Monastery of Silver Threads

GoldenGoblin · Post by **GoldenGoblin** » Wed Oct 03, 2007 10:17 am

When I was playing RL we did a Mount Baratok climbing stint to the Monastery our DM was old RLer and it was amazing.
I am now running some RL and am looking for some other tidbits of information about this place.
Gaz1 mentions it and that is fine but just wondered about anything else.

My players are heading there because they think there are good magic items there. Little do they know that the monastery is where bad magic items went to be kept safe.

The Giamarga · Post by **The Giamarga** » Wed Oct 03, 2007 10:31 am

I voted raving mad. Give him the Blood Lust salient ability. Though i can see Leo coming back to his old brilliance as leader of the Dilisnyas.

IMHO the stats in Gaz 1 are off, he's not a cleric but a more powerful mage. I would give him Ari and Rog levels instead of the cleric ones (perhaps even Assassin or Deceiver). Here's a thread where Leo Dilisnya was discussed quite thoroughly

GoldenGoblin · Post by **GoldenGoblin** » Wed Oct 03, 2007 10:32 am

ah thanks going to read

OOOoooohhhhh!

You know I forgot about the I, Strahd book. Ok. Wow the pieces fit all to perfectly.
So if my players manage to free Leo:
1 he might be a little crazy and thristy for a bit.
2 if he gets himself together he will probably find out about Nicu.
3 probably try and kill Nicu

Very awesome plot twists since the outlander halfling rogue finished a contract of Ba'al Verzi and met Nicu only because he thought it was interesting that a halfling would finish a contract just for the money. Short story is he gets turned into a nosferatu and is on his way to Leo's tomb unknowingly.
Love having villians not be villians and just random occurances have epic proportions. Especially for later and the 'final' battles.

Thanks

The Giamarga · Post by **The Giamarga** » Wed Oct 03, 2007 10:40 am

Other interesting sources:
-The chapter on the Dilisnya in Legacies of the Blood.
-This excellent thread on assassin guilds in Ravenloft

Rotipher of the FoS · Wed Oct 03, 2007 10:55 am

Remember that not all the living Dilisnyas are Leo's descendents. Nor is he likely to be the family's most popular ancestral figure, considering how he murdered two of his own sisters among the other wedding guests in 351, and is the bastard product of his mother's love affair, not a real 'Dilisnya' at all.

True, he did help his relatives hide from Strahd's pogroms ... but then, he's the one whose bungled power-grab provoked them, in the first place! Frankly, I can see Leo trying to conscript the living Dilisnyas to his service, only to get booted out of Borca by the Home Faith's clergy and Ivan's hired muscle. Which is actually a good thing, as IMO he's far more interesting as a skulking threat, fomenting trouble from the shadows and awaiting his chance, than as a familial patriarch/administrator: it's what he's always been best at.

NeoTiamat · Post by **NeoTiamat** » Wed Oct 03, 2007 11:27 am

In fairness to Leo, he didn't really bungle the power-grab. As a matter of fact, it was working like a charm, except that he did it on the night that Strahd became a vampire, and you can't really blame him for not forseeing THAT.

Likewise, I don't know if the Dilisnya will be as irritated as that at Leo. For one thing, do they know that he's not an actual Dilisnya? I'm not sure, I can't remember the situation where he admitted it, but that might well be rather secret information, as is Leo's membership in the Ba'al Verzi. For that matter, the Dilisnya have a considerable appreciation for practical politics, they might well respect Leo as a master manipulator.

I agree though, he wouldn't make a good patriarch. But then again, he's never been a patriarch. He's a conspirator without compare, since he managed to fool everyone into thinking he was a dupe, but until the night of Strahd's ascension he was a manipulator and after, a leader in hiding.

He'd make a good 'shadow' foe, fencing with Strahd and Nicu in war of plots and counterplots.

