Get Your Players HOOKED on Dream Pastry! | Running Curse of Strahd 5e

[@elengul]

Duuuuuuuude ... I love this video, and I love the change to the dream pastries. I gotta say, though ... that Lion King clip hits differently given the implication that Mufasa is just asleep ... because of a drug to which he's addicted ...

[@hughtuller6344]

Great video and write up on these pies. One hook may also be for “Granny” to ask the characters to take a pie to that poor woman (Mad Mary) who lost her daughter the other day. “You can hear her cry from here. I fear for her health. I’ve heard she has been crying day and night, and most likely not eating. So, sad. Perhaps one of my pies can ease her mind a bit and provide some sustenance for the poor mother. So, so sad.”

[@paulcoy9060]

"That's the most evil thing I've ever heard." --- Mojo Jojo

[@LuckDragonLair]

@@paulcoy9060 Agreed... I approve heartily :)

[@VuvuzelaTM]

Duuuude, that IS just genius!

[@cloudi7665]

Omg I’m using this

[@TrippyTheShroom]

I'm using this. Good God that is wonderful.

[@geoffreynolds3157]

The Barbarian in the party went into a rage after he figured out what he was eating.

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

“What do you mean these aren’t FREE RANGE children?! RAAAAH!”

[@geoffreynolds3157]

@@LunchBreakHeroes 🤣🤣🤣

[@MagneticDavid]

OMG! As soon as this video ended, when you were saying "knowing full well that they're made out of...", the video stops and a "Chick-fil-A" add came on. I about fell out of my chair! LOL!

[@guttyjip]

The requiem cut aways are perfect lol

[@mikeadkins9851]

I am just now discovering this video, and it's almost time for my players to have some pie. Oh this is gonna be fun...

[@PanicsMannequin]

My players were tipped off that something was up with the nice old lady selling pies. They'd already been ripped off by the barkeep and the merchant in the village so when they were offered something for free they were instantly suspicious

[@maxtowers9769]

Imagine youre reading the d&d cookbook and you see dreampies on the next page.

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

4 cups white flour 6 tablespoons unsalted butter 3 cups minced child meat 2 tablespoons garlic and herb seasoning 1 gram salvia 0.5 teaspoon salt .... Bake at 425 degrees Fahrenheit or until crust is a golden brown color and screaming has stopped.

[@maxtowers9769]

@@LunchBreakHeroes By the way I got my Curse of Strahd book four days ago and I couldn’t be more excited to run it with my friends. Its my first ever written adventure as up until now I had just been making stuff up from my imagination. Luckily, my dad who’s been DM/Player since high school is helping me get ready and your videos have been so helpful and fun to watch and I can’t wait to run it in about a week. Thanks a lot man you’ve been a great help and I appreciate the videos. Nice recipe also :)

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

@@maxtowers9769 best of luck to you! Be sure to drop by our Discord server.

[@maxtowers9769]

@@LunchBreakHeroes will do man, love the content and thanks again!

[@shadowrigg]

About half of my party dove in headfirst on the pastries tonight. it was great. Without any prompting from me, they instantly started snapping back at the rest of the party for suggesting it wasn't a good idea.

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

Niiiiice!

[@FlyerBowman]

The most evil part of this entire video was the use of Simba trying to wake his dad, how dare you! You monster! 😄

[@ryanestes7331]

Ah just what I needed. My players just bought a bunch of these pies from Ofelia. I look forward to them learning the recipe

[@SereneIceDragon]

I'm running this for the first time and a lot of my party is new to D&D but are all super into the RP. They met Morgantha selling her pastries in town last session, almost fought her for taking a child, but ultimately let her go (after burning her cart down) and the rogue stole 2 pies. I want them to try it SO BAD. If they do I'm definitely using this.

[@emmanuelacosta5371]

I'm thinking of making Morgantha "blind", or at least appear so. Making her seem weaker will make her more appealing and less likely a target for the players' scrutiny.

[@Ktb014]

My players bought her entire cart last night…two have already eaten their own pies. This video came just in time

[@Dersarien]

I love the idea! I am starting my CoS campaign soon. We plan to play with the Stress system. I plan to make Dream Pastry lower the stress level to zero. This way, players can treat it like a free jail card for a short time. Until addiction and the truth about baked goods drive them crazy.

