Hello everyone,

We recently shut down the subreddit for two days as part of the larger protest against Reddit API pricing changes.

Why we shut down

Reddit is increasing API prices that numerous third party apps such as RIF, Apollo, Sync, and others rely on. The massive increase in costs to use the API, short timelines to update apps, and poor communication on Reddit's part mean that it is untenable for many of these apps to continue working. Many users of this subreddit and others rely primarily on these apps to use the site. Others, including the mods of r/CurseofStrahd, are reliant on the API to help moderate subreddit communities. Many more users rely on the accessibility features of 3rd party apps to be able to browse and interact with Reddit at all.

If you use any of the aforementioned apps, you will find them broken and unusable by the end of this month unless something changes. They will not be repaired or replaced.

Ultimately the only hope to avoid these API changes going through is to make our voice heard by protesting via the one metric Reddit cares about: users. In response to these changes, and Reddit's disinterest in listening to the community's list of demands, a large number of subs went private in protest.

The Response

At its peak, almost 9000 subreddits went dark, or 65% of the top 1000 subreddits. This was noticed by advertisers and even caused reddit to crash.

Reddit CEO spez doubled-down on the response, with a leaked internal memo telling employees that this "will pass".

As a result, some subreddits, such as /r/videos, are shutting down indefinitely until Reddit walks back their API pricing changes. Others are moving into a restricted state, keeping past content open but not allowing new posts. Others are planning rolling blackout days.

Our Plans

Going forward, we want to hear from the userbase how you wish to approach this problem. None of these options will impact the community Discord.

1. Should the Curse of Strahd subreddit close indefinitely until Reddit walks back the API changes (after a grace period so that DMs can save or make copies of subreddit resources they rely on)?
2. Should the Curse of Strahd subreddit go read only, so that no new posts or comments can be made but users can still browse existing posts?
3. Should the Curse of Strahd subreddit remain open and not protest these API changes?
4. Is there another alternative you recommend?

Please discuss in the comments below, as well as the #subreddit-blackout-discussion channel in the community Discord: discord.gg/CurseofStrahd

Regardless of the outcome, we recommend backing up resources that are important to you at this time. You never know when reddit will go down, even if we do not.

Hey everyone! So, um, maybe I did die XD

I'm just kidding, I've actually been quite well. Like I mentioned in my last update, I've recently had a lot of life changes and have simply been very very busy. The good news is that I love my new job and am doing spectacularly. The bad news is that I let dnd fall to the wayside. BUT NO LONGER.

Over the last couple weeks, I dusted off my old CoS drafts and got typing again! Gosh I missed this! I'll be posting my next post on Argynvostholt this weekend and then keep on posting every 1 to 2 weeks as usual.

Thank you again for your patience and continued support despite my disappearance. This is still truly one of the best dnd communities out there and I love you guys to pieces! <3

See you all again very soon,

Mandy

Hello everyone,

The last few days sure have been a whirlwind! We've ready every comment on the last post and the Discord channel, as well as kept an eye on information from reddit and others within the larger Reddit community.

Results of the protest site-wide

The results are interesting and multifaceted.

• Before the protest, Reddit CEO spez lied about the nature of a phone call with a 3rd party developer.
• Reddit pushed article about their api updates on Tuesday. 1/5 of the top reddits were still down following tuesday; says they were not "unilaterally opening communities", and have reiterated commitments to accessibility and mod tools.
• Reddit's official app remains incompliant with WCAG standards and has been for some time. Ironically, only a sighted person can enable and disable a subreddit. The 3rd party apps that Reddit has made concessions for are not adequate replacements for proper 3rd party apps.
• Advertisers are already noticing the results of the protest and pulling resources out of Reddit in the wake of bad PR.
• Spez views Elon Musk as an influence to how he thinks Reddit should do business.
• Spez first claims to respect the community's right to protest, then calls reddit moderators landed gentry and has the admin team threatening to remove the mods of many different subs, even piracy, which is an interesting connotation for aforementioned advertisers. You can read the note that was sent to moderation teams of larger subreddits.
• Moderators from r/modcoord are continuing to support the protest and recommend "Touch-Grass Tuesdays" to show continued support for the protest with less community disruption.

We welcome you to draw your own conclusions about the effects of the site-wide protest from the above information.

For us, we welcome Reddit to improve the efficacy of moderation tools and accessibility tools - especially given that we ourselves rely on API access to assist with moderation. However, given the slow pace at which Reddit has made such improvements in the past, we do not hold our breaths for this; Reddit and its CEO has burned any "good faith" we may have had, and the onus is on them to prove they are listening and working to develop the tools moderators and communities thrive on.

The future of the Curse of Strahd subreddit

After reading your feedback on both the subreddit and the Discord channel, and seeing the aforementioned information rolling out, a few things were made clear.

