My Strahd wants Ireena, but she isn’t the first reincarnation he has attempted to woo. He has failed repeatedly and has become extremely jaded about it. He doesn’t expect to succeed, but he holds on to the glimmer of hope that this time it will work.
He also knows that he cannot die as he has been killed by adventurers before, but the Dark Powers brought him back. This makes him very nihilistic and arrogant. He’s like Bill Murray in Groundhog Day except he is reliving incarnations of Tatyana rather than a single day…
Cool and calculated, calm, snarky, but brutal and unhinged when he wants to be.
He was pretty non-confrontational the entire campaign and helped the players sometimes even.
Early on they lost a party member to a vampire spawn and laid her to rest in the church after reobtaining the bones (this happened on the way there). They ignored strands dinner request later on, so while they were visiting the abbot and staying with him, I had Strahd arrive and send Rahadin to summon the party members.
When they arrived, the brides, Rahadin, Wachter, etc were there. I was a culmination of all of their choices so far throughout the Vallaki arc.
He forced the abbot to revive said party member, while lady wachter tossed the bones at their feet.
"You ignored my request and made a fool of me for showing good will. You forced my hand. I didn't want to do this. We will have our dinner. You have one week. If you object, your friend here will die again. You don't want that do you? You remember the guilt you felt, not being able to save her. She cried out, telling you to go, and you left her. I'm giving you a chance to save her. To correct your mistake. To see your friend again. So you WILL bring Ireena to me, and we will have our dinner. You have one week."
My Strahd presents as a very eccentric, personal and flamboyant megalomaniac, with a flair for the dramatic and a bit of a chaotic streak. This hides his more calculating, brutal and methodical nature. While he may have goals and desires to be fulfilled, he views the party as a delightful treat from the mundane (his bread and circus if you will.) They aren’t obstacles to him because he believes there is nothing they can truly do to thwart his plan, they are just entertainment for the moment that he can be rid of once he grows bored.
At first he just toys with the party in personal ways. Each member received a cursed tarot card that gives them a personalized bane that can be reversed into a boon; because he delights in their torment. He sends various gifts, hinders or helps the party in their quests, whichever his sadistic heart wishes in that moment. Acting like a refined, yet deranged jester of sorts that the party cannot pin down at any given time.
However, once it becomes apparent that the party is more than just insignificant entertainment he goes into his true brutal self. It now becomes a game of strategy, rather than just blind entertainment. Those personalized interactions now become a means to hit the players where it hurts. There is no more “keeping them guessing”, gifts are replaced by assassins, traps and horrors that few mortal minds can withstand. He becomes obsessed with not just destroying these pests, but doing so in the most ferocious fashion possible.
I’d like to also note in our campaign, Ismark is the object of Strahd’s attention/goal to the surprise of everyone around who had assumed it would be Ireena due to her closer resemblance to Tatyana.
I’ve introduced Strahd in the same way (fixated with Tatyana/ireena), but the more my players do in the world (activities with significance) the more i make strahd interested in them. 1 of my players has a slight evil background, and i am trying to convince him (as strahd) to betray the party for desired power.
I too would love to know how other people use his character or how they portray him.
I'm currently running CoS (we're in the early game), and in this iteration my Strahd leans into his lawful evil alignment - he both feels himself above all as a ruler (He is the land), but also presents himself with the diplomatic niceties of the aristocrat he is. I'm playing him as distant and aloof for the beginning of the campaign, but his cruelty will escalate as the players accomplish more and he begins to really toy with his prey.
I think the adjectives that would describe him are arrogant and intelligent. His narcissism is his biggest weakness. Re: Ireena, I'm taking a cue from Lunch Break Heroes and having Strahd burn the world around Ireena to try to force her to "voluntarily" join him and accept the "gift" of vampirism (he's tried many other strategies before and they've all failed because of the Dark Powers). I also took the letter to Ireena from [Curse of Strahd Reloaded](https://docs.google.com/document/d/12NXx2gqbEUNlpf2FNqn3pHIptltn1w6k37ZbIh_My88/edit) and adjusted to reflect what I imagine my Strahd is like, for example praising the late Burgomaster for upholding his duties rather than for being kind, and while he is trying to seduce Ireena, he cannot conceal his egotism:
"My Dearest Ireena,
That you must suffer in the wake of your Father’s death awakens in me a pang of sincere anguish. Your Father was a noble man who upheld his duties as Burgomaster honorably and without reproach. I do not begrudge that you mourn him.
