Stripping Curse of Strahd, looking for feedback

[Sjappo]

Before I start a fair warning: Here be Spoilers.

With that out of the way. I will be DM-ing CoS starting this friday. I've read the module and this thing is huge. I like the feel of the module but it is way to big for our group. So I need the strip it down to the bare bones, without loosing to much of the feel or story.

I have some ideas and I'm looking for input from DM's and players. What did you use and enjoy and what can be stripped? Any feedback on my ideas is welcome as well.

Background: my group.
That's me and my 5 players. We meet once every two weeks for an evening DnD. Catching up with friends is one of the main reasons we do this so there are frequent breaks for chatting. There is some alcohol involved as well. We typically play from 8 to 12 in the evening. Our group is seldom complete, so mostly it is me with 4 or 3 players.
To give an indication of our play speed, we finished Lost Mines of Phandelver in just under 1 year. So, not so quick.

My ideas:
I'm going to cut a lot. And I mean a lot. I'm emptying the sandbox and putting in rails. So to speak.

Cut: I'm going to cut out the Mad Mage, the werewolf den, Von Richtens Tower, Tsolinka Pass and the Amber Temple.

Vallaki: Vallaki will be reduced to a shanty town popped up around the Blue Water Inn. Blinsky will have his shop here. Izek is a thug trying to control the shanty town. This leaves the story of Ireena untouched. I'll tie in Izek with the fisherman on lake Zarovich as well.
The story is that people are leaving Barovia to settle in Kresk. When they get turned back at Kresk they wind up here.

Barovia village: Not many changes. I changed the burgomaster to a woman. She was supposed to marry the priest Donavich. That ties these stories together as well as giving me a nice brides-dress for the Abbot.

Von Richten / Ezmirelda: I'm having Ezmiralda be the ally. I like Rudolph, but I don't need him. I'll have him dead and have Ezmiralda step in his footsteps.

Argynvostholt / Castle Ravenloft: Dungeons are a huge timesink for our group. So I'm going to cut all forays into Castle Ravenloft. I might keep the invitation, maybe. I'm going to use Abstract Dungeoneering (http://theangrygm.com/abstract-dungeoneering/) maybe combined with an altered Random Encounter (http://theangrygm.com/hacking-time-in-dnd/) system.. Practising with Argyncosthold. Hopefully killing of al lot of the pointless looking for traps and locked doors.

Old Bonegrinder: The witches are using the skull of Argynvost as a mill stone. Tying it into the story of the Paladin and Argynvostholt and eliminating a need to enter Castle Ravenloft early.

What I don't like is that the Krezk is not tied into the story, nor are the Wizards of Wine, Yester Hill and Berez. But I need some locations to stash the three items and have some mile stones to level the PC's.

Questions:
What did I miss? Am I breaking up story lines with the stuff I cut?
What could I cut as well? I'm doubtful about the whole Wizards of Wine, Yester Hill, Ruins of Berez story line as well. I'm keeping Argynvostholt for sure since I have a Barovian Paladin as PC.
What shouldn't I cut? Should I put Vallaki back in? If so, something's got to go instead. And how does it tie in?

TL;DR: What should I keep and what can I cut from CoS to make it as short as possible without loosing the main story and the feel of the module.

[noob]

