Any, but having a paladin or cleric along to turn undead would be mighty helpful!
Scope
Large
DMNeeded
No DM Required
Single or Multiplayer
Single Player or Multiplayer
Max Character Level
15
Max # Players
06
Min # Players
01
Min Character Level
12
Content Rating
Teen
Alignments
Any, although good or neutral characters may have a few more options available to them
Gameplay Hours
10
Description
"The master of Ravenloft is having guests for dinner... and you are invited..."
So ends the original description of one of the most famous AD&D modules: Ravenloft.
This adaptation of Ravenloft borrows from earlier versions by Raven Builder. People who have played those versions will recognize many areas in this newer module. However, the module has been upgraded to make it more challenging for higher level characters and is meant for a party of 4-5 at 12th to 15th level. with access to plenty of healing magic. In addition, many updates have been made to these excellent mods. They include...
1) The addition of materials from Shadows of Undrentide, Hordes of the Underdark, and the Community Expansion Pack.
2) Community scripts that allow vampires and werewolves to conform more closely with their 3rd edition statistics. This includes gaseous form vampires that seek out their coffins (including Strahd!), trolls that regenerate, and lycanthropy effects for those players unfortunate enough to be bitten by werewolves!
3) All areas have been extensively reviewed for sound, music, and item placement, including nasty effects when leaving the Mists of Barovia!
4) New NPCs with extensive dialogue have been added, along with new quests, and new areas. An additional level of the castle, "Strahd's Laboratory" has also been introduced.
I've worked on this module on and off for the last 1 1/2 years. I hope you enjoy this expanded edition of this classic PnP and NWN module!
Please look at the read me file for more info!
Version 1.2 offers significantly improved henchmen control, and the option to have up to 3-4 henchmen at a time. Major restructuring to the lower levels of Castle Ravenloft has been done to decrease lag, and the DMFI DM wands v 1.07 have also been added.
Version 1.21 fixes some waypoint orientations and a few spelling errors. Version 1.3 adds henchmen popup text and fixes some faction issues. Version 1.4 updates Spires to patch 1.68 and CEP1.52
My how time flies...
I checked this site recently after a few years. Turns out that one of my original NWN band who I took through Spires of Ravenloft how has kids that are old enough to play NWN. They've been asking me to take them through "Uncle Evan's Adventure" so I logged back on to see if it was still up. I'm kinda surprised that people are still downloading the thing considering all of the newer games.
I had a blast looking at some of the old posts and refreshing my memory on the creative process. A big thank you to all of those people who entered feedback on this thing and helped to make it better!
Mirgalen, thanks for the honest feedback. I too played through CDChrome's entry. If you compare the two, I think you'll find the outdoor areas in his "House of Strahd" to be far larger and more sprawling than the ones in this module. As a side note, I had his name in the credits at one time, but he emailed me and told me he didn't want to be associated with it because of religious reasons so I respected his wishes and remove his name.
The bugs you mentioned are a combination of limitations of the toolset and limitations of the scripter (i.e. me). Since I don't do this for a living and I last took a computers course some 25 years ago, this was more a labor of love rather than an attempt at a professional product. Sorry about the bugs... hope you enjoyed some of the other aspects of the module!
Since I'm going to be taking my friend's kids through this, I'm in the process of updating it for CEP 2.4 and going through it one more time. I'll see if I can do some cursory bug fixes and post the final thing on nwn. Hope to have that done within the next 1-2 weeks, but I'll be celebrating my 10th anniversary with my wife in the very near future. That may make things take a bit longer. :)
Posted by Mirgalen at 2011-05-13 22:12:27 Voted 5.00 on 05/13/11
Final comment on this one.
Overall this module is neither better than the original conversion (by Raven Builder) nor better than the epic "Ravenloft, Beyond the gate" module.
I took my paladin (lvl 14) from the "Dawn" placeholder module and finished lvl 17.
I can now confirm that trolls do die EVENTUALLY ;-)
Henchmen seems immune to curse (e.g. belt) and or disease (like lycanthropy). For the "lycanthropy quest" the PC must have a cure on hand (or spell ready) before talking to the NPC.
Item strip can be cool (in this context) but it should exclude undroppable items (e.g. subrace skin...).
Having two Ireena at the end did not really make sense.
5-6: A good effort that fans of the style will find worth the download.

Posted by Mirgalen at 2011-05-04 06:52:57 Voted 5.00 on 05/13/11
AD&D Ravenloft modules
"The Spires of Ravenloft" - Raven Builder - 2002
Scores: Players 7.98 - Reviewer 7.4
Raven Builder's conversion is pretty close to the original AD&D module AFAIK. Probably the best one to date.
"The Spires of Ravenloft (modified)" - The Dungeon Master - 2002
Score: Players 8.29
Level slightly increased. Poor game balance.