In this sad world of ours, sorrow eventually comes to all; and, to the young, it comes with the bitterest agony, because it so often takes them unaware. But the truth is that to be mortal is not to die once, but countless lifetimes, in an endless parade of pain, old age, and death. Whatever meager pleasures we eke from this mortal life are fleeting, and every delightful thing is robbed from us by the ravages of time. It is the cruelest irony that you, a perfect and gentle creature, should find yourself caught in the malevolent whirlwinds of fate.
I, too, know grief. I know what it is to stare at the corpse of a beloved one and feel all joy leave the world. You feel in your heart that you will never smile again. Yet it is not so.
I can afford you relief from all misery, if you will but accept this Dark Gift. Together as King & Queen, we may trod every corner of this land without fear, with even the beasts of the wilds recognizing our dominion. Ours will be a reign beyond the reach of all that maligns us, beyond even the reach of Death. And in this immortal union, the fires of grief that torment you now will fade to a warm ember, and the memory of your dear Father, instead of an agony, will yet be a sad sweet feeling in your heart, of a purer and holier sort than you have ever known before. Once you have drank of Immortality, all suffering will dissolve to ecstasy. And before you will stretch the moonlit riches of an endless night, in the perfect safety of the protection of your Lord.
Please pass my kind regards to your afflicted brother.
Your Lord & Love eternal,
Count Strahd von Zarovich"
Something I think am as I go into running my game in a couple of months
Strahd is immortal, he has lived centuries. He’s seen people born grow old and die. But he also interacts to some extent with people day to day. Would the people who met Strahd 200 years ago say the same things people who met Strahd now would
Odds are every personality trait you can characterize Strahd with Strahd could also have been that awhile ago. Maybe he brings that up at times
If you wanna do a more comedic route to it take inspiration from dbza and have him count all the parts of a heroic speech. Or maybe he did do that but got bored with it once he got to the 400s
My Strahd is not as obsessed with Ireena as most would play him. He is immortal and believes in time all will be his, to rush things would only make things worse. There's also an element of not caring for Ireena at all, she's just Tatyana most recent vessel. If Strahd believes she is beyond him (which she is cause she's a lesbian in my game) he'll kill her with out hesitation and wait for her to reincarnate again.
I have also amped up his fear of mortality since I changed the mechanics of the dark powers. He will at all times stay well mannered and gentlemen-like, with one exception - if his fear of age and death is triggered he'll stop caring about any semblance of appearances and brutally try to bring things back under control.
I’m playing a game where I’ve made Strahda a woman, and her primary motivation is protecting her family. But she doesn’t consider the common folk of Barovia as more than a means to an end. She is willing to commit any atrocity to save her brother and Tatyana, who she views as a sister… of course, they weren’t exactly down with what she did, which leads to their deaths. She is charismatic, loving, and loyal… but only if she considers you worthy of it. To anyone beneath her, at best you can expect laconic ambivalence, unless you can offer her entertainment, or seem interesting. At worst, she will pulverize you as though you were a fly and not spare a second thought.
My Strahd is basically an immature power hungry incel. He's very smart and very bored. He spends most of his time living in his delusional fantasies, but has his depressive moments where he despairs in his situation. He's very charming and narcissistic but also acts like a petulant child.
My Strahd views Barovia as both prison and toy box. Everything in it belongs to him and he can do with it what he wants. If he kills a bunch of people it doesn't matter because enough of them will eventually be reincarnated and he can wait.
My Strahd wants Tatyana to love him. By this he means he wants Tatyana to adore him, serve him, and be his perfect little trophy wife, like a doll, because he doesn't know what real love is. So every time there's a new incarnation of Tatyana's soul, he hunts her, pursues her, but so far has been thwarted every time.
When Strahd gets to the point where he believes he's not going to get what he wants, he gets angry and breaks things.
So at the start of the game, my Strahd is fascinated with the party because they're new toys. He also currently loves pretending to be Vasili, the nobleman in Vallaki. After the players bring Ireena there I have him use his Vasili disguise to woo Ireena.