• Most users were supportive of the idea of the protest, though many wondered at how effective it could be, and whether or not we were large enough to have any influence. For what it's worth, we are in the top 5% of all subreddits and garner more than 50k pageviews per day, often cresting 75k pageviews.
• Many people expressed support for leaving the subreddit Read Only as a form of protest, while others encouraged us to go dark entirely, while others yet wanted us to stop the protest.
• A consistent trend among all the respondents was that the CoS subreddit has an invaluable swathe of resources that can't be found anywhere else, and should not be lost.
• Commenters valued the subreddit's ability to surface new resources and share ideas and expressed a disinterest in migrating to Discord, which often fulfils a different role in supporting the community and its resources.
• Many users (including internal mod discussions) pointed out that while making the subreddit Read-Only was a supported form of protest, said protest would only inconvenience the users without actually hurting Reddit and thus fail in its only goal.

We agree that the loss of the resources within the subreddit would be a huge blow to the community. With that in mind, we have decided to proceed with a limited blackout of the subreddit.

The r/CurseofStrahd subreddit will be private Tuesdays to Thursdays from GMT+1 to protest the API changes, but will remain fully open for all the remaining days of the week. Users will be able to post, comment, and share their work on these days, so that they can make their games the best they can be, but midweek we will close the subreddit so that Reddit won't profit as much off advertising on this sub. We will have a list of common resources available to send via modmail for those who are impacted by the blackouts. This list will also be shared within the Discord.

As always, this will not impact the Curse of Strahd Discord.

We once again remind everyone to take the opportunity to backup the important posts and resources from the subreddit so that you will not lose them. We also recommend you backing up resources from all subreddits, as Reddit's stability is in question, and many users are deleting their contributions in individual protest.

TLDR

Subreddit reopens from Friday - Monday; Subreddit closed Tuesday - Thursday; always back up your resources.

All will be well,
The mod team

Hello everyone, this is an announcement to inform everyone about the update to Subreddit Rules.

Rule 9: No Low-Effort Posts has been amended to remove references to AI generated content.

We have now added a new rule:

​

Rule 12: No AI-Generated Content

To promote quality contributions to the subreddit, no AI generated content (either art or text) is permitted. This includes any content that was initially generated by an AI and then touched up by a human in editing software.

You may join the Official /r/CurseOfStrahd discord via this invite link: https://discord.gg/EjEnpVq

Come one, come all,

To the greatest celebration of the year:

THE CURSE OF STRAHD FANFICTION COMPETITION

All Will Be Written!

The r/CurseOfStrahd mod team is pleased to announce that the much-adored fanfiction competition has returned (after a long break) for its fifth year! We hope the break from the competition has given everyone fresh new ideas for stories to tell. We have had dozens of creative entries in years past, and look forward to seeing what our inventive writers may craft this year!

The exact rules for the competition will be announced shortly, but right now we need your help to suggest the writing prompts for this year’s contest. You can share your prompts and then vote on your favourites on the official Curse Of Strahd Discord Server in the #fanfic-prompt channel.

The rules for creating a prompt are simple:

6 words or less

Cannot involve a specific character or location

Cannot require stories to involve a specific type of scene or narrative

As some examples, the prompts from last competition were: "Barovia 2077", "Kindness is a choice we make", "Once More With Feeling", and "Success is measured in blood".

The submission period for prompts is open from now until June 28th, Midnight GMT+2, with voting beginning soon after and ending on July 5th, Midnight GMT+2.

Let the festivities begin!

All Will Be Well!

The dust has settled and dawn has come, bringing with it our winners for the 2026 Curse of Strahd Fanfiction Competition! The competition was small but fierce this year, with only fractions of a point between many entries. But in the end, a few pulled ahead of the pack to take home the prizes!

If you haven’t read all the stories, you can find the complete list of stories here.

Without further ado, our winners!

First Place

“Close to the Son” in the Slice of Life Category by u/ashslayswrites with a score of 4.20!

The prize for first place is Subreddit and/or Discord flair and a $50 donation to the winner’s charity of choice* (sponsored by u/Ziopliukas).

Second Place

“Becoming Someone” in the Drama Category by u/NativeGuilt with a score of 4.19!

The prize for second place is Subreddit and/or Discord flair and a $25 donation to the winner’s charity of choice* (sponsored by u/Ziopliukas).

Third Place

“A Bride Without a Groom is Like an Angel Without Its Wings” in the Romance Category by u/OrangeJuice8 with a score of 3.79!

The prize for third place is Subreddit and/or Discord flair.

Genre Winners

The highest ranking stories in each genre are:

• Adventure: There were no adventure submissions this year.
• Comedy: “Van Richten's Guide to Larceny” by u/Firestar_12 with a score of 2.31
• Drama: “Becoming Someone” by u/NativeGuilt with a score of 4.19
• Romance: “A Bride Without a Groom is Like an Angel Without Its Wings” by u/OrangeJuice8 with a score of 3.79
• Slice of Life: “Close to the Son” by u/ashslayswrites with a score of 4.20
• Horror: “Becoming” by u/human_rights_bard with a score of 3.67

Each of these winners are eligible for a custom flair of their choosing on the subreddit!

