Curse of Strahd (Part 1a The Village of Barovia)

2025 Update: Whew, updating this one was a challenge; many things have been changed, including adding a full-blown siege that your players will have to defend against!

Just like in Death House, I've added two versions: one that follows Curse of Strahd Reloaded as closely as possible, as well as my own version that lightens up on the descriptions, retains a side quest from previous iterations, and will be updated even more in the future! Oh, and I can't forget dialog is far clearer and the document is now also collapsible, which will make navigating much easier!

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Your players just barely made it out of Death House and now find themselves in the dreary Village of Barovia. Here they'll meet allies, fend off a siege of undead, and begin to understand the grim situation they find themselves in. Their decisions will decide the fate of not only themselves but everyone in Barovia. Do they choose, to stand side by side with the villagers to defend this town, do they choose to help a vampire spawn, and do they offer to escort Ireena to Vallaki, only time will tell...

You'll find over 15 tracks, the best map of Barovia I could find, and full integration with Curse of Strahd Reloaded in my notes. I hope this helps you run the perfect game!

When it comes to using my notes, you may have to bounce around depending on the route that your players take, while CoS: Reloaded does its best to keep it slightly more linear and give obvious clues of where to head, this is a sandbox and players will be players, just be open and go with the flow, each area is self-contained and will do it's best to guide you through things. If you have any questions, feel free to ask in the comments below or join our amazing Discord!

Without further ado:

• Link to: The AAA Collection

• Link to: The Village of Barovia Playlist

Included in The AAA Collection is:

• Downloadable copy of DM Notes, including links to music tracks for ambiance and fights

• DragnaCarta Version that follows Reloaded as closely as possible

• Advent Version with several tweaks that will continue to be expanded on in the future

• Collapsible Word Doc to make navigating things easier

• Special PDF for all encounters. This includes the enemy stat blocks organized neatly, along with an initiative tracker and a spot to mark HP

• Custom Maps of The Village of Barovia (Credits: phosphorialove)

Index:
Curse of Strahd:

• Part 0 - Intro + Death House

• Part 1a - The Village of Barovia

• Part 1b - The Village of Barovia Church

• Part 2 - River Ivlis Crossroad

• Part 3 - Tser Pool

• Part 4 - Journey to Vallaki 

• Part 5a - The Village of Vallaki (Tower Gates and Blue Water Inn) (Coming Soon)

• Part 5b - The Village of Vallaki (Coming Soon)

As always, please let me know if you see anything you think I can improve, add, change, etc., especially for this one, Curse of Strahd is massive and has many moving parts, and I want to do my best to make your sessions as smooth as possible!

Cheers,
Advent

Credits:
Art: ArtofRagnar
Campaign: Wizards of the Coast

*Revision 3 (7/27/25)