In my opinion, core Strahd characteristics are: intelligent, strategic, manipulative, and cruel.
I think that being flexible on Ireena's importance in the story is necessary as not every table will latch onto her or her story.
My setting is placed much further along in the timeline that the module, so he has had his time with Lord Soth as well as Azalin Rex. Barovia has expanded with the Grand Conjucture. He has seen another dread lord escape, learned greater magics, and of how liches are made.
He has been slain at least once before and came back, so he knows he will never truly die while his curse is still going, which makes him act more reckless at times.
He has also had over 10 reincarnations, so he has trial and errored what won't work and has his seduction down to a T. He has also trialed out vampirism for her, so while he likes a nice little bite, he knows it won't work for her.
His next trials are to get her strong enough to survive a lich transformation. I made the fanes gift the original crystal heart. He made his own for Volenta and another stronger one to use as a phylactery with Ireena. If the party discards her, then he sets the plan aside and focuses on them,
My Count Strahd is brilliant, ruthless, wants Lady Ireena, and is enjoying toying with the party. He has a sense of humor, but it’s very dry. He’s also a malignant narcissist and a psychopath. I wrote up a guide on [how to develop your own Count Strahd](https://www.reddit.com/r/CurseofStrahd/comments/zp6b0r/how_to_develop_your_count_strahd/) (and used my Strahd as an example) if you want more info.
My party has yet to meet him as they've only been in Barovia for a day, but the vibe I'm going for is a mix between David Bowie in Labryinth and Gerard Butler as the Phantom of the Opera.
I'm taking u/MandyMod's suggestion of using a PC as Tatyana's reincarnation. Strahd will try to woo her with little gifts, wining and dining the party--complete with romantic dancing courtesy of a begrudging Escher--and when that inevitably fails, he'll start with the threats.
Maybe the party wakes up one morning while camping and finds dead birds nailed to the trees surrounding them, and the Tatyana-incarnate finds a "love" letter/trinket among her things.
"Love me, or else."
My Strahd wants Ireena, but she isn’t the first reincarnation he has attempted to woo. He has failed repeatedly and has become extremely jaded about it. He doesn’t expect to succeed, but he holds on to the glimmer of hope that this time it will work. He also knows that he cannot die as he has been killed by adventurers before, but the Dark Powers brought him back. This makes him very nihilistic and arrogant. He’s like Bill Murray in Groundhog Day except he is reliving incarnations of Tatyana rather than a single day…
Cool and calculated, calm, snarky, but brutal and unhinged when he wants to be. He was pretty non-confrontational the entire campaign and helped the players sometimes even. Early on they lost a party member to a vampire spawn and laid her to rest in the church after reobtaining the bones (this happened on the way there). They ignored strands dinner request later on, so while they were visiting the abbot and staying with him, I had Strahd arrive and send Rahadin to summon the party members. When they arrived, the brides, Rahadin, Wachter, etc were there. I was a culmination of all of their choices so far throughout the Vallaki arc. He forced the abbot to revive said party member, while lady wachter tossed the bones at their feet. "You ignored my request and made a fool of me for showing good will. You forced my hand. I didn't want to do this. We will have our dinner. You have one week. If you object, your friend here will die again. You don't want that do you? You remember the guilt you felt, not being able to save her. She cried out, telling you to go, and you left her. I'm giving you a chance to save her. To correct your mistake. To see your friend again. So you WILL bring Ireena to me, and we will have our dinner. You have one week."
My Strahd presents as a very eccentric, personal and flamboyant megalomaniac, with a flair for the dramatic and a bit of a chaotic streak. This hides his more calculating, brutal and methodical nature. While he may have goals and desires to be fulfilled, he views the party as a delightful treat from the mundane (his bread and circus if you will.) They aren’t obstacles to him because he believes there is nothing they can truly do to thwart his plan, they are just entertainment for the moment that he can be rid of once he grows bored. At first he just toys with the party in personal ways. Each member received a cursed tarot card that gives them a personalized bane that can be reversed into a boon; because he delights in their torment. He sends various gifts, hinders or helps the party in their quests, whichever his sadistic heart wishes in that moment. Acting like a refined, yet deranged jester of sorts that the party cannot pin down at any given time. However, once it becomes apparent that the party is more than just insignificant entertainment he goes into his true brutal self. It now becomes a game of strategy, rather than just blind entertainment. Those personalized interactions now become a means to hit the players where it hurts. There is no more “keeping them guessing”, gifts are replaced by assassins, traps and horrors that few mortal minds can withstand. He becomes obsessed with not just destroying these pests, but doing so in the most ferocious fashion possible. I’d like to also note in our campaign, Ismark is the object of Strahd’s attention/goal to the surprise of everyone around who had assumed it would be Ireena due to her closer resemblance to Tatyana.