For the winners: please reach out to me to claim your prizes

Discussion and Feedback

Out of consideration for the authors' privacy, we will not be publicly disclosing the authors or scores of any stories that did not place high enough to receive prizes. However, you are free to DM me (u/Ziopliukas) via Reddit or Discord, or contact the mods via Reddit Modmail or #contact-the-mods in Discord to request your fic’s score. Authors are more than welcome to announce which stories they wrote in the comments below on in the Discord server!

To the authors: Please feel free to identify yourselves in the comments below, share your intent/thought process from writing your story, and ask for feedback!

To the readers: Please feel free to give it to them!

Additionally, if you have any feedback for the mods on how this competition was handled and promoted, please feel free to leave it in the comments here or on Discord.

We would also like to extend a generous thanks to our sponsor u/Ziopliukas (that's me) for his generous contributions to the competition!

And finally, thank you all for your wonderful stories and votes!

• The mod team

Due to an uptick in player posts for what is intended (but we never outright specified) to be a DM-only subreddit, the mod team has elected to clarify and create Rule #9: No Players

This server is intended for DMs only. Posts by a player involving their experience in a contemporary Curse of Strahd game are banned, and should be posted in r/dndnext, r/3d6, or r/dnd. Posts made after a player has finished their Curse of Strahd campaign are permitted.

You can view this rule, and all other rules, on the sidebar. You can also view an expanded version of the rules, with examples and clarifications, on the subreddit rules wiki page.

(Note: Posts that already exist that have been created by players will not be removed. This is not going to be retroactively enforced.)

Welcome to “Strahd Must Die Tonight” - a /r/CurseOfStrahd competition to find which Strahd stands supreme! As celebration for /r/CurseOfStrahd’s two-year anniversary, we’re bringing together players, DMs, and everybody in-between for one big vampire-killing bonanza.

The set-up is simple: Each group must include one DM and four players. The players - a group of 10th-level pre-generated characters - have eight hours to kill Strahd von Zarovich or survive in the depths of Castle Ravenloft. Strahd in return has eight hours to kill the PCs - and, using specific rules and pre-allocated resources, can be as tactical and ruthless as the DM desires in doing so.

(Note that, while inspired by the official Strahd Must Die Tonight scenario, this competition has its own unique set-up and rules - more on that below.)

We’ll be giving out four types of awards in this competition: Quickest TPK, Quickest Strahd Kill, Most Creative TPK, and Most Creative Strahd Kill. We’ll also be giving out honorable mentions to (1) parties that include neither a cleric nor paladin; (2) parties that include no melee PCs; and (3) DMs that successfully kill “optimized” parties.

Right now, the awards for winners are limited to custom Subreddit/Discord flair and bragging rights, but better rewards might become available later, so stay tuned!

We also plan to make all of the data and logs from this event public immediately afterward, giving new Curse of Strahd DMs the tools they need to run Strahd’s final battle “like an unholy terror.”

The full rules for players and DMs can be found here. If you’re a DM, you’ll also receive a brief cheat sheet on navigating Castle Ravenloft and running Strahd in combat via Reddit PM after you’ve signed up.

To register your team, click here. Players and DMs must register together; any teams not comprised of one DM and four PCs will be turned away. If you need help finding a team, you can post or reply to a post in our LFG thread, found below.

To participate, all teams must be registered no later than Friday, December 13th. All games must take place between Sunday, December 15 and Saturday, December 21, with results released on Sunday, December 22.

We encourage you to record or stream your games on Twitch or YouTube! If you share or post them on social media, make sure to include the hashtag #StrahdMustDie. Tag @CoSReddit in your post if you’re on Twitter, and our official subreddit account will share your stream with the rest of the community!

If you have any questions, comment below or join us on the official /r/CurseOfStrahd Discord server. We’re excited to have you, and looking forward to seeing the outcome of this event!

Welcome to Castle Ravenloft. Next stop: Strahd’s funeral - or yours.

TL;DR

• Four PCs enter Castle Ravenloft to try to kill Strahd

• Rules and pre-generated characters available here.

• Sign up here!

Frequently Asked Questions

• I’m a DM. Can I participate as a PC, even if I’ve DM’d Curse of Strahd before? Yes!

• Is metagaming as a PC okay? The original goal of this competition was to gather information on the best ways for DMs to play Strahd in combat, so we ask that you avoid beelining for specific powerful magic items (e.g., the Doss Lute or the secret entrance to the Treasury). However, PCs are welcome to search for secret doors and use Detect Magic to formally gain access to these and other notable points of interest.

• Can I play both as a DM and PC in this competition? Can I run or play in games on multiple nights? Yes - though we ask that you only sign up to play in one game at a time to ensure that everyone gets a chance to play!

Hello all,

As we continue to monitor the ongoing situation regarding Reddit protest and the API changes, we have also been listening to the vocal and spirited community discussion on the subject.

After noting the re-opened status of other, larger, ttrpg subreddits (including some that were forced to re-open by Reddit administration) - and vocal feedback from our own users, at this time we will be remaining in an 'open' state and not introducing 'private days' on the subreddit. We will continue to monitor and discuss the ongoing situation with Reddit.