"Ravenloft - The house of Strahd v 1-4.mod") - CDChrome version
Huge maps poorly designed. Tons of of similar creatures you need to fight nearly at every corner.
"The Spires of Ravenloft: Revised Edition V1.40" - evan.yeung - 2006
Score: Players 9.49
Module duration and level range doubled from the original. I found some of the weaknesses present in CDChrome version. Huge areas, creatures coming out of thin air, some evil ones with wrong alignment (they should obviously be evil). In this version I also found a number of issues like: No paladin mount for some reason, original atmosphere poorly recreated including outdoor areas too bright for Barovia. Bugged conversations, immortal trolls (fire or not), lycanthropy bugged (remove disease and heal had no effect) and alignment shift for killing poor werewolf that we should have been able to cure in the first place, gnome mage seems interested only in shooting at monsters or killing the party with his spells, excessive amount of loot/XPs. I will hold my vote for the time being but this does not bode well.
Note: Jamos modified the above module in 2006 and JironGhrad did the same in 2008
Posted by Thullraven at 2011-02-10 10:06:19 Voted 9.50 on 02/10/11
Loved the Mod until the Finale in front of the church. Everyone goes hostile and attacks my party. Can anyone explain why? Would have given this great mod an even higher rating if not for the finale.
Posted by murf09 at 2010-06-26 19:20:46 Voted 9.75 on 06/26/10
A great conversion of I6 Ravenloft with several significant extras in the village. An awesome mod with tough combat and henchman. Gained 2 lvls.
Posted by edosan at 2010-04-30 21:35:26 Voted 9.00 on 04/30/10
Fun mod -- a couple of minor bugs but a good story and nice hard fights.
Posted by ubernerd at 2009-07-13 07:12:36 Voted 9.50 on 07/13/09
Very fun! I have a hard time deciding which one I like better between this and Firestarter's module. Firestarter's one has more interesting plots and quests, while this module gives you the feeling of a classic DnD adventure. The combat is also much better done here. On occasions I felt like there was a real DM behind the scene. The encounter design plays to the strength of undead and have definitely crippled my party on many occasions. The area design is among the best I've seen. Castle Ravenloft is creepy and deadly just as it should be.
However I wish there were more caster enemies that will dispel buffs. In a undead theme where a cleric is mandatory, you can always expect 'buff monster' - PC who is loaded with buffs. I suspect a simple set of buffs like darkfire,magic vestment,deathward,pfa and GMW will completely break the balance, not to mention turning. Dispel is required to keep them in check.
Posted by DarkWyldchilde at 2008-09-15 13:18:56 Voted 9.00 on 09/15/08
I loved it. The fact that moments had ME creeped out is an excellent feat of programming design. I couldn't give a 10 however as with the teleporting everywhere I found myself battling Strahd and finishing the game without being sure I got everything. I'm sure I'll play through it again though.
I thought this was an excellent mod all the way up to the castle. I never found the crypt and could not make heads or tails of the castle - too many ins and outs. Couldn't find an author made map, nor could I find a walkthrough walking me through it or a spoiler to help. I just kept going round and round it seemed even with map pins. After 3 days of 6 hour sessions or more trying to find it, I just gave up because it was no longer fun for me. Perhaps you can add stronger hints in the game on how to get to the vault or leave clues lying around or something.
I think this was a great effort. Obviously a lot of time was spent developing the module and the areas. Initially the module drew me into the environment and the story, and things moved along fairly well. The problems began when I arrived at Ravenloft castle. I had been bitten by a werewolf and spontaneously transformed, destroying my armor. It was absolutely no fun to sit for minutes and wait until I changed back at dawn. Sitting behind the machine watching my character stand around and be unable to do anything about it just didn't thrill me.There was also no indication in-game ,that I found,as to how to remove the curse.I had to read up online to figure that one out, or the dev notes. My beautiful journal seemed to go completely to waste.
And then there was the castle itself. A more disjointed piece of architecture I've never come across. Rooms lead off from doors, and into other areas of the castle in such odd ways that one wonders what a floor plan could possibly look like with whole 'secret' sections seemingly hanging in space.Also, woe be unto you if your main character doesn't have a high spot and search skill, as missing some of the secret doors could mean missing ways into mission critical areas of the game.All this difficulty in getting around is compounded by the fact that there are no Map Waypoint Pins on the mini map. You need to make these yourself, which becomes a tedious task of entering an area, then exiting back placing a map marker, then going through the door again. And this is necessary, because all but those with photographic memory will forget which myriad door leads to what obscure area of the castle. All this turned what I felt should have been a thrilling adventure into an exercise of frustration where much of my time was spent figuring out where I was, and trying to divine where I had to go. Perhaps this would have been fun in a Pen and Paper environment sitting around a table with a group of friends, but as a Computer game it just didn't work for me. The final straw was in the Crypts where I approached a door with the red effect indicating it was important, and I was transported to a room, stripped of all my equipment, and surrounded by Wights while my companions were killed by a Bodak. Ooooh..fun fun! So I reloaded and tried a different path..same thing...then another path. Same thing. Now perhaps there is some clever lever or switch somewhere to turn all this off, but by this time I simply wasn't motivated to find it, or to search for my equipment. The module will probably appeal to some folks that enjoy this sort of thing, but it wasn't for me. That's not to say it wasn't very well done, because the production value is quite high. The conversations and companion text from Ireena is good and engaging. The story itself is also quite interesting, and the tension and heightened expectations when walking toward Ravenloft for the first time is excellent.I didn't complete the game, so I don't know if it is fair to rate it, but I'd probably give it a 7 out of 10.
