Games Logs

The tree blight lies broken across the road, branches still twitching faintly as if some sap-thick memory of life refuses to let go. The air reeks of crushed pine and the metallic tang of ichor, and steel rasps against wood as the party and a handful of borrowed guards hack their way down toward the two buried beneath it. Sawdust and splinters settle in their hair like snow. It’s in the middle of all this that Etuttelong makes its appearance — a small, curious creature tha

The Abbey of Saint Markovia clings to the hillside above Kresk, its bells casting a long, resonant toll across the valley. As the sound resonates, the creatures within the abbey yard answer with yipping, howls, growls and screams. Nikolai Wachter sits in the relative warmth of the abbey’s receiving room and tries, very hard, to understand what he is being told. A year. He lost a year. He had closed his eyes — he is almost certain he had merely closed his eyes — and the worl

The wagon smells of old wine and worry. And it is making Shifty feel terribly unwell. The next chapter of their adventure has started unpleasantly for him. It is early morning when the party pulls away from the vineyard and the Barovian mist sits low and cold across the road. Shifty is in a deeply pitiable state. He sits hunched against the wagon's side rail, scales the grey-green of pitted copper, looking every inch like something a cat dragged in. The fresh air does not

The smoldering ruins of the tree-blight are still sending thin threads of smoke into the grey Barovian sky as the party descends Yester Hill. The ground is soft underfoot, churned by the night's violence, and the air smells of char and wet earth. Somewhere on the slope, Biblo whistles to himself. Nike spots them first — hoof prints pressed into the mud at the path's edge, the ground around each one singed dark. Four-legged, large, and burning. Crystal's eyes narrow. She know

The party wastes no time. With Exethanter’s library still humming at their backs, they turn their attention to the matter of reward — and reward, in Barovia, rarely arrives without complication. Neferon regards them with his unsettling golden eyes. “I do not know the stores contained within the Great Library as Exethanter does. And I may only gift you with items we have many of.” Soulfire selects a Feywild Shard from the pile — a resonant crystal that, when metamagic is app

Wizards of the Coast. The Dark Gifts. Digital illustration. Curse of Strahd, WotC, 2016. Hall of the Amber Sarcophagi The East Hall of the Amber Sarcophagi smells of damp stone and something older, sharper underneath — caused, possibly by the divine things that have been imprisoned within for a very long time. Behind one of the chamber doors, the sounds are extraordinary: crashing, roaring, the shriek of something that might be female or might be the sound stone makes when it

Soulfire, Nike, and Crystal face the newly hostile nothic together. It glares at them with its single enormous eye, the air between them gone suddenly sharp. Soulfire casts Dragon’s Breath on Nike, wreathing them in crackling potential — a lightning cone ready to be exhaled should the situation demand it. Crystal doesn’t wait. She unleashes Scorching Ray, bolt after bolt connecting with searing precision. The nothic crumbles, smoldering, and moves no more. The group regard

In the blink of an eye, Fekre is gone. One moment she stands before them — tattered gown, closed eyes, the wire crown pressed into pale

The shelves of the Great Library climb upward into darkness, tier after tier of arcane curiosities vanishing into the vaulted ceiling high a

When Exethanter finally retires, retreating into the silence of his quarters with the slow, shuffling certainty of a man who has lived too l

The air in the library sits thick and cold, carrying the faint smell of ancient stone and something older beneath it — dust, old parchment,

On the floor of the Great Hall, Biblo is confronted by the arcanaloth, Neferon. “Exethanter, the lich, wants to see me?” The dragonborn gulps and regards the creature who stands before him. Some sort of infernal, Biblo guesses, looks jackal-like. With tawny fur, a bushy tail and a foxy face, Neferon’s odd, coppery eyes have horizontal slits for pupils. They are jagged, like a lightning bolt. He regards Biblo with an inscrutable expression. ”What does the lich want of me?”

The dining room is warm with the illusion of plenty. The long table groans beneath an impossible spread — roasted meats glistening with imag

The mewling from behind the door is unsettling—something between a whimper and a keen, echoing off the stone walls of the hall. Zilk sucks t

The rest of the night passes without incident, though the cold seeps through even the warmth radiating from Crystal’s portable forge. The ch

The party barely has time to catch their breath before the attack comes. The two massive shapes emerge from the swirling snow—abominable ye

The deafening bellow of the great roc tears through the mountain air. The massive creature banks hard, its shadow darkening the bridge as it

High above the blazing Wall of Fire that burns above the Tsolenka Pass, Ratrick smolders, wisps of smoke curling from his singed fur. The ac

On the evening before they expect to reach the Tsolenka Pass, the companions bid their elderly elvish visitor a warm good night, watching as

The party stirs as dawn breaks over the shattered bones of the minotaur skeleton. Fifteen days—that’s all the time they have to reach the Am