We would like to thank those users on both side of the argument who engaged in the discussion respectfully.

All will be well,
The r/CurseofStrahd Mod Team

Stories shared around a campfire reach new ears, whispered myths and legends sow curiosity in curious souls, and brave souls seek to write their own fate in the darkness. r/CurseOfStrahd welcomes you to our 5th writing competition to share the untold tales of Barovia’s past, present, and future.

Do you know what dark secrets Exethanter once held before his mind was eroded away by the uncaring passage of time? What foul monsters did Ezmerelda d’Avenir slay during her years on her own? Does Patrina’s shattered ambitions compel you to explore her motives and past before her untimely death (or perhaps after it)? We want to hear the stories that have yet to be written, and learn what creativity brews in the heart of the community!

Rules

In this contest, we’re looking for entirely new stories buried in Barovia that you can help bring to life. All members of the r/CurseOfStrahd Reddit and Discord community are welcome to participate in this fourth annual Curse of Strahd Fanfiction Competition. These stories could be used as the inspiration for future campaigns or community resources, so put your best foot forward and share your interesting, novel, tragic, humorous, or inventive tales!

With the writing period lasting a whole month, there has never been a better time to join the fun!

Here are the rules:

• All submissions must be no less than 500 words and no more than 10,000 words long.
• All submissions must focus primarily on a Curse of Strahd NPC, or NPC connected to Barovia. Stories about original NPCs (e.g., a member of the Keepers of the Feather, a soldier in Strahd’s army, a past Burgomaster of Vallaki) are permitted, but no stories about player characters (i.e., outsiders adventuring in Barovia) are allowed.
• All submissions should follow or incorporate one of the following five community chosen prompts:
  • “I am your faithful servant”
  • “A glimpse of sunlight”
  • “Memory can be unkind”
  • “To feel the sun once more”
  • “Deny your maker”
• Each author can submit at most one story.
• The story must have a title other than the prompt you chose.
• No submissions involving sexual content or overt descriptions of gore are permitted. Please keep submissions PG-13.
• All submissions must otherwise follow the rules for posting on the subreddit (e.g., no off-topic or offensive content).
• Stories written with the help of AI must clearly state this fact within the submission.
  • The use of generative text AI as a brainstorming tool, or as an editing tool for original content is permitted. Content produced through the assistance of large language models must be presented with the LLM in question clearly credited.
  • Text content wholly generated by AI and images generated by AI is banned.

Submissions are due no later than August 7th, 11:59 PM GMT+2. Stories can be submitted through the official Fanfiction Competition Entry Form. There will be a period afterwards where everyone is invited to read the stories and vote on the submissions!

You will be asked to submit your story as a Google Doc containing your entry. This Google Doc must be set to allow anyone with the link to view it. Any story that is not viewable by anyone with the link will be disqualified.

This competition will have six categories: Adventure, Drama, Slice of Life, Romance, Horror, and Comedy. A story can be submitted to one category at most.

Prizes

Voting will take place through a (non-anonymous) Google Form from August 8th through August 30th.

To incentivize personal creativity, the prize structure has changed this year.

First, second, and third-place winners of the competition will receive the following prizes:

1. First Place: Subreddit and/or Discord flair and a $50 donation to the winner’s charity of choice* (sponsored by u/Ziopliukas)
2. Second Place: Subreddit and/or Discord flair and a $25 donation to the winner’s charity of choice* (sponsored by u/Ziopliukas)
3. Third Place: Subreddit and/or Discord flair

Subreddit and Discord Moderators will not be eligible to win prizes, but can participate in the competition if they choose.

We’d like to thank our sponsors (me), for their contribution to the competition!

If you have any questions let us know in the comments below! You can also join the #fanfic-competition channel in the official Curse Of Strahd Discord Server for discussion, updates, and more.

May the words flow freely, and the ideas flourish! We look forward to reading the wonderful stories you have to share with us!

*The moderation team reserves the right to refuse to make the donations to organizations which promote hate or bigotry.

ELI5: What is the Reddit Shutdown?

Or, in handy infographic form.

With Reddit's increases to API pricing numerous third party apps such as RIF, Apollo, Sync and others will be forced to shut down. The massive increase in costs to use the API, short timelines to update apps, and poor communication on Reddit's part mean that it is untenable for many of these apps to continue working. Many users of this subreddit and others rely primarily on these apps to use the site and moderate communities.

The Curse Of Strahd subreddit will be joining other subreddits across the site in shutting down for 48 hours on the 12th to protest these changes.

Following this shutdown we will begin an open discussion with the Subreddit community on what to do next. Whether that means regular shutdowns, a permanent shutdown, restricted submissions, or something else is to be determined.

This will not impact the Curse of Strahd Discord. It will remain open. We encourage anyone who is not in the Discord to join it via this link.

Voting is happening on the rCurseOfStrahd Discord. You can join here.

