Turn a Barovian Guard PC Against Strahd?

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Turn a Barovian Guard PC Against Strahd?

Post by Ender »

So one of my players in my heavily-modified Curse of Strahd game is a Barovian native that was a member of the militia and was a true believer. That is, he hasn't yet seen anything to directly pit him against Strahd. In his eyes, Strahd is the rightful ruler and he is, at worst, a neglectful ruler. The rest of the group is pretty gung-ho about taking on Strahd, but I haven't been able to get him on board. The player is perfectly fine with the idea of taking on Strahd, but he tends to get really into his characters' motivations, meaning that his PC hasn't turned against the group, but is pretty buddy-buddy with Strahd now, in part because Strahd has been actively trying to court the PC.

In fact, Strahd recently made the PC the new Sheriff. My plan is to reveal to the character that he's actually a distant blood relative of Strahd (making him the equivalent of Sheriff von Zarovich, even though I'm not a huge fan of the way Champions of Darkness wrote that character... but I digress). Anyway, I asked the player to come up with a memory of his father, and for it to be a good memory. His idea was a memory in which his father trained the PC as a youngster with his first training sword, shaping him into the man he is today. My players are well aware that when I ask them for this kind of stuff, I'm about to twist it and make it something they didn't quite expect. What I'd like to do is to make sure this memory somehow directly conflicts with his tacit acceptance of Strahd. Like, if Strahd actually appears in the memory (perhaps tracking down his relatives) and does something not okay.

So I'm looking for ideas. How can I twist this memory? What would be in character for Strahd and what would make the PC turn against him? And, amidst all that... what can we do that's not cliché? "Strahd shows up and kills his father" is just so run-of-the-mill. Something along the lines of "Strahd comes by and tricks the PC into killing his own father" is better, but requires some careful thought about how to make it good.
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Re: Turn a Barovian Guard PC Against Strahd?

Post by Gonzoron of the FoS »

Off the top of my head, and not necessarily related to the memory/vision. What if Strahd orders his new sheriff to do something completely morally repugnant? (maybe it's not obvious at the time the order is given, but when he goes to carry it out, he learns the true nature of what he's been asked to do.)
Would that do the trick of turning him against Strahd?
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Re: Turn a Barovian Guard PC Against Strahd?

Post by Ender »

Gonzoron of the FoS wrote:Off the top of my head, and not necessarily related to the memory/vision. What if Strahd orders his new sheriff to do something completely morally repugnant? (maybe it's not obvious at the time the order is given, but when he goes to carry it out, he learns the true nature of what he's been asked to do.)
Would that do the trick of turning him against Strahd?
Maybe. It depends on how it's executed and why. But that's a wee bit on the nose for my tastes, personally. Building up to that is one thing, but it feels a bit heavy-handed to me.
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Re: Turn a Barovian Guard PC Against Strahd?

Post by Dark Angel »

Ender wrote:
Gonzoron of the FoS wrote:Off the top of my head, and not necessarily related to the memory/vision. What if Strahd orders his new sheriff to do something completely morally repugnant? (maybe it's not obvious at the time the order is given, but when he goes to carry it out, he learns the true nature of what he's been asked to do.)
Would that do the trick of turning him against Strahd?
Maybe. It depends on how it's executed and why. But that's a wee bit on the nose for my tastes, personally. Building up to that is one thing, but it feels a bit heavy-handed to me.
Maybe have the memory focus on his father and a small item amongst his effects (a particular medal or badge of sorts, etc) and his father being a good man who was trying to teach his son that might is not right and that it is up to good people to stand up to those that would harm innocents. Maybe the father (or grandfather) of the PC was a former sheriff (along the von Zarovich bloodline) of Barovia who left the position after refusing to do something terrible to innocent people (killing children, slaying good members of a holy faith, etc). Now that person sought a more peaceful life and raised his kids and they then raised the PC. The old insignia is the Badge of Office from the sheriff (at that time) and he vaguely remembers his father training him with good ol' grandpa watching on. His grandfather disappeared when he was a child and the family assumed it was wolves and other dark creatures of the night.

As it turns out, Strahd took the old man and has held him captive for years (either simply imprisoned or magically trapped). One of the first acts of loyalty Strahd expects from the new sheriff? Kill one in the past who deserted his duty as such an act is treasonous. The old insignia or item would be hard to see, but the hooded man tied to a post alone would make such an act pretty evil (harmless captive killed without even knowing if they are or are not guilty of anything). Now the issue is, how does the PC handle that situation and manage to escape without being hunted down and killed? Would Strahd be doing this out of a test of service or just a means to extract revenge on the grandfather by having his grandson take the same office and be lead down the path that he almost did as well? Or is the goal to leave the grandfather with the last thought that his grandson is now being tortured and hunted like he should have been years ago.

