Dinner at Castle Ravenloft

Walkthrough

Getting the quest

The dinner only happens if you come to the castle as Strahd von Zarovich's invited guest. Three things have to be true first:

• You have seen Strahd watching you from a ridge. That scene plays on your first journey after the burgomaster's burial (or after you have met Strahd).
• The lowest-level hero in your party is level 9 or higher.
• You arrive somewhere outdoors, anywhere but the castle itself or Death House.

Then his driverless black carriage is waiting on the road, with a letter sealed in black wax on the seat. Choose Get in. The carriage takes you up the mountain (an hour and a half passes) and sets you down in the courtyard of Castle Ravenloft, the Gates, right in front of the keep's doors. If you say Not tonight. or Tear up the letter. (Thistle and Wren like that), the carriage comes back later, at least 48 hours apart, up to three times in all.

If you walk up the castle road on your own instead (two hours from The River Ivlis Crossroads), you'll find the table laid for exactly as many of you as there are, and nobody at it. This quest never starts that way. When you came by invitation, Strahd waits at the organ in the dining hall at any hour until the meal is settled. The quest starts (Seated) the moment he turns round on the bench.

Step by step

1. From the courtyard, go through the keep's great doors into Castle Ravenloft, the Main Floor. Coming by carriage has one perk: the gargoyles on the gatehouse stay put for invited guests, even at night.
   
2. Head west through the guests' hall to the dining hall. Strahd stops playing as you come in and greets you. What he says depends on what you have done: how you answered him at the burial, whether Ireena Kolyana is with you (or he already holds her), the fight with his wolves on the road, the beacon at Argynvostholt, whether anyone carries a Dark Gift from the Amber Temple, and what you learned about Marina. Godrick, Liriel, Thistle, Wren and Kip each get a line of their own.
   
3. At the table you can ask as much as you like. None of these ends the meal:
   • Why did you invite us? and Tell us about this house. are just talk. He tells you to walk where you like tonight, and that the library is upstairs.
   • What do you want with Ireena? appears if she is with you or you have met her.
   • Medicine DC 13: Smell the wine. A success shows it is only very old wine. A failure tells you nothing, and the option stays, so you can try again.
   • Insight DC 17: Watch him. A success shows you what he wants from you: not to be bored. A failure is spent, and he teases you about the staring when he leaves.
   • (Cleric) Say grace before eating. No roll. Liriel +2, Ratatouille +1, and your cleric earns Heroic Inspiration.
   • With Ratatouille in the party, Taste the food, critically. Strahd offers him a title and a tower of his own. Have him refuse (Ratatouille +4, and Heroic Inspiration) rather than keep eating in silence (Ratatouille -1).
   • With Kip in the party and The Fine Print far enough along, Ask Strahd to sign something. Asking for just the signature moves The Fine Print to its signed stage (Kip +6). Letting Strahd buy Kip's contract instead makes Kip Strahd's debtor (Kip -6).
4. End the meal with Thank him for his hospitality. or Draw on him. If you aren't ready to do either, choose (Excuse yourselves from the table for now.) He tells you to walk about and stretch your legs: the table will keep, and so will he. The meal isn't over and the quest stays at Seated. Talk to him at the organ again whenever you like; he greets you with "You came back. I had the soup kept warm." and you're back at the table.
5. If you draw on him, Strahd and three Swarm of Bats fight you in the dining hall (13,150 XP, well past a High fight for four heroes at level 10). You don't need to beat him. He leaves after three rounds, or as soon as he drops below 100 Hit Points. He has 144, and until you break The Heart of Sorrow, the heart's ward soaks the first 50 damage he takes anywhere in the castle. Clear the bats quickly (11 Hit Points each) and simply outlast three rounds.

While you are on the main floor:

• The organ. Performance DC 16, "Play the count's organ" (each hero gets one try), reveals a compartment behind one of the stops holding an Instrument of the Bards (Anstruth Harp). You can also find it by searching (Investigation DC 16).
• Containers. The sideboard (2 bottles of old wine, 25 gp), the servery cupboard (4 rations, 6 candles), the guest wardrobe (fine clothes, perfume) and the west turret's weapon rack (halberd, shield, 20 crossbow bolts).
• The hearth that burns on nothing, at the far east end of the hall of faces. Put it out by unpicking its spell (Arcana DC 15, quiet; a failure closes this way), with a flask of Holy Water (quiet), or by shutting the flue (no roll, but two Guardian Portraits and three Helmed Horrors wake). Then search beside the firebox (DC 13) for the seam. The hidden room behind it has an iron strongbox with 320 gp, plus a Tarokka treasure if your reading put one here.

Choices and endings

• Thank him (Dined, success). He thanks you for a charming evening, tells you the house is yours tonight, and vanishes from the bench. If you passed the Insight check he adds a warning: keep him interested, because nothing else has ever kept anyone safe in this house. Liriel +1, Ratatouille +1, Kip +1, Thistle -1.
  
• Draw on him (Affront, failure). He leaves you his bats and goes. Thistle +2, Kip -2, Ratatouille -2. When he withdraws, the game remembers it: in the parley before your final battle he tells you that leaving a fight with you before was manners, not weakness.
• Excuse yourselves (not an ending). Nothing is settled and nobody approves or disapproves. The table and the soup wait until you come back to thank him or draw on him.