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

Sinister. I like it.

[@Dilophomasnaurus]

honestly, I think my players would gladly help Morgantha obtain the required ingredients even if they knew what the key ingredient was...

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

My kind of peeps!

[@BramLastname]

Same, They'd probably be willing to get the main ingredient too, Because they have some weird obsession with slitting throats, But never remember to dispose of the bodies. Also the pastries are probably payment enough for them too.

[@aero33888]

My players not only loot dead bodies. They loot the whole body.

[@mandyb7253]

CoS is my 2nd campaign to run ever. I'm using all your tequniques and tweaks and changes. Picking up a few others and adding my own. 3 of my player are very experienced and being able to change what they may have already been over or see in other games helps me to keep them on their toes. Thank you so much for your help and insight into this. You helped ease a lot of my nervousness running this. I did the skill challenge you suggested as well and they all LOVED it. If the cleric failed to figure out what to do with Walter the shifter barbarian would have died on the balcony. So much excitement. You're the best! Thanks thanks thanks!

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

You’re very welcome! I’m happy the guides could help out!

[@aliraen]

One of my players got addicted to dream pastries and I let the cleric get rid of his early addiction with lesser restoration. My players are super suspicious of everything and our paladin's divine sense tips them off on a lot of things but our bard ate the pastry regardless.

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

Bards... Bless their little lecherous hearts.

[@lemm4630]

my players are loving the dream pies at the moment, now morgantha's usual customers :)

[@fanzel123]

I actually added these pastries into my actual campaign just for funzies.... The party almost fucking died because of these! It was wonderful

[@danielfloresdevalgaz4576]

I did this and my player took the pies but they didn't trust her at all precisely because she was nice. Now we have a funny running gag with the groups fighter and ranger just going around and asking random people party members "hey you want this pie?"

[@tremkl]

Session 3 today and freshly out of Durst Manor, my characters had some Dream Pie. Super smug at the temporary HP, and fearing a siege of the manor, the players all ate a serving of pie as dessert. Ireena, feeling really comfortable with the group, busted out a bottle of Red Dragon Crush. When the characters got really drowsy after, they all blamed the wine. I also had some great successes with the dreams. One character had a wonderful dream where she was reunited with her dead family, and it was wonderful and happy, but when she woke up and didn’t see her husband, it all came crashing back. Another character is an artificer who worships Gond. I gave him a dream where he was making a wonderful invention that would revolutionize farming and improve the lives of thousands. It was a religious experience, but when he woke up he couldn’t quite remember what it was or how it worked. My players were horrified and it was flawless.

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

Great execution!

[@mateofantasma]

Great way of putting these ideas into practice! I am taking notes for my future games!

[@tremkl]

Update: After eating so many pies they had to restock (Morgantha had a stall at the Festival of the Blazing Sun), my party continued eating pies without realizing they were causing many of the dream sequences until Krezk, when they made plans with Ez for a late night rendezvous that they all slept through and finally realized it was the pies. Now one of my PCs wants to secretly buy more pies next time they’re in Vallaki, because he misses the happy dreams. (His Dark Pact dreams got a little... well, dark.)

[@b_olson542]

Dude. Your additions to this module are spectacular! Thank you for your creative albeit dark endeavors. Keep up the fantastic work. DMs everywhere rejoice!

[@Kashakunaki]

I've watched almost all of your videos; I love the content man. You're absolutely great. I found you originally from this video on the CurseofStrahd subreddit (I'm about to run the game for the first time) and subsequently digested all of your Strahd content then all the rest of your content except the Lost Mines (I'm sure I'll watch it when I run that module).

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

Thank you so much for taking the time to watch! It means a lot to me

[@BramLastname]

My players aren't the wisest bunch, I can just put a graveyard outside the mill, And they'll probably become the main supplier in the long run.

[@narrator7351]

I don't know how you got into my KZbin recommendations, and I love how you discuss your topics. Great points both for role playing and mechanical aspects for DnD. Your content is great not only for Curse of Strahd, but for many ideas for dnd. I hope more people stumble upon your works as well.

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

Thank you!