Voting closes Sunday, July 5th, Midnight GMT+2. Good luck!

Hello Curse of Strahd DM's! The inaugural Curse of Strahd Shotgun Scenario Competition organized by the CoS Discord is now live! We’re inviting you to submit a word-limited shotgun scenario that can be dropped into and run in a Curse of Strahd campaign. Do you have a creepy encounter, a horrifying location, or an exciting showdown with the devil? We can’t wait to see what you submit. The top three entries will win exciting prizes, including a Foundry VTT license and gift cards to D&D webshops.

The contest rules for the Inaugural Curse of Strahd Shotgun Competition are given below. Inspired by the Delta Green Shotgun Competitions, Shotguns are highly condensed descriptions of possible adventures, plot-hooks, themes or sub-plots, to be viewed more as inspirational setpieces and plug-ins rather than full fledged scenarios. The purpose of the contest is community creation, to generate creative works that other DMs can easily insert into their Curse of Strahd campaigns.

Submission Rules.

• Entries must be submitted by May 31st 00:00 CET.
• Entries must be structured follows:
  • SUMMARY, giving a short paragraph describing the scenario, as well as any relevant trigger warnings,
  • TITLE (+optional table of contents),
  • CONTENTS (The meat of the scenario) This section may not exceed 1500 words.
  • STATBLOCKS, where any statblocks used by the scenario are to be referenced with their relevant book like so:
    • Giant Badger - Monster Manual 2025.
• Word count are defined by Google’s word count tool.
• Each entry is permitted a single homebrew statblock. Homebrew is qualified by the publisher not being Wizards of the Coasts. This must appear in the STATBLOCKS section.
• You may submit as many shotgun scenarios as you wish.
• Submissions will be accepted via Google Forms.
• When sharing your google docs link, ensure that whoever has the link can view the submission. The organizers will not request access if you have not set this setting.
• Entries that utilize AI will be disqualified.
• Any art utilized within the scenarios should be credited.
• All submissions must work with the base Curse of Strahd campaign module. Submissions that rely on community homebrew supplements are not permitted.
• By submitting an entry, you are agreeing that your creation shall become publicly available through the master index, to be voted on.

Voting Rules.

• Voting begins on June 1st at 00:00 CET and concludes on June 14th at 00:00 CET.
• Moderators cannot win any of the prizes.

Prizes

• The submission with the most votes, shall receive a Foundry VTT License.
• The submissions with the second and third most votes, shall receive a gift card worth 30$ for the Foundry/DNDBeyond or Forge stores.

If you want to discuss the contest, head over to the subreddit discord! I can't wait to see what you all create.

Welcome to “Strahd Must Die Tonight” - a highly anticipated yearly r/CurseOfStrahd event to find which Strahd stands supreme! As celebration for r/CurseOfStrahd’s eight-year anniversary, we’re bringing together players, DMs, and everybody in-between for one big vampire-killing bonanza.

We had a lot of success with SMDT events over the past years, and due to popular demand, we are bringing it back!

Given the official requirement of running Strahd rules-as-written during the first few events, we feel that the capabilities of RAW Strahd have been explored to their limits. As such, this year, like in the last few years, we want to encourage you to modify and change your Strahd or even your game system! We have some suggestions and special awards for DMs choosing to explore new games and ways to run Strahd, but more on that below! We hope that this will be an opportunity for everyone to find some time to unwind and play with some new people (or continue this winter tradition with the same group) after a difficult year. Please keep in mind that the purpose of this event is first and foremost to have fun. Getting some training on how (not) to run Ravenloft and Strahd for your players is a nice bonus.

The set-up is simple: Each group must include one DM and four players. The players have eight in-game hours to kill Strahd von Zarovich or survive in the depths of Castle Ravenloft. Strahd in return has eight hours to kill the PCs.

As a reward for joining the event, we’ll be giving out participation flairs on the subreddit.

We encourage you to adapt the event rules to better suit your game, but if you want the traditional experience, the full rules for players and DMs can be found here. Remember to discuss what system or Strahd stat block you are using with your players beforehand! If you’re a DM, you can also receive a brief cheat sheet on navigating Castle Ravenloft and running Strahd in combat via Reddit/Discord PM after you’ve signed up.

To register your team, click here. Players and DMs must register together. If you need help finding a team, you can post or reply to a post in our LFG thread, found below or in a special channel in our Discord (this is where most of the action will be!).

To participate, all teams must be registered no later than Monday, December 22nd. After taking into consideration community feedback from the last few years, we have extended the period of play this year. Although we encourage you to complete your games before the new year, you can submit your results up until the end of January.

If you have any questions, comment below or join us on the official /r/CurseOfStrahd Discord server. We’re excited to have you, and looking forward to seeing the outcome of this event!

Welcome to Castle Ravenloft. Next stop: Strahd’s funeral - or yours.

TL;DR

• Four PCs enter Castle Ravenloft to try to kill Strahd
• Rules available here.
• Sign up here!

