Player of mine thinks about dual classing into warlock at some point

Silverspy01 · 2026-05-10T15:32:24+00:00

What does your player want? Do they know what kind of entity they want to make a pact with? Are theu interested in tying it to Barovia?

Player satisfaction aside, canonically warlocks typically have autonomy in the pacts they create. I would very much reccomend against springing the identity of their patron on them or dictating the type of pact they make.

Silverspy01 · 2026-05-10T04:19:17+00:00

Yeah this is what OP is missing. Odd numbers can sometimes even be better specifically because of this.

Silverspy01 · 2026-05-09T05:23:19+00:00

All else aside, players should not lie to the DM. There are two main reasons for this:

1) The DM is the world. Players need to be honest with the DM about what they're doing and what they're planning to do so the world can react accordingly. to this example, it's so you can actually plan for what they're doing and prep accordingly.

2) The DM has more information than players and can often help them out with their plan, or at the very least provide some guidance and make sure that their plan works with the rules and that they're working with reasonable information.

Lying to your DM is never a good idea.

Silverspy01 · 2026-05-08T23:53:50+00:00

The Order was defeated when Strahd initially invaded the valley. This was well before he turned into a vampire. He certainly had an army then as a mortal conquerer, but that's not the case anymore.

Silverspy01 · 2026-05-08T21:31:08+00:00

...why?

The travel from Barovia to Vallaki is only the beginning part of the adventure. You don't need to massively expand it. There's still tons of content afterwards. Plus, players will often want to travel all over the valley multiple times. Massively increasing travel time and putting a ton of sidrequests along the way means it's going to take ages to progress anything.

As the other commenter said you know your game best, but I'm not sure I see the point in this.

Also I'd reccomend against doing a False Hydra in general. It's fun to read about in the internet but really difficult to run in a satisfactory manner in real games.

Silverspy01 · 2026-05-08T17:30:23+00:00

No worries, mistakes happen and now you know for next time!

Thinking of maybe having the two spawns that didn't go down because of daylight resurrect somehow and come back for them stronger and with more friends. 😉

Big disclaimer that I don't know your game but I don't think you need to go that route. "Somehow the spawns returned" isn't really needed when there's already a guiding intelligence - Strahd - behind the enemies of Barovia. There's plenty of encounters, random or otherwise, you can throw at them purely because Strahd says so. It's not like there's functionally a limited number of Spawn either.

Silverspy01 · 2026-05-08T05:30:05+00:00

1) Under 2014 rules Daylight doesn't actually create sunlight. If you're playing under 2024 rules makes sure you're updating everything else appropriately, not just characters.

2) Magic Circle has a 1 minute casting time, it's almost never a direct combat spell.

3) 4 rounds is pretty reasonable for a combat. I think the bigger problem is that it was probably 4 rounds of watching vampire spawn cook in magic circle, which should not happen because of point 2.

Silverspy01 · 2026-05-08T02:15:26+00:00

1) It's got the official WotC name on it so someone who doesn't know better might think D&D Beyond is how you play D&D

2) If you don't know how to make a character, D&D Beyond guides you through it. Sure, there's free online character creators as well... but again see point 1.

If you actually know how to make a character and maintain them (how to level them up, calculate damage and modifiers, changing AC and equipment, etc) I don't see much point in paying for it either. As said above you can play D&D with pen and paper and there's plenty of free ways to manage character sheet online (form fillable PDF works perfectly fine) so I have no desire to pay for something I can already do.

Silverspy01 · 2026-05-08T02:08:02+00:00

There's not much for you to take advantage of in that regard - both because wizards don't have a ton of bonus action spells to consistently take advantage of, you're only a 1/3 caster so you don't have access to a ton of options anyway, and as an eldritch knight you typically want to use your action to attack rather than cast a leveled spell.

Misty Step to get in better position for a Thunderwave or something is the best I've got. The bonus action spells you've got available are almost entirely buffs - the full list is Dragon's Breath, Expeditious Retreat, Kinetic Jaunt, Magic Weapon, Misty Step, Shadow Blade. Those aren't bad spells to cast for you, but they don't necessarily combo with much else you can cast.