[@drakebowen5979]

Now I found something on Reddit that was along these lines, adding a d4 to all d20 rolls. One thing I liked to do is whenever a player rolled lowly on their save against addiction, I offered to let them eat a pie to add a bonus to their save. And if they did, I would shrug and say they passed. They always assumed I was being lenient. I also made sure to remind them before every rest, short or long, that they could eat a pastry. If they ate one during a short rest, I gave them 1d6 hp for free. During a long rest, one extra hit die back. This proved crucial after an unfortunate encounter with Doru. So far, they've only seen the sleeping for eight hours downside.

[@Ionotron]

I tried this but failed, my group took one look at that old lady selling pastries and immediately came to the conclusion that she is a witch, who bakes kids into cakes. Maybe its because we grew up on these fairy tales but now they have gone out of their way to evade her.

[@Cyxos]

This is great content! Thank you. Three of my four players just bought and ate the pastries. The next time they take a long rest, it will be the worst night ever for the fourth player. The other players refuse to wake up at the same time as a bunch of Blinsky dolls create havoc in their camp. Ah, good times!

[@lotfj]

how dare you use that clip of simba I almost started crying out of reflex

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

It's a Pavlovian response we all have

[@RichardDuryea]

My players went to the bone grinder and picked a fight before they had a chance to try one. I’m thinking of having the pies available in Valaki during the festival. Resold by someone else

[@brunnooaraujo]

It's excelent for immersion. Wanna make it worse? Make this encounter happens in the lunch break of the session, offering real, tasty pastry to your group. Just be aware of 2 things: 1) Make sure no one of your players have triggers with addiction, this being themselves or family members. Even Evil has standards. 2) It will be much more difficult to make your group accept the Dark Gifts from dreams (as you presented them in another video) if they already had this experience.

[@dylaningram6896]

I'm running a group of 3 and 2 of them are evil one is a hobgoblin and the other is a vampire and the 3rd is a lizard folk. It's kindof sad but unique that noone would have qualms with eating children

[@xyphious]

Your tips are pure gold. I’m about to kick off a CoS game with 4 players and you have added so much depth to my plans. Thank you

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

You’re welcome!

[@itszaque]

I’m preparing to run this campaign with my group in about 2 weeks and this has me so excited for the dream pies! I’ve listened to other playthroughs of CoS and the pies were an afterthought. But this keeps them interesting, and considering one players backstory is that of a magic-meth addicted cleric I’m sure I’ll have a chance to play with this mechanic. Thanks for the great guides!

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

You’re welcome!

[@timcarroll1033]

What would you do for elves that only need a 4 hour meditation are immune to magical sleep

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

They’re not affected.

[@piploo]

This is a really great idea, and while i have given them a dream pie, I am reluctant to play this out due to my own trauma related to drug addiction. So amazing guide, however, unless they keep eating the pies I don't think I will use this in my game. But your videos are fabulous and I love planning my game around what youve created with the module!

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

Take what speaks to you, Pippa, and leave the rest.

[@artesque]

Dad... you gotta get up...

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

He lives... in the soul stone of the hags!

[@BrickQuestAdventures]

Well, I guess I did a good job following you're advice. One player ate a piece immediately of the free one, another player bought 3. Unfortunately I have one player that's warforged and doesn't have to eat lol.

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

Yeeeesss... Let the addiction take hold!

[@TheBooban]

He doesn’t have to eat. But can if he wants to. To gain the benefit...

[@EasilyBoredGamer]

i remember trying to do something like this with my players they all laughed it off thinking the idea of "Pie withdrawl" was a funny joke... best part is they've yet to learn about the secret ingredient

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

*dramatic chipmunk*

[@KarasuJiru]

This made me subscribe. CoS is my first campaign I'm dming. Your videos really help!

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

Thank you!

[@ryanrizzo4869]

Lol. The Requiem for a Dream clips just really add to this topic. Great stuff.

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

JUICE BY YOU!

[@ryanrizzo4869]

@@LunchBreakHeroes XD! "IM GOING TO BE ON TV! JUST WATCH! YOU'LL SEE!"

[@ingridzerpa9928]

We are playing this campaign via Roll20 due to the pandemic. I followed your suggestion and I made my players bring a pastry for the session, and the ones who ate the meat pies, got to role play the scene! It was fantastic! It made my players get more immerse into the module (which is hard when we play online). Thank you!!

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

That's sounds like a lot of fun!

[@aero33888]

I'm getting addicted to your CoS videos.

