Curse of Strahd joined the D&D fifth edition campaign canon on March 15, 2016. The Ravenloft setting has a rich history, but this resurrection of Strahd felt fresh regardless. The sprawling Gothic-horror sandbox is widely considered the greatest 5e campaign – perhaps the best D&D campaign – of all time. 10 years has done nothing to dull Strahd’s shine, either. The adventure remains as ageless as its vampiric villain, and no campaign that followed has ever topped it.
Why is that, though? Why do hordes of DnD classes still flock to Barovia year-on-year? The most obvious answer is, of course, the bad guy.
Strahd von Zarovich is one of D&D‘s most complex characters. He’s not your typical Saturday morning cartoon villain, bent on world domination for paper-thin ambitions. He is driven by many conflicting emotions: obsessive love; hateful jealousy; a fear of death; the delight of power; a desperate need for control; regret at a life wasted in the name of duty. ‘Evil’ simply doesn’t do Strahd justice.
It’s these layers that fascinate D&D players. He’s the model Gothic villain, juggling sympathy and monstrosity in a way that’s utterly enthralling. Dungeon Masters can portray Strahd in many different ways, from a cold, ruthless dictator in one campaign to a passionate figure of tragedy in the next.
Players feel compelled to understand the threat they face. Even when the vampire lord puts them through torture, there’s still some part of them that wonder if he can be redeemed, if there’s some layer of backstory that could explain his vile actions.
It helps that Strahd spends so much time with the players. D&D campaigns have a habit of introducing their villains in the eleventh hour, which makes them feel like an afterthought, and doesn’t give the party much reason to care about thwarting their schemes. Strahd, on the other hand, is ever-present.
From session one, the group hears rumors of his overwhelming brutality. Then, after he’s been suitably hyped up as a threat, the party gets to meet Strahd face-to-face – at a level so low that they’d have no hope of surviving a fight with him. Even when they depart, Strahd lingers. He spies on the group. He sends mocking letters. He meets with them in disguise. He stalks them until he’s ready to strike.
This build-up does an excellent job of making Strahd feel threatening. It also means he develops a personal relationship with each of the players. Everyone forms their own opinion of him, based on how charming or cruel he has been from session-to-session. Everyone has their own breaking point, a unique moment when they discover why they want to see Strahd defeated.
Strahd creates emotional investment in a way the Tashas and Vecnas of the world never have. He is the jumping-off point for a thousand different, equally exciting stories. Those stories Barovia tells get even more interesting when we consider the campaign’s wider cast.
There’s the tormented Gothic heroine who strives for freedom, agency, and escape from an abusive relationship. There’s a celestial whose noble intent has been corrupted by the cyclical madness of Strahd’s domain.
There are disgraced mages, confused liches, hidden cults, and entire families of abominations. There are secret societies struggling against tyranny, malicious hag covens, warring werewolf factions, and armies of ghosts that cannot find rest.
From the complex to the comical, each part of Strahd’s domain feels unique and worth caring about. Even the wonkiest, most unbalanced set pieces make for tales that players will tell for years to come.
Curse of Strahd showcases every style of play that makes D&D worth trying in the first place. Its deft balance of social intrigue, combat, and exploration make it universally appealing. One session, you’ll be negotiating peace treaties or overthrowing a corrupt government. Another sees you dodging traps and enemies in a grueling dungeon crawl. Despite how limiting the horror genre might seem, this is a campaign with tremendous variety.
In fact, those limitations are another reason the adventure is so successful. The entire thing takes place in a pocket dimension, a personal hell of Strahd’s own making that reincarnates the souls trapped there. The players cannot leave without first going through the vampire who’s actions created this place.
That’s a claustrophobic premise, and it’s perfect for setting the tone of a horror game. It also forces your party to become invested in a very small slice of setting.
Many D&D campaigns see players acting as gig economy mercenaries, going from one ‘monster of the week’ job to another and never looking back to the places they’ve been. They might be bound to a linear narrative, the kind that players call ‘railroading’ if they don’t happen to have a good time.
Curse of Strahd, however, forces you to return to settings over and over. It’s a sandbox that suggests an order that the story can be approached in, but it does not hold the party to this. In fact, thanks to the Tarokka deck that decides where key campaign items are hidden, even those guard rails are randomized.
Player agency is as important to Curse of Strahd as Strahd von Zarovich himself. The players are a disruptive force in Barovia, a land that would otherwise replay Strahd’s decisions like clockwork. They have real impact, and they’re forced to stick around and see how their actions shape Barovia’s citizens – sometimes for better, but often for much, much worse. This is a horror campaign, after all.
There’s something truly immortal about D&D’s vampire campaign. Ten years after Curse of Strahd’s release (and 43 years after the setting was first created), new players continue to flock to Ravenloft. No other adventure has such a wealth of ongoing community support – something that makes the best campaign available even better.
Its structure is innovative, its writing remarkable, and the genuine passion the designers have for Strahd shines through. No 5e module has ever compared, and perhaps no one ever will – until Strahd gets resurrected for another cycle, that is.
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Source: Wargamer