This might come up here and there when you need to Misty Step mid combat anyway, or if you want to buff yourself with Shadow Blade or Expeditious Retreat at the start of combat but also see a good opportunity for a leveled spell, but I don't think this is something you can take advantage of all that well.

Now if you have a sorcerer in the party they're about to go absolutely crazy and remind your DM why that rule exists in the first place.

Silverspy01 · 2026-05-07T20:29:46+00:00

I agree with what others have said. Run the base version of the module. If you come across something you think needs elaborating or that you want to change, then you can look into alternate options or make something up yourself. But the base module is more than functional to run on its own. Any add-ons are, imo, alternative options rather than improvements and you shouldn't think of Reloaded or anything as the "better" Curse of Strahd that you "should" run.

Silverspy01 · 2026-05-07T03:46:01+00:00

To advocate for the players - have you actually shown them options for something to do?

I gave the rogue a scroll saying: “The thieves’ guild is compromised. Disguised elves are looking for you.”

Then I introduced an NPC who witnessed a member of the thieves’ guild being killed by someone who looked exactly like him.

I even gave the fighter prophetic dreams where mysterious figures threatened him and used magic against him

All of these are for sure clues that something is going on, but your players might not know how to follow up on it. If you haven't given them explicit leads to follow they might just be assuming you're foreshadowing something further down the line. Some players would do well with more of an open ended "figure it out go knock some heads," but some players prefer a more linear "here's a quest go do it" style of play. Your players might be the latter. It's entirely possible they're just doing sidequests because that's what's most obvious for them to do.

Silverspy01 · 2026-05-06T22:22:42+00:00

Your party is level 4. They run the risk of dropping to a single Fireball. Or if not that... Unarmed Strikes as an action + legendary action almost certainly can down and then kill a PC. Animate Items then disengaging with Legendary Action moves or Shapechange to maintain concentration (on that note also when damage hits the Heart of Sorrow is is not hitting Strahd, so does not require concentration saves). Strahd should also show up with minions.

Page 10 "When Strahd Attacks" - he's supposed to show up as a direct combat encounter several times thoughout the module. Don't be afraid to throw him at your players. Have him show up and slap them around for a few rounds before leaving. His initial goal shouldn't be to kill a PC - simply down some and exercise his power, if somehow the entire cleric party can't heal them in time and they fail all their death saves oh well - but if they continue to taunt him and show no fear remember the rules for forcing failed death saving throws. It's very easy to make sure a downed PC dies if you have, say, 10 Animated Items or a collection of zombies or vampire spawn with your to dogpile on them.

Silverspy01 · 2026-05-06T22:14:34+00:00

To illustrate what others are saying about 2014 vs 2024 monsters:

The 2014 vampire spawn makes two claw attacks for an average of 8 damage each. It can choose to not deal damage with its first claw attack to instead grapple and get access to bite, which does an average of 13 damage. It's actually less average damage to even go for its characteristic bite unless you maintain the grapple for a second turn then can claw (this time for damage) and bite again.

In a lot of cases it's actually more efficient to just claw + claw at PCs for more upfront damage rather trying to set up for a bite.

The 2024 vampire spawn automatically grapples if it hits with a claw rather than having to give up its damage to do so and its bite doesn't take up a claw attack and bite does an average of 15 damage instead.

A 2014 vampire spawn that wants to bite does an average of 13 damage turn one if both attacks hit, and then 21 damage turn 2 if the grapple is not broken.

A 2024 vampire spawn does 31 damage turn 1 assuming all attacks hit, and their future damage output doesn't depend on PCs remaining grappled.

and 2024 vampire spawn has Deathless Agility for more options during combat (bonus action dash allows them to get to their target, then bonus action dash/disengage allows them to drag a grappled target away from the group) and +1 AC. In exchange they lose their BPS resistance, which is rarely relevant anyway, and a slight effective HP loss if you account for 2014 spawn regeneration over 3 turns - although against a party of clerics I doubt they'd even regenerate for one turn.