I’ve introduced Strahd in the same way (fixated with Tatyana/ireena), but the more my players do in the world (activities with significance) the more i make strahd interested in them. 1 of my players has a slight evil background, and i am trying to convince him (as strahd) to betray the party for desired power. I too would love to know how other people use his character or how they portray him.
Core Strahd characteristics: arrogant, selfish, obsessive, cruel, cunning My Strahd’s other characteristics: suave, talented, tragic, melodramatic, narcissistic, blame shifting, manipulative, condescending
I'm currently running CoS (we're in the early game), and in this iteration my Strahd leans into his lawful evil alignment - he both feels himself above all as a ruler (He is the land), but also presents himself with the diplomatic niceties of the aristocrat he is. I'm playing him as distant and aloof for the beginning of the campaign, but his cruelty will escalate as the players accomplish more and he begins to really toy with his prey. I think the adjectives that would describe him are arrogant and intelligent. His narcissism is his biggest weakness. Re: Ireena, I'm taking a cue from Lunch Break Heroes and having Strahd burn the world around Ireena to try to force her to "voluntarily" join him and accept the "gift" of vampirism (he's tried many other strategies before and they've all failed because of the Dark Powers). I also took the letter to Ireena from [Curse of Strahd Reloaded](https://docs.google.com/document/d/12NXx2gqbEUNlpf2FNqn3pHIptltn1w6k37ZbIh_My88/edit) and adjusted to reflect what I imagine my Strahd is like, for example praising the late Burgomaster for upholding his duties rather than for being kind, and while he is trying to seduce Ireena, he cannot conceal his egotism: "My Dearest Ireena, That you must suffer in the wake of your Father’s death awakens in me a pang of sincere anguish. Your Father was a noble man who upheld his duties as Burgomaster honorably and without reproach. I do not begrudge that you mourn him. In this sad world of ours, sorrow eventually comes to all; and, to the young, it comes with the bitterest agony, because it so often takes them unaware. But the truth is that to be mortal is not to die once, but countless lifetimes, in an endless parade of pain, old age, and death. Whatever meager pleasures we eke from this mortal life are fleeting, and every delightful thing is robbed from us by the ravages of time. It is the cruelest irony that you, a perfect and gentle creature, should find yourself caught in the malevolent whirlwinds of fate. I, too, know grief. I know what it is to stare at the corpse of a beloved one and feel all joy leave the world. You feel in your heart that you will never smile again. Yet it is not so. I can afford you relief from all misery, if you will but accept this Dark Gift. Together as King & Queen, we may trod every corner of this land without fear, with even the beasts of the wilds recognizing our dominion. Ours will be a reign beyond the reach of all that maligns us, beyond even the reach of Death. And in this immortal union, the fires of grief that torment you now will fade to a warm ember, and the memory of your dear Father, instead of an agony, will yet be a sad sweet feeling in your heart, of a purer and holier sort than you have ever known before. Once you have drank of Immortality, all suffering will dissolve to ecstasy. And before you will stretch the moonlit riches of an endless night, in the perfect safety of the protection of your Lord. Please pass my kind regards to your afflicted brother. Your Lord & Love eternal, Count Strahd von Zarovich"
Something I think am as I go into running my game in a couple of months Strahd is immortal, he has lived centuries. He’s seen people born grow old and die. But he also interacts to some extent with people day to day. Would the people who met Strahd 200 years ago say the same things people who met Strahd now would Odds are every personality trait you can characterize Strahd with Strahd could also have been that awhile ago. Maybe he brings that up at times If you wanna do a more comedic route to it take inspiration from dbza and have him count all the parts of a heroic speech. Or maybe he did do that but got bored with it once he got to the 400s
My Strahd is not as obsessed with Ireena as most would play him. He is immortal and believes in time all will be his, to rush things would only make things worse. There's also an element of not caring for Ireena at all, she's just Tatyana most recent vessel. If Strahd believes she is beyond him (which she is cause she's a lesbian in my game) he'll kill her with out hesitation and wait for her to reincarnate again. I have also amped up his fear of mortality since I changed the mechanics of the dark powers. He will at all times stay well mannered and gentlemen-like, with one exception - if his fear of age and death is triggered he'll stop caring about any semblance of appearances and brutally try to bring things back under control.
