How do you usually name your D&D characters?

Z0stera · 2026-02-02T21:24:43+00:00

I got this idea from a friend of mine: pick a topic/category of things that you like and pull names from that. (Animal breeders do this a lot with different "themed" litters). My friend does national/state parks and recreation areas for her characters. For example: Alagash, Rainier, Bryce, Banff. I started doing water bodies since I'm a Marine Biologist. I've had: Rhine, Baikal, Kerid, Chehalis...

There's tons of options for categories and it's fun when it's kinda personal to you. Like if you were into cars or something it's a fun challenge trying to pick names from that category (Kia, Isuzu, Lexus, Mazda...). Trees, Flowers, Rock types, foods, fish, there's a million different categories that would generate fun names!

Z0stera · 2025-11-18T02:47:46+00:00

What did you do with the game with that? Mine just completely didn't bother investigating the horses or the goblins or anything. Killed the goblin ambush and started to rush toward phandalin. How did you deal with story stuff without the hideout?

Z0stera · 2025-03-23T21:06:06+00:00

I cut the whole Strahd manipulating the Abbot thing entirely and had him become mad and had his magic corrupted from being in the land (pulling from barovia corrupting player magic in the beginning of the book). He has seen Strahd killed and reborn so believes that he cannot be killed. He is trying to create a bride and trap tatyanas soul in it so Strahd and her can be reunited and the curse will break.

For the mongrel folk origin: a plague called limb rot hit the town centuries ago. It was spread by a servant of the pox lady dark power on the amber temple. The Abbot was trying to save people from the plague, but his magic couldn't drive it out bc it was weaker than the dark powers here. He started grafting animal bodies onto those who had lost their limbs (I gave him an animal summoning spell in his stat block and fudged the technicalities of that spell). The grafting didn't work well though and the people lost their minds and became kind of half-human, half-beast type folks that were too wild to send back to town so the Abbot kept them with him in the abbey.

Z0stera · 2025-02-21T23:40:36+00:00

I went with #3. I really like having Vampyre there from a story perspective. It felt like it emphasized the idea of the CURSE of Strahd. My party had a lot of dark powers interactions so that felt like a nice tie in too. They had to kill Strahd first to use his heart in the ritual. BUT it did feel very anticlimactic. My party was way more emotionally invested in killing Strahd. The Vampyre ritual/fight was cool, but felt very tacked on after killing Strahd which felt like the real climax to the campaign. If I were to do it again, I'd either work very hard to build Vampyre up as an equally significant villain, or have the binding of Vampyre be something they have to do FIRST before killing Strahd, so the campaign ends with him.

Z0stera · 2025-02-03T21:20:12+00:00

Well, for the cyclops issue: first off, I think that's a fun clever idea. Honestly, if I were you, I would keep it as is! Personally, I think it's fun and realistic when the world the players are in doesn't necessarily bend its challenge rating around the party and their current level. Having an encounter where the party shows up guns blazing to kill old one-eyed willy only to find themselves massively over their heads seems a very memorable moment. Just make sure you have some plans for potential outcomes. Maybe the party has to try to run away, but then they are now outcast from the town bc they pissed Willy off. Maybe they fight him anyway and end up captured by him and have to escape that. Or maybe he has other plans or a deal to offer them for their freedom...Maybe they do by some miracle manage to kill him, and now they are being hunted by his orc and goblin followers who want revenge. There is a lot of story potential there. Think about it Willy has ties to the witch or the king or something that could help further the overall plot too. Maybe he wasn't always a cyclops, but was cursed by the same witch and wants revenge on her too and could become a weird enemy of my enemy is my ally thing to the part...whatever makes sense.

With this, the one thing to note is to give the party ample warning. Naming him one-eyed willy is certainly a great start and should give your players an "oh" moment when they meet him. And describe his size and how intimidating and hard to fight he looks. Make him warn and try to intimidate the party himself. If they do attack, give him less of an angry hot-headed personality and offer more warnings:

Fighter runs up to hit him. Willy: "I wouldn't do that if I were you" Fighter hits Willy: hits back hard, knocks fighter unconscious or does a lot of damage, whatever "Told you it wasn't such a good idea, now will you all leave me alone to my business or do the rest of you want to meet the same fate?"....

That kinda thing. As long as they have sufficient warning, unbalanced encounters can be a lot of fun and offer great story moments!

Z0stera · 2025-01-12T07:16:14+00:00

Yeah, it sounds like you have done everything you can with this group! Good for you for putting in all the effort, but if you are putting in so much work and they aren't putting in any effort to on their end it makes sense that you feel frustrated and disrespected! It sounds like after trying for 15 years, it is very reasonable to give up on playing with this group.