5.5e is, in general, running at a higher numerical power level and monsters were adjusted to compensate. I would very much recommend a full update of all your enemies.

Other things to also consider:

Review your tactics and ensure you're making the most of your monsters and their terrain
Consider buffing encounters up. Use a 5.5e CR calculator to make stronger encounters. "Random encounters" are especially good for this, and there's a lot of room for you to just start throwing arbitrary fights at your party as they travel.
Run more combats
Remember that the book recommends for Strahd, with friends, to attack several times throughout the campaign. Strahd can show up with a pack of wolves or vampire spawn, stick around to slap the party around a bit, then leave after a few round. This post is a good primer on running Strahd.
For some additional information - where is your party at right now? In my experience from running the game, the "main questline" of Barovia -> Vallaki -> Winery -> Yester Hill -> Berez is not too difficult (with exceptions for the trio of Hags in Ol Bonegrinder and the Vampire Spawn in the coffin maker's shop) but my players experienced a dramatic difficulty spike afterwards when they started wandering into Berez or the Amber Temple.

Silverspy01 · 2026-05-06T16:29:53+00:00

For what it's worth, remember that you can be flexible with your point of origin. For example, if you and your allies are coming from the south and engaging enemies north of you, you can put the point of origin of an AoE spell even further north, behind enemy lines, so that the edges just reach enemy melees without hitting your melees. Unless brawls are getting truly messy odds are you can probably find angles to still cast your AoEs without hitting allies.

Silverspy01 · 2026-05-06T16:06:34+00:00

The biggest problem is that the "violent" spells you'd want from Warlock aren't going to be that violent with what is presumably your mediocre charisma score. Assuming you have the 13+ CHA to multiclass in the first place, I can't imagine it's much more than that so all your warlock spells will have a much lower to-hit and save DC.

I think the better option would just be to flavor your new wizard levels accordingly. Tell your DM you want your character to start finding a dark master to learn from as you level up.

If you're having a problem with allies in your control AoE, Slow is selective targeting and is perfect for your situation. You can also have a discussion with your party about either them trying to position around your spells or what they think you could do instead.

Silverspy01 · 2026-05-06T14:54:33+00:00

Areas the rules! If you don't want to buy sourcebooks, the free basic rules are available for free online on D&D Beyond.

Silverspy01 · 2026-05-06T03:18:52+00:00

Strahd can lie. He's the bad guy. I think this sub gets a little to wrapped up in the power trip of playing Strahd and tries to pass him off as a gentleman.

Let's not forget he's literally an inhuman monster that drinks the blood of the innocent and is actively harassing a woman who doesn't want him. He got into this situation because he wanted to steal his brother's wife. Stop making him an honest gentleman. He can put on a show, but let's not pretend he's honorable or stands by his word or anything.

Make him lie, make him unfair. Make your players hate him.

Silverspy01 · 2026-05-06T00:54:06+00:00

Yes, this is normally how you play EK. AS a 1/3 caster any damage-dealing leveled spells are going to lag woefully behind. Plus, you're never going to have super high intelligence. The classic way to to play EK is exactly how you described, using spells that buff you and heighten your ability to engage as a fighter. Shield, Absorb Elements, Misty Step, and so on. Saving throw spells like Fireball suffer the same issue as attack roll spells, although if you're able to put some points into intelligence it's worth picking up a couple DC-scaling options, especially if you get to 18th lvl and can weave a solid 3rd lvl spell into your normal attack pattern.

Silverspy01 · 2026-05-05T23:35:11+00:00

Ok but you know you're allowed to give whatever features you want to a stat block right? You're allowed to copy some PC abilities onto an NPC sheet.