[@PurpleKittenofDeath]

It's also good to remember that in 5e, you don't automatically succeed on saves by rolling a 20, so you can actually become so addicted that you can't roll a successful save :)

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

Absolutely! But pass or fail, the next day will be easier.

[@HamletHK]

This is so good, I'm definitely gonna implement this!

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

Lemme know how it goes!

[@HamletHK]

So my party haven't tried them themselves, but they have started feeding some dream pastries to Ireena, who is now kinda hooked on them. I doubt if any of my players are still gonna eat them, but who knows

[@evilducklings9279]

The village of Barovia is next for my group and I hope they actually trust Morgantha after the death house.

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

I hope so too! Let me know how it goes!

[@evilducklings9279]

3 of the 4 party members ate the pie and one has gotten a challenge rating of 18 against the withdrawal.

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

@@evilducklings9279 Nice! Make them feel it.

[@evilducklings9279]

However I made an error by charging the pastries at 5 cp so when they paid one gold coin for the pies they got a lot of pie. Which I am going to rectify by having it all go bad.

[@vivianryder698]

If only I had discovered your channel 5 months ago 😫 you have such great ideas

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

I wish you were here five months ago too! Where have you been all this time?!

[@derekdarby7948]

This works great when tied inn to the nightmare lands, dream pastry, as an opportuninty to adventure in the nightmare lands, and interact with the nightmare court, further info in the nightmare lands expansion for ravenloft 2nd ed

[@Rhiunlol]

Very good video, but I believe I may have an improvement to make the discovery of the pie's contents even more gut wrenching. Instead of making them addiction through a game mechanic, I want to make the players addicted themselves. Once my players eat the pie, the next day after their lucid dreams, they wake up with the 1d4 added to their attack rolls and ability checks for 8 hours. It sounds OP, but that really won't make too much of a difference in this difficult campaign. This will only really work if you have a good aligned party, but oh boy their faces will be a picture when they've willing been eating these pies for days!

[@DeputyNomNoms]

Excited to give this a try in my next session. I'm willing to bet my hyper paranoid players will cast Identify on them though lol

[@DeputyNomNoms]

Not only did they not think twice about eating them, they paid her enough money to give everyone in town a pie lmao

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

New group name: The Ensemble of Enablers

[@maxdavid7647]

Thanks! I sadly already handed out 1 slice for each player who was willing to tell a story to Granny. However I didn't get the bleakness of Barovia and the necessity for sweat dreams across well enough. But I hope my players will try it out

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

Be sure to come back and let me know how it goes!

[@maxdavid7647]

@@LunchBreakHeroes Well they were sceptical since it was bit much in your face. I pulled them in by having a small market the following day with Granny being present and lots of people desperatly needed some pie. I described that the smell unlocked one happy memory from before they arrived, comming from backstory. Standing on the beach in the sun, dancing with a lost love, ...

[@alexlogak6524]

Such a high quality video! Thank you and keep up with that! You'll get big pretty soon i hope

[@brysonnelson7528]

Question: how would the addiction and withdrawal work with a third level Paladin’s divine health feature? From what I’ve heard and seen it’s agreed that they’d still feel the “high” and “low” effects, but when it comes to actually having to roll for addiction and withdrawal I’ve gotten varied responses on whether or not these things count as a disease that they’d be immune to. On one hand I think it would be fun for every party member to have to deal with it, on the other it is a neat niche use of the feature. Also, I’m thinking of keeping the addiction stuff on a down-low (maybe text effects of it to players privately instead of announcing publicly) and having somebody eating the pies without suffering any ill-effects would really throw some players off the trail I think.

[@wandsdaggers9439]

This is a really fun mechanic! I feel like there are lots of cool ways to feature this in your game. I want to have a shady merchant who sells cursed health potions at half price. Even if the players figure out the health potions are bad, they might find themselves forced to use one.

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

"Doctor Feelgood's Ye Olde Potion of Healing & Gender Swapping"

[@wandsdaggers9439]

@@LunchBreakHeroes Yes!!!

[@CptnXplosion]

Ok, so my players decided they wanted some of these, but didn't want to pay for them. My bard cast disguise self to make himself look like Strahd (who I had welcome the players to Barovia), and walk into the middle of the town square. Everyone ran off and the old lady cowered behind her stand and, with truesight, begged them to just take all of her pastries.

