화요일 2026년1월13일	-	Curse of Strahd, Session 1 (Spoilers)

Been awhile since I updated here (or my journal), as I have been occupied
with getting everything up and running with my new pf2e campaign. So,
here is an entry detailing what went down with the first session.
Spoilers alert if you don't want to know what happens in the Adventure:

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I have converted Curse of Strahd to Pathfinder Second Edition, this is our
campaign. We have a party of four adventurers: Costin "Păcălici" Vaduva, a
clever, but slightly mysterious Swashbuckler; Gideon Driscoll
"The Phantom Walker", a Bard of some renown in the region; Reduvia, aka
"Lady Mantis", a young and somewhat naively pretentious Monk; and Zoaphiel
Valisynzarin, a determined Investigator driven to find the truth.

I decided to use the Plea for Help hook, since it fit nicely with the
the possibility of other clues left in CoS (namely, finding the authentic
letter from Burgomaster Indirovich). This was especially true since the
party has an Investigator and it would be good to play up these elements.
Zoaphiel the investigator was in fact the one who detected poor Olensky
and promptly compared the contents and handwriting, so that part is
proceeding well.

The group then began to hear that the wolves, who until this point had
been only sporadically howling in the distance, begin to draw closer. They
decided that beating a hasty retreat back to the gates of Barovia the
wiser course, but unfortunately, the wolves proved too fast and confronted
them along the road, blocking the way back. Noticing that the wolves
didn't seem interested in approaching the group, but only in blocking the
way, they turned back and proceeded to the only known destination in the
land, the Village of Barovia.

On the way, there was a random encounter, and it took an unfortunate roll
of the dice.  The group stumbled upon a group of six werewolves. Clearly
this would be the end if the lycanthropes decided to fight, as at this
point, they were still level 1. Instead, the werewolves exchanged
questions and answers with the group, the werewolves mostly interested in
learning that this was Strahd's latest playthings and the group trying,
unsuccessfully, to gather more information about the situation in the
Village. The werewolves played up their simple trapper identification and
claimed that they had only vague knowledge of what "townies" were up to,
but did seem to show signs of discomfort when questioned about the vampire
or why it was they didn't often go to town (because they are werewolves).
The werewolves parted ways with the party with a vague farewell that
could be taken as either threat or potential friendship.

After this, they arrived without event at the Village, where we
immediately transported them to the dungeon of the Death House, as the
first half had been run by the group multiple times as a test for my
conversion. They wisely pulled the ghoul encounter into a bottleneck to
keep from being overwhelmed, and the Gideon the bard cast a clever
Illusory Object to create a barrier between the group and some of the
ghouls, with one ghoul in particular struggling with the perception check
to disbelieve the illusion. Lady Mantis the monk, their only significant
frontline presence, successfully handled most of the attacks and the group
weathered the assault well.

In the shrine, the shades were no match for the group and quickly
dispatched. The investigator easily found the secret door, but the group
didn't explore the ladder yet, as they opted to check the door to the
west, where the mimic's deception proved too clever for the investigator
to detect. 

Lady Mantis attempted to open the door, only to discover that her hand was
being drawn in rather than the door moving. Both the mimic's reaction
strike and it's first attack after initiative was rolled dealt
considerable damage to the monk, but she fought on bravely until finally
the mimic swallowed her. She valliantly carried on from within, but
lacking access to either piercing or slashing damage, she could do nothing
to affect her escape, and after two rounds of digestive acid damage
succumbed and began her death saves.

Gideon, who had bravely tried to help Lady Mantis, was the next victim. He
was quickly felled by two powerful pseudopod strikes (the mimic's mouth
currently occupied by the monk). Thankfully, Zoaphiel came to the rescue
and was able to finish off the mimic with a critical strike from her light
pick.

This ended the session, as the group busied itself with recovering it's
members from the trauma of the battle.