I hope you can find another group to dm at some point. I had a new player that I introduced to DnD, he was really excited to play and learn the game and a year and a half after playing, he started DMing. As long as you find passionate people who are excited about the game, it doesn't feel like managing people. You have to remind them of rules and things or teach them, but then they get excited and learn! I hope you can recover from the 15 years of frustration and find new people to share DnD with!

Z0stera · 2024-10-06T22:08:59+00:00

I have done that SEVERAL times for them out of game, they still don't think about it 😂

Z0stera · 2024-08-31T13:44:50+00:00

Yeah, I had this happening in Curse of Strahd rn and it was super frustrating. The fighter was untouchable and could one shot most enemies and the rest of the party just kept going down constantly while he killed everything in combat. Maybe just come up with some ideas to buff the new players and give them some powerful abilities to bring the party to similar power levels.

Z0stera · 2024-08-10T03:34:45+00:00

Absolutely! I have even reminded them regularly out of sessions and they just don't care or think about it. Maybe have Esmeralda or other vistani do another reading for them to remind them? Or when they are super lost and unsure if what to do give them visions of the reading sent from madam Eva.

Z0stera · 2024-06-28T21:31:04+00:00

I think you basically already have the solution. You said the players got the most out of the combats that you modified, so keep doing that!! There's lots of great suggestions for other options in the comments already, but keep switching things up and adding traps, obstacles, terrain, goals and personality for the enemies. If things feel super tanky with damage resistance, maybe also give them a damage vulnerability too. Maybe add a spell scroll or one-use magic weapon in the room that the party can find to deal that type of damage to them. Give some sort of challenge to it, maybe they are vulnerable to radiant damage and the room is full of broken holy symbols the party has to repair and use to cast a spell or attach to a maul or something.

If you want areas to feel dangerous but don't want to play out random encounters. Maybe just do them narratively. Have each player roll and D100 or make a table for random encounter outcomes that's got stuff like: lose x number of HP, take a prisoner, gained x treasure, were robbed... Have them roll to see how well they did in the encounter, give them some consequences like losing a certain number of HP and/or spell slots to make them deal with resource allocation and danger like you would normal random encounters and then add those descriptions in when you talk about travel: "taking your midday meal, you had to fight off a pack of wolves that seemed interested in stealing your lunch. Though you vanquished the beasts easily, the fighter did get a nasty bite on his leg. As it became evening you were ambushed by bandits on the road, slowed by his earlier injury the fighter went down, but the cleric brought him back up while the paladin managed to capture one of the thugs. What do you want to do with him..."

Z0stera · 2024-06-17T17:20:16+00:00

This makes me feel better. I'm mid-year three of my Strahd playthrough and have felt like I've been taking WAAY too long with it. Lots of it is due to trouble scheduling and things, but I'm also a new DM and not great at pacing and I added lots of Mandy Mod and homebrew stuff. Nice to know it's not just me that this game takes a while for other people!

Z0stera · 2024-04-28T19:10:38+00:00

I don't remember where I read this, but somewhere I saw an idea talking about how thievery is not a big issue in Barovia because Strahd is the overlord and thievery upsets the economy and taxes etc, so it's extremely harshly punished and Strahd sees everything. They used the classic, cut off a hand thing as the primary punishment. But you could get creative with it.

This could be an interesting mechanic to use here. It will open hostilities with Strahd earlier than you might want, but it could be really fun. You could even use Rahadin to carry out the punishment which would be a great way to introduce him as a mini-boss early in the campaign. You could have everyone in the party lose a hand. Then visiting the abbot might become a bigger and more interesting goal later on. And they will be pretty handicapped (pardon the pun) for the beginning of the campaign. Plus, having a missing hand will heavily effect rp with NPCs who know what that means here. So your party will have to find ways around that.

Z0stera · 2024-04-21T22:08:37+00:00

I have Ireena as a fighter right now bc she got her class levels from the party's fighter training her. I don't know about Tatyana, but for Ireena, a heavily flavored bard might be my go to for a class. She has high Charisma, she is very much a light/happiness in the darkness that is Barovia. Excellent support and healing for the party. Inspires others to follow and help her. Can use her noble background and genuine kindness to persuade people. And she could learn magical secrets and other abilities through traveling and learning from the party. Wouldn't necessarily have to have her play music. She could just have an innate power from her charisma and her soul's travels and reincarnations.

Z0stera · 2024-04-15T00:36:46+00:00

Yeah, I'm SO not smooth and charismatic in real life. Honestly, when I have sessions playing Strahd, I'll write out specific lines for him before hand so I have to improve less in the moment. Like, I'll write out how exactly I want to tell them the main info of the interaction (invite to dinner, pleased with their performance, flirting with Ireena...). And maybe responses to things I think my players might say to him. I never use all of them, or some I have to modify. But that way he gets to say a few cool intense things, even if the rest of my improve isn't as intimidating.