[@100madmic]

we don't have any of pastry drugs but I do have a character addicted too alcoholic drinks.

[@guamae]

My party bought out the Windmill of pastries to use them as sedatives for the party members inflicted with Lycanthropy :P Not being able to wake up all night, no matter what, certainly has its uses!! But they stopped having them after Ismark (who had been Feebleminded) found the deliciously smelling basket, and ate 11 pies! He was not doing well after that....

[@lotfj]

Your CoS series helped me a lot running it as an inexperienced dm. we are 3 sessions in and i'm wondering if you have advise for me to make travel more interesting. (the party is on their way to vallaki and ended the last session with the tarokka reading)

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

I think you have a few options there. One thing that I always recommend is to expand the travel times between locations. The map of Barovia that's int he module is three times smaller than what is depicted in other canon (i.e., books). By expanding those travel times, you guarantee that your players need to seek shelter outside of a settlement at least once during their travels. This gives you an opportunity to have Strahd and his spies look in on the party and maybe even mess with them a little bit. Aside from that, I wouldn't necessarily sweat the details of travel in between settlements. I'm not a big fan of random encounters, for example, so my party generally makes it from one settlement to another without any encounters--unless it serves to drive their story forward.

[@lotfj]

@@LunchBreakHeroes thanks for the quick reply! I agree on the random encounter part, I'm all for meaningful encounters. I made traveling between the village of barovia and vallaki a 3 day journey. They made camp inside a tower of the gate just past the crossroads to ravenloft/vallaki and I let one pc who kept the second watch see the ghostly figures of strahds previous enemies march to ravenloft. still I want them to experience travel as a dangerous activity (just as they heard from Ismark) it doesnt make much sense if they can just carelessly take a stroll through strahds domain

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

​@@lotfj That's a fair point. I had my players be ambushed by barbarian bandits on the bridge near Tser falls. That was mainly because I could tell my fighter was getting bored with the non-combat gameplay.

[@badgerchillsky535]

I KNEW I'd seen the 'cooking' sequence somewhere before!! I was thinking it might have been from Trainspotting, but I forgot about Requiem For a Dream... IDK how tf I forgot about Requiem :|

[@dezelvol]

Great idea, but why it's so complicated? It would be nighmare for DM to run it! As alternative - each time you eat a piece of pie, you get single inspiration point (can't have more than one). If you haven't a piece for a day, you suffer exhaustion for 3/5/7 days. Players don't have to know actual period, if they decide to wait in tavern, it could be longer. Knowing what pastry is made of and not having negative effect to it, means that it would be pure morale dilemma. You can make them suffer nighmares to feel that something is wrong, but without actual disadvantages on mechanical level. The question is - should pastry magic disappear, after coven was killed?

[@carlosn9080]

This video has made me learn to make pies

[@LXanderHanover]

Oh man, what is that music around 2:00 ?? Its so familiar but I can't place it....

[@FellWolf87]

One of the flavors I always make Morgantha have is Barovian Creme Pie

[@thebigbluenerd]

Wish I saw this before I ran Morgantha, my players didn't really care about the pies and ended up burning her at the stake.

[@danwright32]

Do you have a video for the town of barovia? I took a look but didn't see one.

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

You bet! kzbin.info/www/bejne/haiZoqKej7Z_ias

[@MarshmallowMadnesss]

Using this tonight!

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

I hope it went well!

[@tremkl]

Question on the dream pie addiction rolls: Say a player eats 2 servings of dream pie and fails their DC 12 saving throw. They had pie on them, so I had them eat more pie the next day. What difficulty is their DC the following day? 10, because they only ate one that day? 14 because they have now eaten 3 slices without passing a roll?

[@christopherlancaster6735]

Excellent video but I feel MandyMod deserves a credit. Or did you come up with this mechanic completely independently?

[@dylaningram6896]

Yo why did you put the lion king death scene you evil man lol

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

Muahaha

[@Crozierization]

How would the effect be altered for Elf PCs, who are immune to magical sleep, in your version?

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

You could treat it as a poison effect, rather than a magic effect.

[@bryanfontez]

I LOVE this idea and am definitely going to use it but I find the sleeping portion of it confusing and not much of a "low". Also how would that work on elves? Wouldn't a better low be the opposite of the high? Like losing HP or rolling with disadvantage for a few hours?

