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hypovile · 9 months

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how did ur party discover jackie daytona vasili von holtz? im a dm that wants it to be a cool reveal, but not impossible to deduce

CAUTION TO THOSE WHO NEED IT— this will contain spoilers, both explicit and vague.

In this, I’m explaining our Vasili’s whole thing and how it made us suspicious of him. It’s just a big ol’ dive into him and my thoughts as a player. I also just fucking love talking about our campaign so I ramble like hell. If you just wanna skim through the whole thing— which is totally fine— i did add a little tl;dr at the end thats a little more question-specific so you can just go there :~]

When the party was off for about a week with Ismark and Co., Vasili, as he claimed, walked through the fog and entered the town of Barovia. He was a charming man who decided to take it upon himself to help the town, which was falling into ruin from the werewolves that ran amok every night.

He also took it upon himself to, by some miracle, revive Kolyan. This, I think, was the second red flag. The first was the normal suspicion that comes with a random stranger who claims to have walked through the fog and was suddenly Kolyan’s right hand man after only a week.

I think everyone was also very quickly suspicious of Vasili because the party +Ismark had expected his house to be completely empty. It was definitely a shock to hear laughter coming from inside.

When the party did go inside they had quickly decided to do an arcana check on him and very conveniently rolled well. So, we understood that inside Vasili was a suppressed dark energy, along with a dull sunlight. Vasili also referred to the sun god with a different name.

I think at this point, or a little further in, we had been saying that Vasili was Strahd. The more we said it, the more it became a little bit of a joke to me? Obviously, I considered the fact that Vasili was Strahd and kept it in my head as a definite possibility, and even argued in favor of it a few times in private with the DM (they were doing a very good job pretending to not understand why I thought Vasili was Strahd honestly), but I had never fully convinced myself that Vasili was Strahd.

I think the main reason I was never fully convinced was… actually because Vasili was very reciprocal with my characters flirting, and even initiated it somewhat (…yes, they slept together, and my character woke up to Strahd above him telling him he was a broken man 💀).

But anyways, after that first night, when everyone regrouped back at Ismark’s house, Kolyan refused to let Ismark come with us to find Doru. Vasili quickly volunteered himself to go… half of the party didn’t like that, but decided to let him come anyways.

After a day of travel and an experience with Strahd himself stealing the symbol of ravenkind while one party member was on watch, my character realized that he was missing his special item from Ezra. Everyone was instantly suspicious of Vasili and had my character go search him in private. As my character was about to touch him, he said “touch me and I fucking kill you,” in a completely different accent. There’s a bit of back and forth, but my character promised that he won’t tell anyone in the party. That was when Vasili morphed back into Strahd.

And, again, I was still shocked even though we had been saying Vasili was Strahd the entire time! I think that was part of the fun of it, being suspicious of him and making jokes about it and such.

But the shock isn’t only that Vasili is Strahd, but also that Strahd made his alter ego look exactly like Sergei. It’s a big double whammy that really emphasizes Vasili’s character and the meaning behind him.

TL;DR bullet point list on what made us suspicious of Vasili, leading to his… honestly surprisingly quick reveal:

Vasili’s sudden appearance and seemingly quick relationship with Kolyan in the time we were gone

Directly because of that initial suspicion, the various (and conveniently high-rolled) checks we did on him basically told us that Vasili was hiding something, not necessarily that he was Strahd, but that he was working with him

Him referring to the sun god with a different name (i think; maybe not necessarily important but i think it definitely made some of us a little confused)

An important magical item that connected one of the characters to Ezra going missing around the time they re-entered Barovia. This one only really added suspicion on Vasili because we already were suspicious that he was, at the absolute least, working with Strahd (also due to some conveniently high rolls).

All in all, your players will always surprise you. What may have been a red flag for us may not necessarily be a red flag for them. I think we were a little lucky with getting information on Vasili because we were rolling fairly well during our interactions with him. And I will reiterate, even with everything that made me suspicious, I figured that Vasili worked closely with Strahd, not that he quite literally was Strahd. And even though I guessed that he wasn’t as good of a person as he tried making himself seem, he still was technically making an effort to help us in our travels, which i think was also important.

I can’t give you very specific advice or anything because I don’t know anything about your Strahd or how your players view him. All I can say is to defy their expectations enough to make them think he’s somewhat of an ally, but keep some hints of Strahd’s key traits so he’s not a completely different character. Maybe there’s a little something Strahd is known to like or dislike and Vasili is unable to hide it. Maybe, if Strahd has already met some of them, Strahd dislikes or likes one of the pc’s more than the others and Vasili subconsciously reflects that!

Final reflection: Vasili, to me, has an inherent disconnection from other people. Whether it’s due to entitlement or due to just a flat out lack of understanding how other people work, there’s a disconnection. That’s what links him to Strahd, because when you don’t truly understand other people, it gets hard to pretend to be someone else. Unless, maybe, the thing you’re pretending to be is something you’ve always wanted... I also find it a bit comical

Whatever you come up with, no matter how it turns out or how fast your players solve it, I’m sure it will end up being very fun :~)

#this is probably so unhelpful im so sorry LOL #this is mostly just a reflection from a player perspective that i hope you might find useful #or maybe some bits might inspire you to do certain things #i dunno! i just hope it’s helpful in some way #or interesting #sorry its so long #curse of strahd #dnd #dungeons and dragons #dnd character #vasili von holtz #vasili

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usakkhae · 10 months

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Thanks to twitter, i'm now drawing Cucorucho and QForever kissing

#and i'm doing it..ironically #not cuz i think the shipp is funny or smth #or interesting #no...#forever player #q!forever #cucorucho qsmp #qsmp census bureau #qsmp

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fly-sky-high-09 · 1 month

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I should go sleep

#entered the 'i'm annoying/unfun to be around' zone #i know i lost few filters myself because i haven't properly communicated since the Great Relationship Burnout that's still haunting me #and it's so much more me to not filter stuff I used to #but that also makes me think i'm not a good chill company any more #or interesting #but again it's late so... maybe i'm just overthinking #because i have less grip of other peoples perception of me

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master-missysversion · 8 months

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I know its probably just a meme but what's with the trend of people saying lately that they aren't a characters apologist bc the character did nothing wrong. Why are we returning character moral puritanism where you can either pretend a character did nothing wrong or completely condemn them

#doctor who #my faves did everything wrong and im not apologising for them bc i think it was funny #or interesting

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missilekids · 1 year

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theres something so fun about gerard choosing to play the patient onstage while also being a different guy in the black parade. imagine dying and getting recruited by someone in cosplay as you

#i thought about making this like a Wow... Reflection of the self..... tbp lore post #but actually i dont care and the album stories will forever be incomprehensible to me #like i can talk about them in a meta sense wrt what gerard has said. but i cant balance that w the album itself to create anything new #or interesting #someoen else can take that one and make it sound good 🫡

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florencewellch · 9 months

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Henry Creel has stans??

#hes not even a good villain....#or interesting #anyways stan the mind flayer and cersei lannister for clear skin and good grades

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shepardlives · 10 months

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One user I follow reblogs a bunch of me:a art and man that post about how artists give far more credit to characters then their creators has never been more true

#no one in andromeda is that attractive #or interesting #have fun tho

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simplywrong · 2 years

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Sebastian at the drivers parade ahead of Dutch GP 2021