This time, we got to one of the coolest parts of Curse of Strahd’s rising action—the tarokka card reading. The party had a few questions for Madam Eva as well, as they attempt to unravel the tangled fates that reach throughout Barovia.

In this series, I’m talking about how I prep my monthly CoS sessions and the results of that preparation. I’m learning a lot about what works for me and my group!

What was prepped:

  • Wrote recap

This recap clocked in at 440 words. The more the group accomplishes, the more I have to work to balance thoroughness and brevity. On one hand, I want to help everyone remember what’s going on and what they’ve done so far. On the other hand, this is a tool to help us jump into the game quickly.

I like reminding the players of how much time has passed since the campaign has started. Curse of Strahd comes at you fast! Though it’s only been a week for the party, they’ve already visited all three of the functioning settlements of the area. There’s plenty left to explore, and now that they’ve reached level 6, they’re a little more prepared for the difficult areas.

  • Prepared the state of Vallaki

I wasn’t sure whether the party would visit Vallaki on their way back towards Barovia, so I jotted down a few bullet points about what happened while they were gone.

After the party left, the Festival of the Rising Sun failed, and the burgomaster discovered the party’s meddling in his house. The attitude of the Vallaki citizenry is likely to be much more hostile should they return to the walled town.

I didn’t end up using this, but it’s going to come up eventually, so I have this ready for when it does!

  • Prepared the state of Barovia

The party did end up going to Barovia. I prepped a similar level of notes as Vallaki for the current status of Barovia.

Things can’t get much worse in the little town, but it hasn’t gotten any better, either. Ismark Kolyanovich is attempting to pull things together as the new burgomaster. Doru, the vampire spawn, escaped the church last night.

Not all of this has come to light yet. I’m glad I already wrote this down, though, as it will affect the next session.

  • Read over the tarokka reading

I read through the whole process of doing the tarokka card reading for the party, and I brushed up on the card meanings as well.

The party visited Madam Eva this session, so she performed the tarokka reading for them. The party already found the holy symbol of ravenkind, so I didn’t reveal the card for that part. But now, they have clues to find the tome of Strahd, the sunsword, and their ally against Strahd.

I think the reading itself went well. Interpreting the cards’ hints can prove difficult, but they correctly identified Ismark as their ally, at least, so I’m confident that they’ll decipher the other two in time. This also gave the party some direction as they are deciding what to do next.

  • Wrote Korina’s departure

Other people have noted that the published adventures tend to have NPCs that tend to stick to the party. Korina is an NPC of my own creation, but the party also has Ireena Kolyana with them. Playing multiple NPCs for an extended amount of time is a challenge. I need to work on making Ireena more of a developed character, too. And, on top of that, Korina already mentioned that she would have to return to make her reports on the party.

So, I planned for Korina to temporarily step away from the party at the end of this session. This worked out; the party immediately went to grab Ismark, setting the party NPC count back to 2. They planned to meet at Yester Hill, their next destination.

What was improvised:

  • Setting up a random encounter

The Curse of Strahd book encourages the DM to roll for random encounters frequently during travel. The intent behind this is to emphasize the danger in Barovia.

But, I felt like the party had done enough fighting at this point, so when the dice indicated a random encounter, I came up with something different. I had already shuffled the tarokka deck, so I drew two cards at random and showed them to the party. In-game, they discovered these cards on the roadside: the Seer and the Torturer.

I’m not exactly sure what I’m going to do with that, but Madam Eva was able to hint at the card meanings to them, so I’ve set something up—I just don’t quite know what it is yet.

  • Roleplaying Madam Eva

For some reason, I didn’t give much thought to roleplaying Madam Eva beyond the tarokka reading. I had thought up how she would greet the party. I just didn’t prepare anything afterwards.

This made speaking with the party in-character very difficult. Madam Eva’s a hard character to play impromptu like that—she’s not one for straightforward answers, but she knows a lot. She isn’t particularly invested in the adventurers, but she wants them to free Strahd from his curse.

I think I got by alright, but I should have expected that the players would want to speak with her further after the reading. Overall, I need to prepare to roleplay characters for longer than I think with this group. This is great, because I love roleplaying, but I need to prepare more for these pre-written NPCs.

  • Roleplaying the other Vistani

Same as Madam Eva, I didn’t put a lot of thought into the Vistani living in the camp. Since most of these NPCs are undefined, they were easier to improvise.

  • Roleplaying Ismark

The tarokka reading identified Ismark as the party’s ally against Strahd. So, they ran over to Barovia to convince him to join them. The development points I jotted down before helped inform my Ismark roleplay, but I wasn’t the most prepared to play him right then. Of course, I’ll need to get him all ready up for next session—

What I need to prep next time:

  • Get ready to roleplay Ismark

This time, I’m really going to sit down and flesh out Ireena and Ismark. I’m also going to look back at MCDM’s Strongholds & Followers to see if using the followers rules would help me (or maybe even the players) run these NPCs alongside the PCs.

  • Figure out Korina’s journey and return

I have a scene in mind to narrate before we start the next session. I’ll flesh out that scene and the basic outline of events that surround Korina returning home, making her report, and figuring out how to reunite with the party.

  • Review Yester Hill area

This is the party’s next destination. I’ll need to read over that area, as well as anything in between they might encounter.

Juggling NPCs has been a challenge so far, and I’m seriously considering having the players run them in combat. I’ll probably try it out next session and see how it goes!