Whichever you choose, the rest of the castle is open to you. Once you've thanked him or drawn on him, Strahd isn't at the table again. The dinner's outcome otherwise only changes what the Narrator and your companions say about the dining hall.

Getting around Castle Ravenloft

The main floor is the hub. Every other part of the castle is one staircase away from it.

• Castle Ravenloft, the Gates: the road, the drawbridge over the chasm, the portcullis and the courtyard. The keep's great doors lead north into the main floor. The side gate on the west opens onto the walk along the wall to Castle Ravenloft, the Overlook, a long balcony over the drop.
• Castle Ravenloft, the Main Floor: you come in through the entry hall at the south end. North of it is the great entry, with the grand stairs up at its far end. West, through the guests' hall, is the dining hall, and behind it the servery with the servants' stairs down to the kitchens. East, a narrow door leads to the foot of the high tower stairway, and the gallery doors open into the hall of faces. A door on the south side of the hall of faces leads to the chapel passage, which has the doors of Castle Ravenloft, the Chapel and the stairs down to the crypts. A turret post stands on each side of the entry hall.
• Up to the second floor, Castle Ravenloft, the Court of the Count: the grand stairs bring you onto the grand landing, where Rahadin greets you in the long King's Hall. Off it are the audience hall (north), the study (west), the trophy room (east), the accountant's office and the guardroom. Through the tower stair door at the east end are two staircases: the tower stairs up to the high tower's grand landing, and the stairs up to the third floor, Castle Ravenloft, the Rooms of Weeping (Strahd's bedroom and bath, the portrait gallery, the brides' lounge, the guest room and Rahadin's room). A secret stair behind a portrait of a young woman in the King's Hall goes down to Castle Ravenloft, the Treasury. It opens once you know about it (from Lief's ledger, Lief himself or Ludmilla) or find the catch (Investigation DC 16 or Perception DC 18).
• Up the tower, Castle Ravenloft, the High Tower: a stair winding round an open well. It climbs from the tower's foot past the grand landing (Pidlwick II, and the arch to the Court of the Count) and the upper turns to the high landing. From the high landing, a stair goes up to Castle Ravenloft, the Heart of Sorrow, and a door leads into Castle Ravenloft, the Tower Rooms. From the tower rooms a ladder climbs to Castle Ravenloft, the Roofs, and a hidden stair behind Escher's wardrobe goes up to Castle Ravenloft, the Ravens' Roost. A hatch on the keep roof also drops into the roost.
• Down to Castle Ravenloft, the Larders of Ill Omen: the servants' stairs come down by the servants' hall and the kitchen. At the far east end, the jailers' stair has two ways on: the stairs down to Castle Ravenloft, the Dungeon, and the long stair down to the crypts. The lift in the winch room also drops to the cells once you set its brake.
• Down to Castle Ravenloft, the Catacombs: the stairs by the chapel come out at the west end of the upper gallery, and the long stair from the larders at the east end. In the middle, the hall of names holds the black stair down to Castle Ravenloft, Strahd's Tomb. At the south-west corner, stairs lead down to Castle Ravenloft, the Old Tombs (Sergei's tomb, the guardians' hall and the tomb of King Barov and Queen Ravenovia).

Where the danger is. These fights start the moment you walk into the room. The numbers are for a party at level 10. Several are lighter below level 10, and the fights in the towers get heavier at level 11.

Strahd himself only fights you outside his final battle in three places: at this dinner if you draw on him, at the top of the high tower when you break the Heart of Sorrow, and in his coffin if you try to stake him by day. His final battle waits in the one room Madam Eva's last card named (see Tarokka Reading and Where the Devil Waits): the chapel, the overlook, the audience hall, the study, the treasury, the Heart of Sorrow, the hall of bones, the black horse's crypt in the catacombs, Sergei's tomb, the royal tomb or his own tomb. Walking into that room after your reading starts it, once he has named his price.

Resting. A rest is risky in most of the castle, and impossible in the Rooms of Weeping, the treasury, the dungeon, the Heart of Sorrow, the roofs, the overlook and Strahd's tomb.

If you're stuck

• Nobody at the table. You came without the carriage. Strahd only hosts guests who accepted his invitation, and the invitation never comes inside the castle. Leave, travel somewhere outdoors, and wait for the carriage.
• The carriage never comes. Check that the lowest-level hero is level 9, and that you have seen Strahd on the ridge. After three refusals it stops coming, and this quest can't be started any more.

Rewards

What your companions think

• Liriel Dawnsong: +2 you said grace at Strahd's table; +1 you thanked Strahd for his hospitality
• Ratatouille: +1 you said grace at Strahd's table; +1 you thanked Strahd for his hospitality; -2 you drew steel across Strahd's dinner table
• Kip Smudgewick: +1 you thanked Strahd for his hospitality; -2 you drew steel across Strahd's dinner table
• Thistle: -1 you thanked Strahd for his hospitality; +2 you drew steel across Strahd's dinner table

Fights

• Strahd sets down his glass. At my table, he says, almost fondly. The candles gutter, and the dark above the…, in Castle Ravenloft, the Main Floor: Strahd von Zarovich, Swarm of Bats.

Journal

Related

• People: Strahd von Zarovich
• Places: Castle Ravenloft, the Main Floor