Frequently Asked Questions

• I’m a DM. Can I participate as a PC, even if I’ve DM’d Curse of Strahd before? Yes!
• Can I use a different system/Strahd this year? Yes!
• Is metagaming as a PC okay? The original goal of this competition was to gather information on the best ways for DMs to play Strahd in combat, so we ask that you avoid beelining for specific powerful magic items (e.g., the Doss Lute or the secret entrance to the Treasury). However, PCs are welcome to search for secret doors and use Detect Magic to formally gain access to these and other notable points of interest.
• Can I play both as a DM and PC in this competition? Can I run or play in games on multiple nights? Yes - though we ask that you only sign up to play in one game at a time to ensure that everyone gets a chance to play!

Greetings, we're launching two polls to gauge interest for December 2025 community activities. We'd appreciate it if you took a moment to cast your vote.

The Curse of Strahd server had a huge increase in social activity during COVID, and several popular community events and traditions arose from these. As life has returned to normal we've seen interest and participation in these events understandably decline each year, so we want to gauge interest before committing moderator time and resources into running and curating them.

If you have already voted on Discord, please do not vote here.

You can find the polls here: https://forms.gle/Dk3QtSooEhaP5VSLA

Strahd Must Die Tonight 2025

Strahd Must Die Tonight (or SMDT) is our community "Let's Play" players vs Strahd scenario ran with specific rules, but commonly converted to other game systems and scenarios and ran with unique modifiers, often with memorable results. Documented participation in SMDT rewards a Discord Role and unique Subreddit flair.

Fanfiction Competition

The end of the year has often been when we ran our Curse of Strahd related Fanfiction competition. We skipped this last year, as this seems to be an event that has been impacted particularly hard by both the wind down of COVID-Community levels, as well as generative AI.

Are you interested in sharing a story around a Vistani campfire this evening, or inscribing a new chapter in the legendary Tome of Strahd? /r/CurseOfStrahd is coming together for a writing competition to help us tell the unheard stories of Barovia’s past, present, and future.

Do you have secret knowledge of the terrible childhood of Vargas Vallakovich? What brought Neferon, the arcanaloth, to the darkened halls of the Amber Temple? What triumphs lay ahead of Ezmerelda d’Avenir, and what tragedies await in the hidden histories of Strahd von Zarovich? We want to hear the stories that have gone yet untold, and learn the secrets that others may not have thought to uncover before.

Rules

In this contest, we’re looking for entirely new stories buried in the Curse of Strahd campaign that you can help bring to life. All members of the /r/CurseOfStrahd community are welcome to participate in this first-ever Curse of Strahd Fanfiction Competition. These stories may be used as the inspiration for future campaign adventures or community resources, so do your best to write about an interesting or novel idea!

Here are the rules:

• All submissions must be no less than 500 words and no more than 10,000 words long.
• All submissions must focus primarily on a Curse of Strahd NPC. Stories about original NPCs (e.g., a member of the Keepers of the Feather, a soldier in Strahd’s conquering army, or a past burgomaster of Krezk) are permitted, but no stories about player characters (i.e., outsiders adventuring in Barovia) are allowed.
• All submissions should follow one of the following three community-chosen prompts:
  • Right Place, Wrong Time
  • I Wear No Mask, or
  • I Saw It In the Dark.
• Each author can submit at most one story.
• Your story must have a title other than the prompt you chose.
• No submissions involving sexual content or overt descriptions of gore are permitted. Please keep all submissions PG-13 (at most). All submissions must otherwise follow the rules for posting on the subreddit (e.g., no off-topic or offensive content).

Submissions are due no later than 11:59 PM Eastern Daylight Time (GMT-4) on Monday, June 29. Stories can be submitted through the official /r/CurseOfStrahd Fanfiction Competition Entry Form.

You will be asked to submit your story as a Google Doc containing your entry. This Google Doc must be set to allow anyone with the link to view it. Any story that is not viewable by anyone with the link will be disqualified.

This competition will have five categories: Adventure, Drama (which includes Slice of Life), Romance, Horror, and Comedy. A story can be submitted to one category at most.

Prizes

Voting will take place through a (non-anonymous) Google Form from Tuesday, June 30 through Monday, July 13. Readers will vote for their favorite stories overall, as well as their top choices in each category.

First, second, and third-place winners of the competition will receive the following prizes:

First Place: 1 D&D Beyond Player’s Handbook & 1 D&D Beyond Curse of Strahd Module, 1 Foundry VTT License Key & 1 Roll20 to Foundry VTT Conversion Kit, and 1 Year-Long Gamemaster-Tier Subscription to “The Forge.”

Second Place: Your choice of:

• 1 D&D Beyond Player’s Handbook & 1 D&D Beyond Curse of Strahd Module OR
• 1 Foundry VTT License Key, 1 Year-Long Gamemaster-Tier Subscription to “The Forge,” & 1 Roll20 to Foundry VTT Conversion Kit

Third Place: 1 D&D Beyond Player’s Handbook & 1 D&D Beyond Curse of Strahd Module

The first-place winner of each genre category will also receive their choice of custom flair on the /r/CurseOfStrahd subreddit. Subreddit moderators will not be eligible to win prizes, but can participate in the competition if they choose.

