to Barovia.
I don't have a signature.