DISCUSSING
In the Shadow of the Spire – Session 46B: Into the Asylum
Elestra reached out to the memories of Zairic’s corpse through the Spirit of the City. In a horrible, gurgling voice Zairic’s head spoke from it lay atop his corpse, attached by only a slim flap of flesh.
I love speak with dead almost as much as my players do. It’s an essential part of their toolkit whether they’re scouting a dungeon, unraveling a mystery, or probing the depths of a conspiracy. The In the Shadow of the Spire group actually keeps a “dead-icated bag” — a bag of holding for the important corpses they want to hold onto and question again after the one week waiting period has expired.
This means that I need to be prepared for all of their speak with dead antics, which is something I talk about in more detail in Random GM Tip: Speak With Dead Mysteries. (I also talk about how I keep track of the bodies in the dead-icated bag in Campaign Status Module: Trackers.)
But the fun part is figuring out all of the gruesome ways these mangled and half-rotten corpses speak under the influence of the spell.
Zairic, as seen here, is a fairly mundane example (although miming his head hanging on by a flap of skin had a pretty great effect on my players when combined with the gurgling voice), but I try to bring a little bit of flair to these, as seen with Silion back in Session 40:
“We can still ask her a few questions,” Elestra asked. “I can force her body’s memories to speak through the Spirit of the City. But we’ll only be allowed three questions, so we should choose them carefully.”
Tee nodded. “Let’s make sure we get it right.”
They debated the list of questions for the better part of half an hour and then Elestra wove her magic. Silion’s decapitated head rose into the air, its blood dripping in a sickly, coagulate gore down onto its own corpse below.
If speak with dead is a common part of your campaign, you could certainly prep a list of these to use as needed. Personally, I enjoy improvising them — taking into account the dead NPC, the circumstances of their death, their wounds, and even the surrounding scenery wherever the PCs are casting the spell.
A few things to think about in improvising your own speak with dead moments:
- How does their wound affect their voice?
- What unnatural position could the body be contorted into?
- How could the strangeness of the spell impact the surroundings (e.g., spattering blood, rattling bones, the corpse’s severed arm trying to crawl back to the torso from across the room)?
- Is there an overtly supernatural effect (e.g., the body floats into the air or an eery glow emanates from the corpse’s mouth)?
The goal is for the players to viscerally appreciate that what they’re doing is anything but natural or ordinary. (Is it evil? Morally grey? That depends on your morality. But, regardless, it shouldn’t be easy for them to feel comfortable about what they’re doing. It should feel like weird shit, and they probably wouldn’t want their mothers walking into the room while they’re doing it.)
There’s no need to overdo it, though. Just one or two key details are enough to bring the scene to vivid life. Less is more, and if you’ve got a really cool idea… well, there’s always the next corpse.
Campaign Journal: Session 47A – Running the Campaign: TBD
In the Shadow of the Spire: Index