If you have any questions, let us know in the comments below! You can also join the #fanfic-competition channel in the official /r/CurseOfStrahd Discord for discussion, updates, and more. Otherwise, we look forward to seeing what stories you come up with.

Thank you to all of the brave and talented authors who submitted stories to /r/CurseOfStrahd’s first-ever fanfiction competition! The mod team was astounded by the 40 stories we received, and we’re truly impressed by some of the outstanding work y’all have shown.

Over the next two weeks, all 40 fanfictions will be available (anonymously) and made available for the community to read, discuss, and vote. Voting will close at 11:59 PM EST on Wednesday, July 15.

I’ve added several top-level comments in this post, with each top-level comment containing all of the stories submitted for that genre (e.g., comedy, horror, etc.). Please limit all discussion of fics to replies to the appropriate top-level comment.

Please also note: The identities of all authors will be revealed when voting concludes and awards are announced. If you would like your identity to remain anonymous after the contest ends, please PM me on Reddit (/u/DragnaCarta) or Discord (DragnaCarta#4321), and I will make sure to remove your username from your submission.

To read the submitted stories, you can read and score them using the official /r/CurseOfStrahd Fanfic Competition Voting Form, or you can find them listed by genre in the top-level comments below.

The Voting Process

Here’s how voting will work:

1. Visit the official /r/CurseOfStrahd Fanfic Competition Voting Form

2. Enter your Reddit username and/or Discord username

3. Enter your personal password, or create a new one if this is your first time voting on a fic(s) (to validate your vote in case you don't manage to read/score all fics in one go and decide to submit and come back later).

4. Browse through the (randomized) list of fics, skipping any that you’ve already voted on. Read each fic in order, and score it from 1 to 5.

5. Once you’re done reading and voting, hit “Submit” and close the window. Don’t forget to write down the password you created if you didn’t finish reading/voting on all of the fics!

6. At any later point, if you haven’t voted on all of the fics yet, revisit the official /r/CurseOfStrahd Fanfic Competition Voting Form and repeat the process, starting from Step 2.

If you have any questions, reply to the “Meta” top-level comment in the thread below. All other comments (including those discussing fics) will be removed and directed to repost as a reply to the appropriate top-level comment.

Access the Fanfiction Contest Voting Form Here

This Friday, May 22 at 6 PM Eastern Time (10 PM GMT), I, /u/Ziopliukas, /r/CurseOfStrahd mod will host a “State of the Subreddit” stream with special guests /u/MandyMod, creator of the “Fleshing Out Curse of Strahd” series, and /u/DragnaCarta, creator of the “Curse of Strahd: Reloaded” series and moderator of the Curse of Strahd Discord.

During this Twitch broadcast, we’ll be reviewing and discussing the results of the recent “State of the Subreddit” survey, which received responses from over 600 community members! Topics will include future community commissions of character art, location art, battlemaps, and musical tracks; future community competitions such as “Strahd Must Die Tonight” and meme-making contests; previous and potential future sponsorships with D&D products such as Roll20, DnDBeyond, Foundry VTT, and others; and a general discussion of community thoughts and feedback.

This stream will also double as a live AMA with two of our subreddit’s content creators, /u/MandyMod and /u/DragnaCarta! They’ll be answering your questions live during this Friday’s broadcast, but if you want to get your question in ahead of time, or if you won’t be able to attend the stream, reply to the pinned comment in this thread with a question you’d like to be asked during this broadcast.

You can watch the live broadcast and its recording on Twitch on the official /r/CurseOfStrahd community channel. We look forward to seeing you then!

Click here to watch the stream.

Hello everyone! I am glad to announce that the second community commission has been finished and is now available for you to use.

Big thank you to everyone who helped this project come to fruition (this was funded in less than two hours!) and I'm sure we can do more community commissions in the future.

The map is free for everyone to use and was made by VenatusMaps. You can find their shop here and their Patreon here.

The map itself is provided with a lot different variations and assets, such as removable roof of the hut, gridded and ungridded versions and many more! You can find the finished map with all variants and assets here

Once again thank you for the support and be on the lookout for more news from the mod team!

Why does Curse of Strahd include so many TPKs?

Why is the ending to Curse of Strahd so unsatisfying?

And what does Curse of Strahd look like if played by-the-book, anyway?

From these three questions was born “Curse of Strahd: Twice Bitten”—a hot take-turned-serious campaign that posed a single idea: That the original Curse of Strahd module is not meant to be played by a group of adventurers or heroes, and is in fact best played by a party of cowardly, cynical, selfish, and/or traumatized individuals who fall—not leap—into adventure.

What It Is: Twice Bitten is a new, 100% Rules-as-Written Curse of Strahd campaign run by DM and Curse of Strahd: Reloaded creator /u/DragnaCarta, and played by a cast of five current and former Curse of Strahd DMs who are heading back into the mists for a strange—but hauntingly familiar—experience. Barring a few minor house rules (including potion-drinking and the lingering injuries variant rule), and the potential inclusion of some Unearthed Arcana player options, this campaign will be 100.00% homebrew-free.