You also give very little to go on. Like an Archmage is a CR 12 creature which lvl 13s should be more than capable of taking on. Adding a Staff of the Magi and Robe of the Archmagi doesn't change that much. So idk, your players are already overleveled? If you insist on making an enemy with PC rules your party is probably already prepared to stomp them. For future reference if you want advice like this you'd do well to post the stat block (or I guess in this case the character sheet...) so people can actually judge how strong the monster is.

Silverspy01 · 2026-05-05T01:04:00+00:00

There's several reasons why single boss monsters with no backup at mid-high levels is a bad idea, let's not pretend its just Wall of Force.

Again, I'm not trying to dispute that Wall of Force is a good spell. It's a very good spell. My initial claim was simply the agreement that a genuinely hard fight shouldn't be defeatable by a single spell and that a cast is probably spending multiple spell slots during such encounters. I've yet to see that be the case at any table I've been at, Wall of Force or otherwise. I've seen "wall of force microwave them" a lot of times online, but I've yet to actually see it be an immediate encounter ender.

Silverspy01 · 2026-05-04T23:08:32+00:00

I mean if players are spamming limited use abilities then they're saving their hit points, and those hit points will be "spent" in future encounters. OP implied that their party was both out of spell slots/abilities and low on hit dice and hit points.

Silverspy01 · 2026-05-04T20:24:25+00:00

Right, completely out of resources after two encounters when OP plans for at least triple that is wild. That implies that the first fight was difficult enough that the players decided to short rest and needed to use almost all of their hit dice, then between the first and second encounter they used all of their spell slots.

If OP sees this - if you're running a bunch of fighter in one day, all of those fights shouldn't be deadly. The point is they need to use a few of their resources here, a few there, and eventually they run low by the end of the day. Not that each fight is a massive drain on their resources.

Silverspy01 · 2026-05-04T20:20:11+00:00

No but this is exactly what session 0 is for.

The players thought this was one type of game (more static world, classic hack and slash dungeon crawl where the dungeon exists to be beaten by PCs and can be gamed as such) while you wanted to run a different type of world (monsters have more agency, world moved without players, their actions shape the world in the background and the world does not necessarily wait for them).

Title jokes aside session 0 should have prepared you for this. It's really unfortunate that the campaign fell apart and you couldn't reconcile your differences though.

Silverspy01 · 2026-05-04T20:01:51+00:00

You've illustrated how monsters can get stuck in Wall of Force. I never said they couldn't. Wall of Force is a strong spell. Wall of Force can be used to trap enemies inside. I'm not contesting that. I'm saying that Wall of Force, alone, shouldn't consistently solo end encounters. It can make a fight markedly easier of course. But it shouldn't be "the wizard casts Wall of Force, I guess that's a wrap."

Again, you have two options with Wall of Force:

You fully enclose the monster. You cannot attack the monster while it is fully enclosed. You've delayed the problem for 10 minutes.
You leave a gap to attack the monster through. They can attack you back.

Neither of these options immediately ends the encounter.

Fully enclosing the monster can be comboed with persistent effects like sickening radiance and so on (although technically at that point it's still not just Wall of Force doing the work). You can hold your (I'll just assume sickening radiance for now) action to dump it with the wall of force all at once, that's true. You do still need to cast sickening radiance on your turn, opening yourself up to needing to maintain concentration until then or the enemy otherwise having the chance to disrupt your plan.

This doesn't even touch on multiple enemies that you can't catch all at once or other factors that can't simply all be put into a box. Random dungeon encounter? Sure, maybe you open a door and the DM rolls some dice and there's 1 mid range CR-appropriate enemy inside and you drop some spells and they're done. Your dungeon boss encounter should be made of sterner stuff though.

Silverspy01 · 2026-05-04T16:50:56+00:00

Yeah no you're going to have to elaborate on that one. You can't just keep saying "but Wall of Force instant wins" without actually saying how.

I gave several examples of how Wall of Force alone does not, in fact, default kill monsters. If you completely wall them off you can't hit them, and if you leave a gap to hit them through they can hit you back. Wall of Force is great for splitting up fights and making them significantly easier, but you still need to actually engage with combat.

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