Yeeees....well....I'm in castle strahd. And...Rawwrrr. I become a werewolf.So...I was just wondering, what do I do now? How do I remove the curse, I have a save in the castle before I turn.
Posted by fire&ice at 2007-12-02 13:56:29 Voted 9.00 on 12/02/07
�played through with my MP group, Paladin, Sorceror, Bard starting level 12-13. Didn�t take any henchmen (including the plot one). Had a lot of fun, generally. Particularly liked the balanced combat (we�re fans of fairly combat-heavy mods) � the vampires were particularly tough, particularly a Vampire Rogue who kept using HiPS or similar.
I particularly liked the complexity of the layout of the castle � sticking down map pins made me feel like I was mapping it out � just like RPGs in the old days. My MP partners were less keen on this aspect and left me to do it. Loot was generally good, although one particular monster dropped some armour and a scythe which I thought were overpowered for the level range and didn�t have any restrictions (like evil only).
Anyway, only minor things � thanks very much for your (and your co-authors) hard work.
*SPOILERS*
Lief went a bit psycho and started attacking us and we couldn�t kill him (due to his flags). Fortunately we were able to lose him in the winding passages of Castle Ravenloft.
Our bard had a bit of a life-changing experience when he tried on a certain belt. He somehow got it off him (without a remove curse) and now appears to be stuck in his new form permanently, much to his chagrin and our amusement. I may be kind and fix this form him�or I may not :)
Finally, although some of the earlier Straud encounters were harder, the last one seemed fairly straightforward. However, all of the Thralls had been killed earlier � I teleported in to the final encounter without knowing I was going to and fled � the Thralls followed me and were picked up.
No hakpaks are actually required to play this module, except for the CEP and the two expansion packs. I tried to make this easy for everyone to download and play. If you look at some of the previous comments on this thread, some players had some initial difficulty when the CEP autoinstaller put files in unusual folders. That may be one of the problems you're having...
Dawnseeker... thanks for the nice words! It's good to see that even after this long people are still downloading the darn thing :)
Missing a hackpack to play it. It's not in the download and my buds and I were planning on playing it Monday.
What hackpack and where is it at?
Posted by Dawnseeker at 2007-09-24 07:33:24 Voted 9.00 on 09/24/07
What an incredibly fun module! Thanks to Evan Yeung, et al, for placing it here for the rest of us to download. The atmosphere was spot on for a gothic horror module. I should have waited to play it around All Hallow's Eve. Ravenloft Castle was a delightful maze, and I think the lack of map pins in this case might actually have helped with the ambiance of the module. I encountered zero bugs and was very pleased with the way everything ran so smoothly from start to finish. The henchmen were polished, even though the corresponding dialogue was not extensive. Henchmen (The *fighter* I played with) had their own "floaty text" interjections and actions at certain points as the plot advanced. The pros *far* outweigh the cons in this module.
SPOILER ALERT
As for the cons they were few and far between. I'll list just a couple:
1. As you first meet Ireena, the fighter henchperson, she alludes that her "song" is well-known, or some such. I take it that earlier in the games development, Ireena was a bard and not a fighter, yet this dialogue was never corrected.
2. In Castle Ravenloft, the guardian golems on the main floor keep saying that the master has forbidden you to leave. Yet they just stand there as you do so. I left and returned to the castle on many occasion, without repercussion.
END SPOILERS
With all that said, Spires of Ravenloft was pure enjoyment. I expect it will stay on my hard drive for a while. Again, many thanks to Evan Yeung and the other authors who have made this gem available to the community! Bravo.
Hm...
Received an interesting email from CDChrome. He no longer wishes to have anything to do with his 'House of Strahd' module due to religious reasons. I am removing his name from the credits listing for this module out of respect, but I am still grateful for his previous efforts!
For anyone wondering, I spoke to Evan this past Thursday (Feb 22) and a CEP 2 version is being tweaked and prepared for launch... anyone interested can try out the Beta Test version on the Tech Support Section of Gamespy (Title: Spires 1.41 Beta)
UbdU: A PC afflicted with lycanthropism (is that a word?) should change back when the sun rises. If that hasn't happened to your PC, let me know and I'll take a look...