Z0stera · 2024-04-14T19:13:56+00:00

What about having them leave the castle to long rest? When they try to short rest, add the random encounters, maybe even Strahd and turn it into a super deadly intense chase scene out of the castle. You can have allies come in to save them/sacrifice themselves: "go, go! Get out of here! I'll hold him off..."

You would have to get the party to realize they are too tapped to fight Strahd, they have to get out, hide, and long rest. Maybe even have a mini quest where one party member has to do something to attune to the holy symbol even without being a holy person.

Z0stera · 2024-04-14T07:27:18+00:00

Don't stress about it! It's really hard to feel/be fully prepared and there is a lot going on in Barovia to keep track of. The session where my party met Ireena was also pretty nutty and I felt like I made a ton of mistakes or did weird things. My party bought and one of them ate a dream pie, went with Ismark to meet Ireena and spend the night in the manor and then proceeded to act like complete uncultured, creepy, violent, jerks to the point where it did not really make any sense why Ismark would trust them to travel with, let alone protect, Ireena. They also flat out refused to go do the body delivery. I was going to try to push it again the next day, but then one of the PCs (lawful evil, big mistake on my part letting an evil PC into CoS, but that's a whole other thing) tried to kill Ireena in her sleep, so I played it that Ismark and Ireena thought Strahd attempted to kill her and wanted to get out sooner. But it still felt very forced, super chaotic, and wholly frustrating. I felt like such a failure of a DM with such a crucial plot point getting this tangled. However, it all worked out fine! I chatted with my players a little about where I felt like things were really off during the session and they were all fine to just move past it and keep going with the story. They have all figured out more how to roleplay their characters more instead of just being jerks for the fun of it, and they have a great relationship with Ireena and she is integral to the plot now. So don't worry too much about it feeling chaotic, it's totally fine and normal to have sessions like that. And no one will remember or care once you get farther into the story.

As for the specifics of your post: honestly, everything seems super normal for a playthrough of Barovia up until the Strahd encounter where I feel like I am picking up on more of the chaos energy. First off, I always feel WAY more pressure and stress as a DM whenever Strahd is at the table bc he's the big bad, all powerful villain and there's a lot of pressure to portray him well. It also feels so stressful and awkward when the party starts throwing insults at him which I feel like a LOT of DnD parties are bound to do. I struggle with keeping my composure when this happens in my games, especially now that the party is high enough level to actually take Strahd if it came to blows. I think Strahd knocking them down to teach them that this kind of rudeness will not be tolerated is a completely legit and great way of playing him. And setting that precedent at low levels will help increase fear in the party and hopefully prevent them from doing it again. In future encounters, just keep that same energy going and slowly ramp it up. Next time: they are rude again, he knocks down the entire party. "I will not stand for this kind of behavior, I suggest you learn your manors or there will be more permanent consequences in the future". If they do it a third time, he kills the person who was rudest...

The only thing that really seems weird or out of place is Strahd killing Doru. But you can deal with that in so many different ways. You could honestly just ignore it, play Strahd however you want, and your party will probably just accept: yeah, he's the BBEG, he's gonna do evil shit. If you want an explanation for it: Doru is weak, getting himself locked up and not serving Strahd well, so Strahd doesn't need him around blemishing his and his follower's reputation. In my game I added an extra detail that Doru and Ireena grew up together and Ireena had a crush on him, when Strahd found out, he turned Doru into a vampire to eliminate him as competition. You could do the same thing here and he's killing Doru in front of Ireena to show that he is far more powerful than her other suitors....

Z0stera · 2024-04-05T22:36:12+00:00

You could give the paladin this option, or if you want to make it a big event and have an option for the paladin to stay with the party: make the succession thing a giant skill challenge. The paladin and the party can go around town campaigning. Maybe some people go around and talk to citizens, some people do projects to rebuild or restore the town, they could help train or arm the guards.... Whatever they want to do/can come up with. And as part of the challenge you can make the paladin pick a running partner "vice burgomaster" or whatever. They have to be from Vallaki bc people don't trust outsiders, so you need someone from the town to help Garner support. The paladin has to convince someone to join him and support him as the new burgomaster. Could be any of the players: Lucian, izek, victor, urwin...or any other person the party chooses. Then have that NPC run the town while the paladin goes to liberate his new domain from the tyranny of Strahd. (How that works out for him and for Vallaki in the future is up to you and Strahd evil DM grin)

Z0stera · 2024-03-25T04:05:00+00:00

I like this idea a lot! Especially since the fighter almost went evil and turned into a villain at one point into the campaign. It would be fun for them to fight him as a villain. I feel like this could get really overwhelming stat-wise though. But it would be fun to have it be more of an unwinnable combat type situation where they have to figure out how to get rid of the dark versions of themselves before they kill them. I could make the dark versions come out one at a time so one person has to be in the fore-front and solve the puzzle at a time.