Anyway, I voted thirsty. He's probably a raving madman just now because he hasn't been fed for centuries, but will regain his wits once he's fed. Mostly because using Leo Dilisnya as a lunatic vampiric animal loses his charm as a villain. Of course, as an object lesson of why you don't cross Strahd...

Rotipher of the FoS · Wed Oct 03, 2007 11:42 am

NeoTiamat wrote:In fairness to Leo, he didn't really bungle the power-grab. As a matter of fact, it was working like a charm, except that he did it on the night that Strahd became a vampire, and you can't really blame him for not forseeing THAT.

Even omitting Strahd's undead revival from the picture, he also didn't allow for Sturm and his wife and children having missed the wedding. As the Von Zaroviches aren't extinct, Leo clearly didn't achieve the familial TPK that he'd planned.

GoldenGoblin · Post by **GoldenGoblin** » Wed Oct 03, 2007 1:42 pm

For me the monastery is a nice spot to hide Leo. Way up out of the way. Everyones scared of Mt Baratok.

Lots of good intrigue to plot with.

Rotipher of the FoS · Post by **Rotipher of the FoS** » Wed Oct 03, 2007 2:58 pm

NeoTiamat wrote:For one thing, do they know that he's not an actual Dilisnya? I'm not sure, I can't remember the situation where he admitted it, but that might well be rather secret information, as is Leo's membership in the Ba'al Verzi.

Hmmm. Thinking back, I believe that one of the Arthaus books -- either Gaz IV or LotB, I don't remember which -- mentioned that the branch of the family which is not descended from Leo often taunt their rivals from the other branch with the allegation that he wasn't a real Dilisnya. They've never been able to prove it's true, though.

IIRC, it's actually Ivana's branch that traces back to Leo, while Ivan's kin descend from his older (half-)brother. I'm pretty sure of that, because when I first read in Gaz IV of how Camille laid claim to Borca on the basis of her "true" Dilisnya blood, I stopped to look up her ancestry in the Black Box's bloodlines and realized: "Hey, she and the DPs pulled a fast one!"

GoldenGoblin · Post by **GoldenGoblin** » Wed Oct 03, 2007 7:38 pm

That does make sense. Its like a big soap opera with the Boritsi-Dilisnyas.

So are we blazing a trail of Leo here?
Seems that way.

Seems more could be done with him.

1 Ba'al Verzi tie in
2 Vengence against Strahd
3 Take over the family

So I thank you again for the awesome info.

NeoTiamat · Post by **NeoTiamat** » Wed Oct 03, 2007 10:04 pm

Sinister manipulative mage and assassin mastermind? What is not to love?

The Giamarga · Post by **The Giamarga** » Thu Oct 04, 2007 3:07 am

Here's a thread that i dug up on the Baal Verzi

Bluebomber4evr · Post by **Bluebomber4evr** » Thu Oct 04, 2007 2:28 pm

There's one slight problem: the sidebar in Gaz 1 is wrong. Leo wasn't entombed in the monastery, Strahd took Leo's corpse down the mountain with him and entombed him on the Wachter estate.

Rotipher of the FoS · Post by **Rotipher of the FoS** » Thu Oct 04, 2007 2:37 pm

Or Strahd simply claimed to have entombed him on the estate, to conceal Leo's real location in the monastery and ensure his enemy couldn't be released by anyone who read his journal. Remember that most of I, Strahd is something the Count wrote as a self-serving propaganda piece, so it can't always be trusted.

GoldenGoblin · Post by **GoldenGoblin** » Thu Oct 04, 2007 10:27 pm

Im inclined to believe that Strahd intentionally misled readers of his book as well. Which could account for why it seems to be all over. LOL

Doing a rough draft of Leo atm taking into account things that I heard here and liked.

Will post sometime soon for critiques if you want.

Café de Nuit

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Monastery of Silver Threads

How do you think Leo Dilysnia is after his being made a vampire never feeding and being entombed in the Monastery for 300 years?

Monastery of Silver Threads