Why We’re Running It: The goal is simple: To explore and push the boundaries of the original, as-written Curse of Strahd 5e module, and to tell the most evocative, satisfying, character-driven, and narrative-rich story possible in the context of the campaign.

Where & When Can I Watch? You can catch Curse of Strahd: Twice Bitten every Saturday at 1 PM EST/10 AM PST on the official /r/CurseOfStrahd Twitch channel, or you can watch the VOD every Monday on the official /r/CurseOfStrahd YouTube channel. The first episode airs this Saturday, August 8 at 1 PM EST/10 AM PST.

Where Can I Get Updates? You can follow the campaign on Twitter at @TwiceBittenCoS for character reveals, announcements, memes, and more, or join the #twice-bitten channel of the official /r/CurseOfStrahd Discord server for discussions, more memes, and Q&A with the cast!

What Else Should I Know? The cast will also be streaming Twice Bitten: After Dark, a monthly campaign discussion and character analysis program hosted by /u/DragnaCarta and subreddit moderator /u/Ziopliukas, and featuring a rotating panel of cast members and other guests.

What Next? The party will enter the mists of Barovia for the first time on Saturday, August 8 at 1 PM EST/10 AM PST. Join us—if you dare...

Welcome to “Strahd Must Die Tonight” - a highly anticipated yearly r/CurseOfStrahd event to find which Strahd stands supreme! As celebration for r/CurseOfStrahd’s seven-year anniversary, we’re bringing together players, DMs, and everybody in-between for one big vampire-killing bonanza.

We had a lot of success with SMDT events over the past years, and due to popular demand, we are bringing it back!

Given the official requirement of running Strahd rules-as-written during the first few events, we feel that the capabilities of RAW Strahd have been explored to their limits. As such, this year, like in the last few years, we want to encourage you to modify and change your Strahd or even your game system! We have some suggestions and special awards for DMs choosing to explore new games and ways to run Strahd, but more on that below! We hope that this will be an opportunity for everyone to find some time to unwind and play with some new people (or continue this winter tradition with the same group) after a difficult year. Please keep in mind that the purpose of this event is first and foremost to have fun. Getting some training on how (not) to run Ravenloft and Strahd for your players is a nice bonus.

The set-up is simple: Each group must include one DM and four players. The players have eight in-game hours to kill Strahd von Zarovich or survive in the depths of Castle Ravenloft. Strahd in return has eight hours to kill the PCs.

We’ll be giving out participation flairs on the subreddit as well as special flairs if your run kills Strahd and fulfills any of these extra challenges: (1) No spellcasters in the party, (2) No melee characters in the party, (3) Running a non-RAW Strahd and (4) Running SMDT in a game system different that D&D5e.

We encourage you to adapt the event rules to better suit your game, but if you want the traditional experience, the full rules for players and DMs can be found here. Remember to discuss what system or Strahd stat block you are using with your players beforehand! If you’re a DM, you can also receive a brief cheat sheet on navigating Castle Ravenloft and running Strahd in combat via Reddit/Discord PM after you’ve signed up.

To register your team, click here. Players and DMs must register together. If you need help finding a team, you can post or reply to a post in our LFG thread, found below or in a special channel in our Discord (this is where most of the action will be!).

To participate, all teams must be registered no later than Saturday, December 14th. After taking into consideration community feedback from the last few years, we have extended the period of play this year. All games must take place between Saturday, December 14th and Saturday, January 18th to be eligible for flairs, with results released soon after.

We encourage you to record or stream your games on Twitch or YouTube! If you share or post them on social media, make sure to include the hashtag #StrahdMustDie. Tag u/CoSReddit in your post if you’re on Twitter, and our official subreddit account will share your stream with the rest of the community! You can also share them in the promotion channel of the Discord.

If you have any questions, comment below or join us on the official /r/CurseOfStrahd Discord server. We’re excited to have you, and looking forward to seeing the outcome of this event!

Welcome to Castle Ravenloft. Next stop: Strahd’s funeral - or yours.

TL;DR

• Four PCs enter Castle Ravenloft to try to kill Strahd
• Rules available here.
• Sign up here!

Frequently Asked Questions * I’m a DM. Can I participate as a PC, even if I’ve DM’d Curse of Strahd before? Yes! * Can I use a different system/Strahd this year? Yes! * Is metagaming as a PC okay? The original goal of this competition was to gather information on the best ways for DMs to play Strahd in combat, so we ask that you avoid beelining for specific powerful magic items (e.g., the Doss Lute or the secret entrance to the Treasury). However, PCs are welcome to search for secret doors and use Detect Magic to formally gain access to these and other notable points of interest. * Can I play both as a DM and PC in this competition? Can I run or play in games on multiple nights? Yes - though we ask that you only sign up to play in one game at a time to ensure that everyone gets a chance to play!