[@mrbaldy1665]

This may have been answered already, but how does the forced sleep at night affect elves who can't be put to sleep magically?

[@LadyRomanasTeaTime]

I'm going to be running COS soon, but I'm a new DM (yikes!). Question. If someone casts detect magic on the pies, will they show up as magical? And thanks for the idea. I have one player who I know is going to try a pie. She eats everything in every game.

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

I would say yes, but I don’t know what school they would show up as off the top of my head. The fact that they immediately get temp HP would hopefully put them at ease if someone does try some pie after detecting magic.

[@LadyRomanasTeaTime]

@@LunchBreakHeroes Thanks so much for your reply! I appreciate it. Starting my game tonight. I made meat pies last night so hopefully we make it to that point! So excited about this.

[@DevianTrickster]

I made almost all their equipment disappear when they were took by the mists now they dont trust anyone. Almost didnt even accept the free dream pie but refuse to eat it hahaha

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

Smart PCs!

[@momqabt]

*evil chuckle* I mean...DM chuckle DM chuckle heheh...heh😅

[@WexMajor82]

You'd better not have a line of villagers in front of her cart. And most of all, you don't want to describe them. That's how junk-ies line up for metha-done. If someone has seen that, they'll instantly know Morgantha is a push-er.

[@SH4n1AC_C4C7]

Was that drug cut from the movie Spun? 🧐

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

Nope. Everything was from Requiem for a Dream if I recall

[@davidjohnson5557]

8:01 LMAO

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

One of my favorite bits. :-D

[@nickfrego6642]

Let’s say that a player has already made their saving throw for the day. If they encounter a dream pastry at some point within that same day, should they make another constitution saving throw? If so, a failure will, of course, lead to them eating some of the dream pastry, but would a success results in the DC being reduced by two? Or would nothing happen?

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

I’d say that their save lasts the whole day. Otherwise it might seem unfair to the player.

[@alienspaceshaman]

One of my players is a druid that can create magic berrys and refuses to eat anything else regardless of the situation

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

Constant vigilance, Potter!

[@alienspaceshaman]

@@LunchBreakHeroes To be fair,the meat pies that were given out are from locally sourced village kids, but they wont figure that out till later...love the vids, thanks!

[@Crozierization]

Do you have any way for your characters to avoid being incapacitated all night? I’m thinking about my players, and I’m sure that after a single night of that that they will swear off the pies forever. I don’t want all of them to swear them off forever. Maybe elves? Let the elf in my party be immune to the compiler sleeping, per their racial traits?

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

Some ideas where tossed about in other comments about how elves are immune to sleep, but perhaps have trouble coming out of their trance. Or they can be immune entirely--there's nothing terribly wrong with that.

[@Crozierization]

Ok but how does your way get the *players* addicted? It seems like it punishes them. Imagine them halfway through a dungeon when sun sets and they just fall asleep in the face of the enemy or something. It seems like they would reject them immediately??

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

​@@Crozierization I wouldn't enforce sleep immediately at sundown, but rather when they chose to long rest during that 24-hour period.

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

@@Crozierization And the *players* are addicted because they get positive mechanical benefits at first, but fight withdraw symptoms later. The withdrawal symptoms encourage continued use of the pastries, or a gradual weaning-off of them.

[@funnybusiness6491]

Damn I want to play in one of your games.

[@onesaltydoge3105]

Got 4/5 of my party eating them, thanks!

[@eternal-sty43]

Should i increase the DC if they eat more than one pastry a day

[@MarshmallowMadnesss]

What happens when casting detect magic on the pies?

[@shelbyparker6821]

So Unfortunately I may have a problem with this. One of my PC’s is a damn Warforged. So it can’t be affected by these pastries. Any advice?

[@TheBooban]

Warforged are not immune. They can get drunk for instance. They have resistance to poison. This is not poison. They cannot be magically put to sleep. This is not magic. It is a drug. They are not immune or resistant to this at all.