Kenrae and Lucas... thank you for some very kind words! I'm glad at least
SOMEONE got dinged by 'the item' :). The comments about Lief and 'the item' are well taken. I wasn't sure how far to press the issue, but seeing how dark and foreboding the rest of the module is, I figured a bit of levity was in order. Whether it was too much may be dependent on the eye of the beholder. I'm very glad, though, that your group had fun!
Evan
Posted by lucaspwilliams at 2007-01-02 07:39:48 Voted 9.75 on 01/02/07
(*Spoiler Warning*) We finished our multiplayer trek last night with a party of four 13th level characters and everyone enjoyed it thoroughly. Brilliant immersion for us purists out there; this module just drips atmosphere. From the wolves howling throughout the eerie trek through the Slavich forest to the mist shrouded climb up the rocky path to Strahd's castle, area design is gorgeous. Kudos to all authors - internal consistency is a sight to behold and visual elements used just right. From carefully placed blood spatters leading from one door to the next in the city providing visual clues to the fate of villagers and the potential location of their assailants, to the physical similarities we observed in the appearances of Gertruda and Ireena (Strahd�s motives for preying on the two fair skinned red heads made perfect sense once we saw the portrait in the Weeping Rooms), all the attention our party paid to observing details paid off in the end culminating in a very rich and satisfying final confrontation.
A few optional and thematically appropriate quests in and around the village were just right - they provided a spooky backdrop as we worked up courage for a very focused exploration through Castle Ravenloft. No off topic errands or unrelated �four corner� quests to run here. I mean, really, who has the time when there is pure evil to defeat?
Scripts were nicely done as well and the world felt dynamic (Ireena�s reaction to one of the crypt markers, the swaying of the tower spire, certain PC actions affecting party alignment for example).
Any complaints are sufficiently minor and cosmetic. Somewhat flippant comments made by Lief about horrific situations (enrollment at his college dropping off once professors became undead and started eating the students) and scripted PC comments of a highly comical nature after donning a cursed item made us all groan since they were so at odds with the setting; but this was because everything else was implemented so flawlessly. Ireena appeared twice in the finale (once in her NPC garb, once in her finale garb), though we may have precipitated this bug by not returning the key to the Burgomaster�s sarcophagus and completing that quest. In the finale, we noticed the tombstones had vanished from behind the chapel. Two encounters seemed significantly more difficult than others and eliciting some OOC discussion - one with a demon in Strahd�s lab gave us more trouble than Strahd himself, but there seemed to be no warning to avoid them. None of these things interfered with the scripting or mod completion in any way.
Net net, this is a mod to behold, and really, a must play, Ravenloft fan or no.
Posted by Kenrae at 2006-12-29 04:14:38 Voted 9.25 on 12/29/06
A very nice mod. The areas layout are very well done, specially the castle. And the lack of sidequests once you get there is IMO a good thing, it let's you concentrate on the oppresion of the place.
It only lacks on NPC interaction, without being attrocious at that. Good job.
Ok, so, if I turn into a werewolf, the module is over? Because I don't seem to be able to turn back, even after letting my new NPC run around for more than 10 minutes.
Posted by Steve_Savicki at 2006-12-18 05:56:11 Voted 9.75
Okay, the interview is up. _________________________ Steve's Characters - please don't forget to vote on them if you play them.
Thanks,
Steve
Posted by Malak Darkhunter at 2006-12-10 17:37:59 Voted 9.50 on 12/10/06
Great mod!! I encountered no bugs, it started out with nothing really spectacular for me but the action really got better when I got to castle Ravenloft.I especially liked the bridge to castle Ravenloft.It gave a scary feel to the scene.On the whole great job,had a lot fun,thanks for your hard work!
Posted by Malak Darkhunter at 2006-11-18 17:01:42 Voted 9.50 on 12/10/06
Hey jeffery just a guess, do you have the actuall full instalation of cep and not just the 152 patch,got my friend through the cep and he had to have it all cep1 cep150 cep.tlk etc...alot of times they say need version 152 cep but you have to have the original cep the full instalation to play it.If that's not it then im not really for sure unless your missing something or the game is bugged..
Yes, I do have the cep 1.52 hakpak, but for some reason it still won't allow me to play the mod. Do you think it has something to do with the cep2? Other mods I've downloaded and saved seem to be unaffected.
Posted by Malak Darkhunter at 2006-11-15 10:44:48 Voted 9.50 on 12/10/06
Hi jeffery i've noticed that with the cep2 it's like a hak by itself. The mod requires cep 152 do you have that? If not then I would download the older version.Cep was at version 1.53, with the 1.68 version just a patch to fix the visible cloaks.
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