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Post by whipstache on Aug 12, 2015 21:02:01 GMT
[Cross posted from the Homebrew World Building forum]
I'm interested in doing a little crowdsourcing.
I have the shell of a world, a map with a few vague ideas about history and setting, but not much else. So I'd almost certainly be able to use any ideas you contribute.
Here's what I'm thinking: I'll write out my opening session, and you guys can help me fill in some potential consequences and/or ideas for where the PCs might go and what they might be able to do after that. Maybe we even get a chain of events going. If there are enough ideas, I could even put together a mind map.
If anyone's interested, I'll post the map. But, keep in mind it's my first one (I have a couple others that I'm working on that are already much better).
Alright, here goes.
Our PCs start at a carnival setting with midway games, food & drink, and entertainment (inspired by this thread). Depending on what the PCs each decide they want to do, I'll figure out ways to end up with them all arrested. The wizard tries to use magic in a game, stall owners call security. The fighter rolls a nat 20 on a strength-related game, but still fails, and picks a fight with the stall owner. Another PC gets his pocket picked and follows the urchin into an alley where he just starts screaming for security. You get the idea.
Once all the PCs are in prison, they can get to know each other a bit before they are transported to the City Hall/Duke's palace. Instead of individually going before an arbiter, as per usual, the party are taken to a back room where they meet with the Duke himself.
The Duke tells them a story of how when he was younger, he was leading a group of soldiers to take out a bandit stronghold. It was a fairly successful operation, but one soldier died. That soldier's mother happened to be a witch, and she tracked him down and put a curse on him. She told him that he would never live to see 40 years of age (which is how old her son was when he died). The Duke's 40th birthday party is in a week, and he's absolutely convinced that the curse will take effect before then. If the group agrees to track down the witch and figure out how to remove the curse, he will not only ensure that they are not tried for their crimes, but he will make sure they are rewarded. If they choose not to participate, they will be tried, and the Duke will ensure they are convicted.
The part goes to track down the witch [insert witch dungeon encounter here]. It honestly doesn't matter if they succeed or not... maybe they find evidence that the witch is dead, or come up with some other creative way of solving the problem. Whatever happens, when they return to the Duke, they are intercepted by his trusted adviser who tells them that the Duke has turned into an infant! (The party may or may not find out that this is actually not the first time the Duke has been turned into a baby.) As they are the only people who know of the curse, they must take the baby to the king, who is the Duke's much older brother (only, he's actually the Duke's much younger brother, because the Duke is actually like 120 years old). The party starts on the journey, escorting an infant to the royal city in hopes of delivering him to the king's palace.
Alright, your turn! What happens next? What are some other options in case the party decides to go a different direction?
Can't wait to see what you come up with.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Aug 13, 2015 6:29:42 GMT
The party must decide who gets diaper duty on the first day of travel. Whoever gets assigned this task ...
Scratch that.
a) Players accept the quest:
En route to the King, the party encounters a dangerous creature by chance. It is beyond their ability to defeat, but it fortunately has not detected their presence. The appearance of this creature foreshadows events occurring elsewhere in the kingdom -- it is the ally of a powerful enemy of the king, our BBEG. Whether they begin carefully and stealthily edging away, or simply hide and wait for the threat to pass, the baby begins to cry. The DM can award them a pass on this encounter for some quick thinking (ex: making funny faces at the baby to stop it crying, cast a silence spell, shove the baby in a portable hole - but not for longer than 5 minutes!). Failing any bright ideas, they may make a persuasion check (DC 10 or 15) to coo the baby to quietude. If the check fails, they will be detected. The DM must telegraph well the extreme danger the creature presents; the party is not yet meant to fight it. He should also provide a viable place to escape.
I am being intentionally vague here, because I'm not sure how generic or party specific you imagine this exercise to be. An example may be an adult green dragon. While travelling through the woods en route to the king's castle, the dragon lands in a nearby clearing to pounce on a hapless bear it wanted to eat. The noise will disturb the baby and cause it to start crying, unless the party acts quickly. Little do they know, the dragon is allied with an evil vassal of the king, another Duke and a powerful wizard, who has been waiting for a chance to depose his ruler. If they are detected, they will quickly discover a cave entrance that is far too small for the dragon to follow. The dragon collapses the cave entrance, and now the party must find another way out, with their delicate charge in tow. The DM may wish to have the dragon discover and chase them regardless of how they deal with the baby when it starts crying, if he has some fun ideas for the cave in mind.
b) the party refuses the quest
The party will still encounter the creature under similar circumstances, though without the baby in tow, will have a much easier time of avoiding detection. The point is still to foreshadow the BBEG's ally. Let's say, after a week of adventuring -- whatever they choose to do, the DM will need some basic filler material -- they start hearing rumors about the (baby) Duke's disappearance, and his citizens are starting to become restive. Worse, bandits are getting bolder. Eventually the players will either stumble upon, or track down a group of bandits. This group ambushed and murdered the adviser and his bodyguards mere hours ago. The adviser realized he'd have to take matters into his own hands and sought to reach the king. The bandits found the baby after the carnage, and one of them decided to keep it around because he lost his own child years ago, and he's got a soft spot.