Hopefully something here helps you.
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Re: Turn a Barovian Guard PC Against Strahd?

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The best thing that I can think of is to make that shining paragon of virtue come at a secret, horribly, and bloody cost. What if the PC has been born and bred to be a propaganda tool, a figurehead if you will? (The seeming innocence and upstanding nature could benefit both the PC's family and Strahd)

Daddy wanted to keep his son to the straight and narrow, so he made a pact with Strahd and did all sorts of mean and nasty things for him in the background in order to keep his son happy, pure, and ignorant and the public adoring... Of course, as time went on, daddy became less and less mentally whole, until Strahd all but had to toss him aside, left in a madhouse somewhere. Now, Strahd may seek to make the best use out of his son, possibly repeating the pattern (even arranging the son to meet a lovely woman whom he falls in love with, producing a child, and then bringing the son turned dad to repeat his father's mistakes.)
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Re: Turn a Barovian Guard PC Against Strahd?

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So I've had a small realization. I've been thinking that the PC has to be a distant relative of Strahd, down the generations. I couldn't, for the life of me, come up with a good reason that Strahd would have been unable to track down his relatives over the centuries or why he would not have done so. And then it hit me: I am not constrained by time. The PC can actually be a close relative of Strahd himself if, as a young child, he was given to the Zarovan. They don't need to have kept him, just made a quick hop through the Mists and deposited him hundreds of years later.

I'm currently thinking that the PC's "parents" are whatever foster family the Zarovan left him with. Strahd, as Vasili von Holtz, stumbles across the PC as a child one day and has some innate ability to recognize his family's blood (let's chalk it up to him being a vampire and mage). He investigates the situation a bit and understands what happened. He confronts the family and tries to convince them to give up the child into his care, but they refuse. Instead of charming/dominating them, he allows the child to stay with them, but he makes sure that the PC is raised right. At the same time, he makes sure that the "parents" are out of the picture as early as possible. The father is sent off to fight the Gundarakite rebellion, on the front lines, and dies in battle. The mother finds it difficult to continue financially, but the PC is offered a Zarovich-sponsored entry into the Barovian militia, where he is manipulated and watched by Strahd over the years.

The real question is this: whose son is the PC? Did Strahd himself have a child before he was a vampire? Did Sergei and Tatyana have a child before they were married? Do I introduce Sturm into the plot? Is he not really a von Zarovich? Perhaps he's actually Alek Gwilym's son and Strahd sees this as an opporunity to have a loyal commander, and potentially a friend, again.

If he is Alek's son, the reveal that Strahd murdered Alek (his closest ally, even willing to help him in the end) might be the thing that changes the PC. Building that up with the understanding that he's been a pawn his whole life and that the people he knew as his parents ultimately died because of Strahd's machinations may work.

Hm. I'm kind of leaning toward him being Alek's son, now.
Last edited by Ender on Sat Aug 26, 2017 7:21 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Turn a Barovian Guard PC Against Strahd?

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Ender wrote:So I've had a small realization. I've been thinking that the PC has to be a distant relative of Strahd, down the generations. I couldn't, for the life of me, come up with a good reason that Strahd would have been unable to track down his relatives over the centuries or why he would not have done so. And then it hit me: I am not constrained by time. The PC can actually be a close relative of Strahd himself if, as a young child, he was given to the Zarovan. They don't need to have kept him, just made a quick hop through the Mists and deposited him hundreds of years later.

I'm currently thinking that the PC's "parents" are whatever foster family the Zarovan left him with. Strahd, as Vasili von Holtz, stumbles across the PC as a child one day and has some innate ability to recognize his family's blood (let's chalk it up to him being a vampire and mage). He investigates the situation a bit and understands what happened. He confronts the family and tries to convince them to give up the child into his care, but they refuse. Instead of charming/dominating them, he allows the child to stay with them, but he makes sure that the PC is raised right. At the same time, he makes sure that the "parents" are out of the picture as early as possible. The father is sent off to fight the Gundarakite rebellion, on the front lines, and dies in battle. The mother finds it difficult to continue financially, but the PC is offered a Zarovich-sponsored entry into the Barovian militia, where he is manipulated and watched by Strahd over the years.

The real question is this: who's son is the PC? Did Strahd himself have a child before he was a vampire? Did Sergei and Tatyana have a child before they were married? Do I introduce Sturm into the plot? Is he not really a von Zarovich? Perhaps he's actually Alek Gwilym's son and Strahd sees this as an opporunity to have a loyal commander, and potentially a friend, again.