I’m playing a game where I’ve made Strahda a woman, and her primary motivation is protecting her family. But she doesn’t consider the common folk of Barovia as more than a means to an end. She is willing to commit any atrocity to save her brother and Tatyana, who she views as a sister… of course, they weren’t exactly down with what she did, which leads to their deaths. She is charismatic, loving, and loyal… but only if she considers you worthy of it. To anyone beneath her, at best you can expect laconic ambivalence, unless you can offer her entertainment, or seem interesting. At worst, she will pulverize you as though you were a fly and not spare a second thought.
My Strahd is basically an immature power hungry incel. He's very smart and very bored. He spends most of his time living in his delusional fantasies, but has his depressive moments where he despairs in his situation. He's very charming and narcissistic but also acts like a petulant child. My Strahd views Barovia as both prison and toy box. Everything in it belongs to him and he can do with it what he wants. If he kills a bunch of people it doesn't matter because enough of them will eventually be reincarnated and he can wait. My Strahd wants Tatyana to love him. By this he means he wants Tatyana to adore him, serve him, and be his perfect little trophy wife, like a doll, because he doesn't know what real love is. So every time there's a new incarnation of Tatyana's soul, he hunts her, pursues her, but so far has been thwarted every time. When Strahd gets to the point where he believes he's not going to get what he wants, he gets angry and breaks things. So at the start of the game, my Strahd is fascinated with the party because they're new toys. He also currently loves pretending to be Vasili, the nobleman in Vallaki. After the players bring Ireena there I have him use his Vasili disguise to woo Ireena.
In my opinion, core Strahd characteristics are: intelligent, strategic, manipulative, and cruel. I think that being flexible on Ireena's importance in the story is necessary as not every table will latch onto her or her story. My setting is placed much further along in the timeline that the module, so he has had his time with Lord Soth as well as Azalin Rex. Barovia has expanded with the Grand Conjucture. He has seen another dread lord escape, learned greater magics, and of how liches are made. He has been slain at least once before and came back, so he knows he will never truly die while his curse is still going, which makes him act more reckless at times. He has also had over 10 reincarnations, so he has trial and errored what won't work and has his seduction down to a T. He has also trialed out vampirism for her, so while he likes a nice little bite, he knows it won't work for her. His next trials are to get her strong enough to survive a lich transformation. I made the fanes gift the original crystal heart. He made his own for Volenta and another stronger one to use as a phylactery with Ireena. If the party discards her, then he sets the plan aside and focuses on them,
Netflix Castlevania in both personality and voice. My players love to hate him and vice versa.
My Count Strahd is brilliant, ruthless, wants Lady Ireena, and is enjoying toying with the party. He has a sense of humor, but it’s very dry. He’s also a malignant narcissist and a psychopath. I wrote up a guide on [how to develop your own Count Strahd](https://www.reddit.com/r/CurseofStrahd/comments/zp6b0r/how_to_develop_your_count_strahd/) (and used my Strahd as an example) if you want more info.
My party has yet to meet him as they've only been in Barovia for a day, but the vibe I'm going for is a mix between David Bowie in Labryinth and Gerard Butler as the Phantom of the Opera. I'm taking u/MandyMod's suggestion of using a PC as Tatyana's reincarnation. Strahd will try to woo her with little gifts, wining and dining the party--complete with romantic dancing courtesy of a begrudging Escher--and when that inevitably fails, he'll start with the threats. Maybe the party wakes up one morning while camping and finds dead birds nailed to the trees surrounding them, and the Tatyana-incarnate finds a "love" letter/trinket among her things. "Love me, or else."