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Samuel Wise
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Post by Samuel Wise on Aug 13, 2015 6:38:19 GMT
This sounds like a fun adventure hook. It is also great because one can take either a wacky or serious approach to it.
I would have the players find evidence of the Witch being dead for at least a 100 years. That should cause enough confusion.
Perhaps the King wants to kill his younger brother, but has been unable to do so due to the Dukes high Social status or for some political reason. Perhaps the Duke was meant to be King, but was to be crowned on (of all days) his 40th birthday. So he is the true heir to the throne, he just can never be crowned. Maybe the King even told the witch where the Duke was staying so that she could curse him so that he could never get the throne. Did the duke know this? Did he send the PCs to try to find a why to stop the curse? Why has the King put a bounty on their heads? Who else is vying for control of the throne? Is the Witch really dead? If the King made a deal with the witch what was her price? Is the Queen actually the Queen (or is she the witch)?
Just one idea of many, but I'm sort of fond of this. Of course, this is big picture (and it assumes you had not planned out who the King was and his affect on the story as a whole). If I gave too broad a context on which to build off, then I apologize, my imagination carried me away.
EDIT: Just noticed Nevurr posted his while I was writing mine... Now are we supposed to link these? Or have mine as just an idea.
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Post by Vulash on Aug 13, 2015 13:00:03 GMT
OOC: I'm working my way through a couple ideas that I can't quite make fit yet. I think this is a great idea! I do have one comment, if this has happened multiple times I'm not sure it works to have the Duke just be an older brother, unless something is also going on with the King. I think he'd have to be like a grandfather or older to account for multiple generations. I'll keep thinking this through for my addition!
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Post by whipstache on Aug 13, 2015 14:35:34 GMT
Both of these are fantastic. Nevvur took a more direct "what happens next" approach, while almarianknight went with more of a "why are these things happening," background story tack. I think they work quite well together. As for the exercise, I'm definitely looking more for ideas (or "bones" if you will) that could work with any party composition.
Here's the way I see them working together to make the most sense.
Whether or not the PCs initially takes the Baby Duke with them, they come across the travelling party of the Duke's adviser, who have clearly been the victims of some bandits. The PCs are ambushed by the same bandit party. After dispatching the bandits, the PCs have the Baby Duke in tow (as I can't imagine any party with at least one good-aligned character leaving the infant in the middle of the woods alone). As they continue their travels, they encounter an insurmountable foe (dragon, iron golem, goristro, etc.). Let's take Nevvur's idea of a dragon preying on a bear in a field. If the PCs don't take the GM's hints not to fight the dragon, then the bear can actually be a druid NPC that guides the PCs away safely, and provides some useful information connecting the dragon to some nefarious plan. Hopefully, though, they will attempt to avoid the dragon, and have to do some research as to where, how, and why the dragon exists.
Behind the scenes: The Duke's adviser doesn't have any idea that the King collaborated with the Witch to cast this curse. Without that knowledge, sending the Baby Duke to his brother was the next logical move. As almarianknight suggested, the King did so as a power play (remember, the Duke is actually the older brother of the King, and would have been in line for the throne.) The King was young and rash, and isn't actually evil, but is willing to go to great lengths to acquire and keep the power that will help him lead his nation. Hopefully, this will make any moral quandaries related to the confrontation between the PCs and King more interesting.
The witch has actually been dead for nearly 70 years. (I've worked out the timing. If the Duke were cursed before his first 40th birthday, and his brother was, say, 16 at the time, then the King would have to currently be 96 year-old. So maybe he's not human. Half-elf? The Duke, though, is full human?) If the PCs can work this information out, they will have a big clue as to the history of the situation. The King has made a tenuous alliance with the dragon (or sorcerer if golems or demons are involved), only a small component of which deals with his brother, and the secret of the curse. These draconian anomalies have been rumored to have occurred in 40 year increments, beginning 80 years ago, and corresponding to the other two times the Duke has been reduced to infancy. They've also been blamed for the the Duke's disappearance each time (although, bear in mind that he would have been thought to have been different people, with different names and identities each reset).