If he is Alek's son, the reveal that Strahd murdered Alek (his closest ally, even willing to help him in the end) might be the thing that changes the PC. Building that up with the understanding that he's been a pawn his whole life and that the people he knew as his parents ultimately died because of Strahd's machinations may work.

Hm. I'm kind of leaning toward him being Alek's son, now.
If he's Alek Gwilym's son (as opposed to merely his descendant), then there may need to be some chronological anomalies explained for depending upon the time and setting you're using for CoS. If the Guard PC's actually a Gwilym, then Strahd may have a way to follow his bloodline based on the fact that Alek was technically the first person Strahd drained dry. (As an aside, making the PC a Gwilym might have interesting repercussions for interacting with Sir Godfrey Gwilym if he's in your altered Order of the Silver Dragon/failed Dawnslayers, as Sir Godfrey seems to share Alek's last name. It might be interesting if Alek and Godfrey knew each other in life- and that they were both on opposite sides in relation to Strahd.)

On the other hand, if you wanted to go with a von Zarovich offspring/descendant, here's an option: in Fair Barovia they mention that Yelena Aresek is the illegitimate daughter of a tryst between a woman of the "Olavnya" family and Strahd before he became a vampire. I'm assuming this refers to Burgomaster Dagma Olavnya from I, Strahd, the Memoirs of a Vampire, whom he beds with in his memoirs after becoming a vampire. Therefore, it might make for a cool hook that the PC guard has some diluted dhampir blood in his veins. You could leak a fragment of the Tome of Strahd that contains mention of Dagma as an early sort of clue and then slowly drop hints at the horrible nature of the PC's ancestry. (Of course, this could also all just be a feint played by Strahd to make the PC think he was a descendant of Strahd.)
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Re: Turn a Barovian Guard PC Against Strahd?

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The Lesser Evil wrote:If he's Alek Gwilym's son (as opposed to merely his descendant), then there may need to be some chronological anomalies explained for depending upon the time and setting you're using for CoS. If the Guard PC's actually a Gwilym, then Strahd may have a way to follow his bloodline based on the fact that Alek was technically the first person Strahd drained dry. (As an aside, making the PC a Gwilym might have interesting repercussions for interacting with Sir Godfrey Gwilym if he's in your altered Order of the Silver Dragon/failed Dawnslayers, as Sir Godfrey seems to share Alek's last name. It might be interesting if Alek and Godfrey knew each other in life- and that they were both on opposite sides in relation to Strahd.)
According to Chris Perkins, Godfrey is supposed to be Alek's descendant... which I'm just not doing. I think the Godfrey/Horngaard relationship probably doesn't need to be muddied by a relation to Alek, but if Godfrey was, say, Alek's brother, it could be interesting for the PC to meet Godfrey.
The Lesser Evil wrote:On the other hand, if you wanted to go with a von Zarovich offspring/descendant, here's an option: in Fair Barovia they mention that Yelena Aresek is the illegitimate daughter of a tryst between a woman of the "Olavnya" family and Strahd before he became a vampire. I'm assuming this refers to Burgomaster Dagma Olavnya from I, Strahd, the Memoirs of a Vampire, whom he beds with in his memoirs after becoming a vampire. Therefore, it might make for a cool hook that the PC guard has some diluted dhampir blood in his veins. You could leak a fragment of the Tome of Strahd that contains mention of Dagma as an early sort of clue and then slowly drop hints at the horrible nature of the PC's ancestry. (Of course, this could also all just be a feint played by Strahd to make the PC think he was a descendant of Strahd.)
I've been thinking about having him be of the von Zarovich bloodline and am struggling to decide whether or not that's beneficial to the plotline. There's been an undercurrent theme of "family" to my campaign and having the PC be directly related to him would be fitting... but at the same time... I don't like the thought, in general, that Strahd had children with anyone. I don't have a good reason for this. But there's something nagging me about it, making me feel that it undercuts his narrative relationship with Tatyana. There's nothing out of place with it in the society... I just don't know.

Let me post a strange thought. What if Strahd had a history of wanting people already taken? Could he have had an affair with Alek's wife, making the PC both his son and, in a way, tied to Alek? Is that too convoluted? It feels like it should be more simplistic. Decisions, decisions.
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Re: Turn a Barovian Guard PC Against Strahd?

Post by Rock of the Fraternity »

What if the PC is related to Strahd by his mother's side? By means of a sister of hers, which would explain why the family name isn't a dead giveaway for the relationship.
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