ItвЂ™s important to note that after exiting this place, itвЂ™s unlikely that the adventurers will visit it ever again. Not all of them need to be visited, your group might skip some parts of the house or the dungeon. There are 38 locations in the Death House. Which makes for a really fast way to level up from level 1 to 3. All this can be achieved in 6-10 hours of playing. Depending on your group, and how roleplay heavy they are. And then level 3 after escaping the house.

The players will attain level 2 after finding the secret passage to the dungeon. They will have no other choice (Hop on the railroad car). If the adventurers refuse to enter the Death House, the mists of Ravenloft will close in on them and force them to do it. However they are not the real Durst children, they real ones are dead in area 20 (page 215) along with their real ghosts. They donвЂ™t know they are fabrications and react like real scared children. They still wonвЂ™tВ go willingly into the house and if they do, they will try to get out of it. Yes they are still illusions but appear too be real children and wonвЂ™t vanish. I advice to treat these children like a simulacrum-like spell. If your players find out that the kids are illusions then they wonвЂ™t be trying to help and will believe it is a trap (I mean itвЂ™s obviously a trap but stillвЂ¦) I find this last bit of information a potential let down for the settingвЂ™s tone. When they enter the village, the adventurers find out that they canвЂ™t find anyone or access any location because of the mists, that ultimately lead them to Thorn and Rose Durst (Thornboldt and Rosavalda).ДЄccording to the source book they are illusions created by the house to lure people inside, it says they vanish if attacked or forced inside. They will close up on them leading them to the Village of Barovia. The mists will dictate the places the party can visit.

However if you wish to start from level 1, the attached dungeon crawl Death House is a great tool to level the party up, set the tone of the campaign and introduce a few clues and facts about the realm.ДЄfter using one of the adventure hooks (page 18), you have successfully steered the party to Barovia. If you already have level 3 players you can jump right into the action of BaroviaвЂ™s encounters. The main Curse of Strahd module encompasses levels 3-10. The GUIDE index for Curse of Strahd and other related articles can be found here !

Curse of strahd miniatures