[@nowsmile790]

My players bought 10 dream pies and every player ate a piece. Which means they have nine pies left so that means they have 32 more slices. I didn’t think my character should become a literal drug fiends. Lol

[@Fundipped13]

...My party went to the windmill, killed one of her daughters, stole more baked goods for later use when she fled with her other daughter, and burned the place down as we left... so... oops...? 😂

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

In the words of Bob Ross, there's no such thing as a mistake. Just happy accidents. :-)

[@TheEldritchGoth]

Would elves and half elves be affected by the eight hour forced sleep effect?

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

Because of Fey Ancestry, no. But you can swap it out with something else if you choose. There's several other suggestions among the comments, I believe.

[@zeldaandTwink]

can you please reverse the order of your playlist? its going from newest to oldest

[@minethulhufhtagn7239]

I loved this idea and got all my players to eat some pies. It wasn't until day 3 when they skipped the pie fix and started to hit withdrawals. Needless to say they took "revenge" on Granny Momo (just last game session). I managed the long con (even though they suspected weird ingredients and knew the pies were addictive) such that players weren't 100% sure attacking was the right plan until the "ladies" revealed themselves as Hags (when the players became demanding and "mouthy"). However, it occurs to me that likely the entire village (minus a handful) were addicted (otherwise why would they be selling their children). I foresee "fun" in the future for the Village of Barovia. Did this happen to anybody else or is it just me abusing my NPCs? Lucky me I had Ismark give Ireena a Sending Stone prior to the PCs departure so he can start reporting his "problems" (and maybe some pointed questions about Granny Momo and if Ireena has seen her). I've made travel distances longer (as per another recommendation), so the PCs are many, many days away. Now I get to mentally torture the PCs as well! Bwaahahahahaha!

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

I love it!

[@noahjockett3304]

For some reason the link to the pastry homebrew page isn't working for me. Anyone else having that issue?

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

Still works for me. Try a different browser?

[@noahjockett3304]

@@LunchBreakHeroes Actually I decided to download the page. When I opened it up in my downloads it loaded properly! Thank you so much though!

[@davidlewis5312]

Hehe I changed her daytime name to May and she urges people new to her to call her Auntie May (we are all spiderman fan)

[@mathewlydy4623]

Should elves be immune to this magic sleep? They don't sleep and they're actually immune to it. I have 2 elves in my party and they'll probably be encountering the dream pastries in the next game..

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

Excellent question! I'll admit that I completely overlooked fey ancestry when I came up with this. Since elves can't be put to sleep by magic at all, they would be immune to the pie's nighttime effects. Perhaps it locks them into their trance and they need to pass a DC 10 Wisdom check to come out of it before eight hours.

[@mathewlydy4623]

@@LunchBreakHeroes that sounds like a good way to make it work. It makes them have vivid dream like vision in their trance. I can tell the players that they're amazed because they've never had a dream before.

[@philpallas4259]

If you treat it as a poison effect and not a magic effect, then elves won't be immune.

[@mathewlydy4623]

@@philpallas4259 I actually ran it today like I described above. I think because he's a new player he didn't think anything of it but if he asks then I'll tell him that it's not magic it's poison. The two players that ate the pies are already realizing that they're probably addicted and they're planning on role playing it out. They don't yet realize that the pies are made of kids.

[@charalargenumber8327]

Reminds me of the heroin mechanics from Termina

[@NovaAlcor]

This is amazing I love everything about it so devious lololol

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

I'm glad you like it!

[@bdhueb]

Barovian Cream Pie

[@3Authoress]

I have a problem. I tried opening the link in the description for the dream pastry sheet, but it only opens one page. The Withdrawal info is on another page that I can't scroll to. Is there any way you could give me the information? One of my players ended up buy one and I really want to use this homebrew material for it. Sorry for the trouble.

[@LunchBreakHeroes]

The document is just a single place. The withdrawal info is at the bottom. If you're using simplified view, then you may have some problems.

[@3Authoress]

​@@LunchBreakHeroes AH. I had to download it as a pdf in order to see the whole thing. When I just clicked the link, it only showed 1 page. There's about a paragraph's worth of empty space after the "Withdrawal" header, then "Non-magical food requires a Con save" just before the page cuts off. I've got it now. Thank you for the awesome ideas.

[@IliumGaming]

if you have my players, then they might also consider going into business with granny and opening a new distribution network in vallaki. very lucrative market and a fresh source of ingredients 😈

[@PMullable]

Piiiiiiiiiiiieeeeeee