This is great! Let's keep going. I have this idea that in the long run, the Duke will be returned to his (most recent) former self and take up arms against his brother the king (AND the dragon/sorcerer!) and the party (and nation) will be caught in the midst of this family feud turned civil war. But, it seems like there needs to be some other things filled in before we can get to that point. Plus, I think having the PCs carrying around a baby for a while would be really interesting for all kinds of situations, especially combat and stealth as has been mentioned.
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Post by whipstache on Aug 13, 2015 14:39:16 GMT
OOC: I'm working my way through a couple ideas that I can't quite make fit yet. I think this is a great idea! I do have one comment, if this has happened multiple times I'm not sure it works to have the Duke just be an older brother, unless something is also going on with the King. I think he'd have to be like a grandfather or older to account for multiple generations. I'll keep thinking this through for my addition! I saw you posted this while I was writing my response. I think having the king be an out-of-wedlock half elf would allow him to be old enough for all this to be plausible. It also adds some flavor to the rivalry between the two. But, if you have a different idea, please share! |
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Post by Vulash on Aug 13, 2015 14:55:22 GMT
Can we brainstorm here? Because I haven't fully finalized my thoughts (backstory related), and I'm not sure if they'd work anyway with the direction things are going. So I'll just put out what I've been thinking, and feel free to fully ditch it. But perhaps it will spark some ideas from someone else.
I was trying to figure out a way that the original bandit slain was also tied to the Duke and his curse. Perhaps the price the Duke paid was another life. Instead of being the Witch's son (since the Duke and the Witch were working together), perhaps it was a family member (a cousin or something) that the Duke betrayed for his continual rebirths. And perhaps when he asked for eternal youth, this wasn't quite the bargain he expected. Now, he must hunt down and slay the "cousin" before he turns 40 every cycle. When he is reborn as an infant, the cousin is as well, but without the benefit of family name and trusted advisers - so he typically ends up in the life of a bandit. Or maybe it WAS the witch's son, and she framed this curse so that her son would also benefit from eternal life - it just didn't work out as happily as she had planned. Now the Duke must discover this man he's tied to, and find a way to kill him before he turns 40 every cycle.
I'm not sure that works with where the story is going now, but like I said maybe it will spark something. Does the Duke keep his memories? Does he know the truth of the curse?
I almost mentioned throwing some elven heritage into the bloodline to fix the timing issues! The only other solutions I saw were to make him a more distant ancestor. Or perhaps something about taking the "Kingship" means extended life for this nation. Perhaps the crown, or the throne, grants extended life so that the nation undergoes less changes of leadership. Maybe the Duke was shafted from his rightful place on the throne, and that's why he sought extended youth through other means, or maybe he's the younger, jealous brother that didn't get the benefit of the throne, and sought out the witch.
Okay, those are my rambling and unpolished thoughts for backstory! I'll try to come up with something for the "moving forward" when I get a moment!
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Post by whipstache on Aug 13, 2015 15:55:43 GMT
Thanks for the input, Vulash!
In my original idea, the Witch's son was a soldier in the care of the Duke, not a bandit being attacked. But, this is certainly an interesting take. There's no reason why the Duke's curse can't have been attached to someone else. There's a little Dorian Gray in here somewhere... is someone else somewhere benefiting from the Duke's perpetual life reset? Maybe the dragon (or, in this case, it would probably be even better were it a sorcerer) gains 40 years of life each time the Duke returns to baby-hood? It also reminds me a bit of Count Rugen saying nonchalantly, "I've just sucked one year of your life away." Only here, it's 40, and the sorcerer is taking them for him/herself! A sorcerer who turns from 70 years old to 30 years old, but actually has 120+ years of sorcery-ing would be a pretty formidable foe.
What would be the connection between the Witch and the Sorcerer? They collaborated on the curse, then he betrayed her and killed her, taking the opportunity to attach himself to the Duke through the curse?
This could also explain how the Sorcerer and King came to be ill-fitting partners.
Interesting ideas, indeed...
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Post by arnil on Sept 7, 2015 20:49:43 GMT
Quick question? Has the carnival scene already been played through? Cause i imagine it would be hard to make sure those events happened. It would make a good opening statement however to explain to the pcs why they are already in prison. That said. If they refuse the quest what if a rebel group asks them to track down and kill the baby duke? Or steal him so they can raise the heir to think like them? dungeonsandtulu.wordpress.com/ |
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Post by whipstache on Sept 8, 2015 13:51:51 GMT
No, I'm building this out in more of a "theoretical, some day" kind of situation. I don't have a group that plays right now.
That's a good thought. Thanks!
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