Abstract Dungeoneering interacts very weirdly with stuff like the spell eyes of stone or even the lower level version spying eyes(or whatever name it had) as well as with stuff like adventurers saying "we breaks walls at random and try to attract as much attention as possible" and combining that with some way to trap the monsters.
I mean the adventurers always have weird ideas and rarely "roams" in the typical way you indicated so you will have to adjust in real time and in the end the most efficient thing is deciding what are the monsters(and their populations) in the dungeon and then improvising with them.
if your adventurers are capped at level 3 spells and have no access to the following: explosive stuff, poison, monsters(rust monsters are very useful when in the hands of adventurers and it is true for a lot of other monsters), stone, adamentine tools(such as a mundane adamentine hammer) , any form of trap(be it marbles or nails), thunder stones , any other alchemical item, a huge supply of arrows and a lot of bows(do not ask why), ropes, torches, anything flamable or which makes smoke, any material from outside of the material plane, empty iron boxes of one cubic meter, pythons, hooks, ladders(really ladders are one of the most polyvalent tools and you will rarely see anyone actually climb a ladder), Disguise kits, any magical item, shapesand(never let a player be close to shapesand), regular sand(never let a player be close to regular sand), rivers(avoid having rivers in your setting), shovels(obvious),carts ,black sand(and this is why dungeons ends up having only undead: one day there is black sand and adventurers), snow(really it is bad), food, time , the sun(or else they are going to try to break the roof),acid and lava(do not put any in your dungeon: it helps more adventurers than it hampers them), the control undead spell, animals(especially chickens,dogs and bats), strength(actually it is useful but not for fighting), smaller dungeons(very dangerous), Any illusion spell, Any divination spell, any spell that create stuff(especially create lantern archon), boats(especially when moving it on land without magic), mercenaries, a siege tower, anything from which you can make piles for getting a vantage point, gold,copper,silver,platinium,money, bare hands... they are not going to give too much trouble with their ways of exploring dungeon.

[Specter]

Kresk is the only place where Ireena can truly be saved, and also showcases Strahd's corrupting power with the Abbot and the Burgomaster. If you're going to cut the town, make sure all of these elements are still in there somewhere.

Also if you're going to cut something out of the castle, cut the tombs. That can easily take a full session of gaming and it's not crucial to the story.

[Sjappo]

Abstract Dungeoneering interacts very weirdly with stuff like the spell eyes of stone or even the lower level version spying eyes(or whatever name it had) as well as with stuff like adventurers saying "we breaks walls at random and try to attract as much attention as possible" and combining that with some way to trap the monsters.
I mean the adventurers always have weird ideas and rarely "roams" in the typical way you indicated so you will have to adjust in real time and in the end the most efficient thing is deciding what are the monsters(and their populations) in the dungeon and then improvising with them.
if your adventurers are capped at level 3 spells and have no access to the following: explosive stuff, poison, monsters(rust monsters are very useful when in the hands of adventurers and it is true for a lot of other monsters), stone, adamentine tools(such as a mundane adamentine hammer) , any form of trap(be it marbles or nails), thunder stones , any other alchemical item, a huge supply of arrows and a lot of bows(do not ask why), ropes, torches, anything flamable or which makes smoke, any material from outside of the material plane, empty iron boxes of one cubic meter, pythons, hooks, ladders(really ladders are one of the most polyvalent tools and you will rarely see anyone actually climb a ladder), Disguise kits, any magical item, shapesand(never let a player be close to shapesand), regular sand(never let a player be close to regular sand), rivers(avoid having rivers in your setting), shovels(obvious),carts ,black sand(and this is why dungeons ends up having only undead: one day there is black sand and adventurers), snow(really it is bad), food, time , the sun(or else they are going to try to break the roof),acid and lava(do not put any in your dungeon: it helps more adventurers than it hampers them), the control undead spell, animals(especially chickens,dogs and bats), strength(actually it is useful but not for fighting), smaller dungeons(very dangerous), Any illusion spell, Any divination spell, any spell that create stuff(especially create lantern archon), boats(especially when moving it on land without magic), mercenaries, a siege tower, anything from which you can make piles for getting a vantage point, gold,copper,silver,platinium,money, bare hands... they are not going to give too much trouble with their ways of exploring dungeon.

Thanx for your insight. But it is rather specific advice. I don't know if you know Curse of Strahd, but the setting itself prevents players van accumulating to much stuff. Barovia is rather small and poor. And ruled by a nearly omniscient Vampire with a very effective spy ring. Extra planar travel etc is out as well/ The adventure ends at lvl 9 or 10 so the PC's will not be all that powerful.