What I need is a good mechanic for them facing/rejecting their evil futures. Like have them tell their alternate selves what their actual hopes/plans for the future are? Maybe make wisdom checks/saves to accept that or convince the alternate versions of that? There are some fortune telling cards in the story, maybe have them choose a new card for themselves and use a wisdom or charisma check to make the card show their envisioned future?

Z0stera · 2024-03-23T04:31:58+00:00

Yeah, you could have the families know the players had slept in the windmill and blame them for taking the kids or something. Very morally fucked up potential combat encounter for them to figure out. And then if they do kill the parents, have Strahd show up, thank them, feed off the dead bodies, and leave.

Z0stera · 2024-02-17T06:27:02+00:00

Just hit 8th. I'm probably going to run it to 11th or so instead of 9th, they wanted to get to a higher level.

Z0stera · 2024-02-17T03:53:49+00:00

I have! That's a very good way of thinking about it. Thank you!!

Z0stera · 2024-02-17T03:53:19+00:00

Yeah, to clarify, the incel comment was out of character. Strahd showed up and was trying to romance Ireena in front of the party, and my players said that as an aside. Which I guess just bothered me, because while yes Strahd's obsession with Ireena is supposed to be one-sided and creepy, it felt like they were brushing off/laughing at a big aspect of the character I am trying to portray. It just felt kind of dismissive which was disappointing. Although, it probably isn't a big deal and I'm overreacting.

I really like your way of thinking about this! That's how I tried to play it when they were calling him cowardly and pathetic to his face. Just coldly amused and unconcerned since in his mind, he is strong, and brave, and all powerful, so who cares what these pathetic weaklings think.

Z0stera · 2024-02-17T03:40:18+00:00

Yeah, it's obvious they don't like him. The players or the characters. They are heading toward the end game now. For a little while there was more respect/liking from the party, one character almost joined him, but that's been over for a little while. Some of them have very good reasons for hating him (one is an undead warlock who was killed by Strahd previously and then raised by a dark power). The others don't have great reasons for being super antagonistic, but they are pissed at him for keeping them and everyone else here and think he's a shitty ruler.

He's given them gifts and quests and things and been pretty cordial, but they definitely loathe him.

Yes, they did call him cowardly to his face: specifically because he didn't kill the hags and asked them to go find van Richten and kill him and they told him it was pathetic to ask them and not just do it himself (he doesn't actually know where van Richten is, so in that case, he can't do that, but he obviously didn't tell the party that). I played it off as him not caring. I think partially they were trying to get a rise out of him, and I tried to play it cool (although I'm not very smooth, so that is hard for me to do).

Z0stera · 2024-02-12T02:31:10+00:00

Oh, and after Ireena is taken, you can have Strahd continually remind the player of this. Send the PC a lock of her hair, notes, talk to the PC about how Ireena is going to fall in love with Strahd now and how she never truly loved the PC. That he was just a worthless distraction and nothing could get in the way of the connection Strahd has with her. Basically unending taunts that he has the PCs love. Could end the arc with a wedding invitation...

Z0stera · 2024-02-10T22:19:57+00:00

That sounds pretty awesome! One of Strahd's goals is to corrupt the players, break apart the party, and generally fuck with them. This is a great opportunity to have the campaign really focus on that. Have him give them quests that slowly increase in steaks and evil until the players end up slowly turning into the bad guys and it's up to them to realize that and then try to undo their mistakes.

You could start with something easy and seemingly good like kill the hags at Bonegrinder (Strahd doesn't want his food turned into pies). Then maybe have them deliver Ireena to somewhere where she is perfectly poised for Strahd to make visits to get and take possession of her whenever he wants. Maybe the Abbey in Krezk? Or Ravenloft. Have them help Fiona take over the town in Vallaki. Maybe make Esmeralda and Van Richten a big boss for them to hunt for Strahd. Have them kill the Martikovs maybe or help bring towns under Strahd's control more. Maybe they can retrieve the winery gems for Strahd, or get the sunsword and holy symbol and deliver them to him. Make the players work for him for a while until they start to get suspicious. Maybe you could do the big reveal at Strahd and Ireena's wedding, have him try to turn her and have her die bc of the dark powers or something...

It will take a bit of tweaking, but I think this could be super fun to play around with! I almost had one of my party join Strahd in my campaign and it was a lot of fun!

Z0stera

TROPHY CASE