I've never seen my players destroy a dungeon before. If they want to try, the are more than welcome. I'll be laughing maniacally when the whole castle collapses on top of them. Still, Argynvosthold is a test. We'll see what happens.

[Cespenar]

If you're trimming the campaign, also pay attention to trim the combats in some arcs as well. Some sidequests are cool and interesting on their own, but then you get to fight multiple junk encounters before coming to the point that really matters. These combats really ate a lot of our group's time, for example, when we were playing CoS.

[GooeyChewie]

My players never entered most of the places you plan to cut. You can control what’s important and what they can ignore using the tarot reading early in the game. Just set up the cards beforehand so they lead where you want.

If you do want to cut out certain areas entirely, then you will need to look at the brazier in the basement of the castle. It can teleport players to other areas, so you’ll either want to omit it entirely or change the destinations to more appropriate areas.

[Sjappo]

Kresk is the only place where Ireena can truly be saved, and also showcases Strahd's corrupting power with the Abbot and the Burgomaster. If you're going to cut the town, make sure all of these elements are still in there somewhere.
You're right. I forgot about that. I'm not really sold on the whole McGuggin search that Yester Hill / Berez. I need it to tie in to the story more. The PCs go to the Wizards of Wine to get their ticket into Krezk, but they have no incentive to check out Yester Hill or Berez. Baba Lysaga's hut is a good place to stash one of the 3 helpful items. I do like story of Baba Lysaga but it is very hard for the players to discover.

Maybe if Baba Lysaga, Madam Eva and Morgantha were three crones that set Strahd on his journey. I could have their faces pop up on paintings here and there. Hmmm.



Also if you're going to cut something out of the castle, cut the tombs. That can easily take a full session of gaming and it's not crucial to the story.
Really? Even the tombs of Strahd's brother and parents? I was planning on cutting out most of the other tombs. Maybe leave that of Saint Markovia and Pidlwick.

[Sjappo]

If you're trimming the campaign, also pay attention to trim the combats in some arcs as well. Some sidequests are cool and interesting on their own, but then you get to fight multiple junk encounters before coming to the point that really matters. These combats really ate a lot of our group's time, for example, when we were playing CoS.
Good point. Since I plan on cutting large parts of the castle I think I have some of this covered. Can you give more specific examples?
I want to minimize random encounters and only non combat ones like headless horsemen, weird trinkets, disturbed graves etc.

[Cespenar]

Good point. Since I plan on cutting large parts of the castle I think I have some of this covered. Can you give more specific examples?
I want to minimize random encounters and only non combat ones like headless horsemen, weird trinkets, disturbed graves etc.

The main examples I was thinking of were the Castle and Death House, both of which you seem to cover. There were also some Dire Wolf encounters near the start which were a bit of a slog as well, but I think our DM let us have them in order to maintain some atmosphere.

He was otherwise wise enough, however, to trim the other parts to a more manageable length.

[GlenSmash!]

If you are cutting so much it may be easier to just update an old version of Castle Ravenloft to 5e.

[Specter]

Really? Even the tombs of Strahd's brother and parents? I was planning on cutting out most of the other tombs. Maybe leave that of Saint Markovia and Pidlwick.

Oh no, keep the family tombs. Without those, the whole area feels off. My players fought Strahd directly in his tomb, and it was a good challenge.

[SirGraystone]

Someone already suggested a conversion of the original I6 Raveloft module. That module had the invitation letter, the barovian gates and wolves in the woods then the village of Barovia much like Curse of Strahd. The the Tser Pool and the vistani camp (who were called simply gypsies) and Madame Eva cards prophecy. After that, you would meet the black carriage and the rest of the Castle itself.

All the rest the amber temple, werewolves caves, wineyards, etc... is added stuff in the 5e version.

Of course the fortune telling is different since you can only get location inside the castle for the legendary items.

Since there was no Krezk, after Strahd defeats, the ghost of Sergei would appear and takes Ireena/Tatyana with him.