SESSION 45B: UPON A HILL OF CORPSE FLOWERS

October 31st, 2009
The 25th Day of Kadal in the 790th Year of the Seyrunian Dynasty

HOMUNCULI OF THE CITY

They wanted to get an early start the next day, but Elestra was still immersed in her meditations. And Tor had his training at the Godskeep. On the way there, Tor spontaneously decided to stop and purchase a bull whip. He had a few ideas for how it might come in useful.

While they waited for Tor to return, Tee grabbed the morning newssheets. The Columned Row Killer had struck again, but this time it had been seen in the act: A “tall, muscular creature with blue-black skin, glowing yellow eyes, and lanky black hair” had attacked a merchant passing through the Old City Gate. The creature had been driven off by the city guard, but not before leaving its victim in paralytic coma.

With a sinking feeling in their hearts, they recognized the description: It was the troll-spawn that had been freed from the Banewarrens. An evil that had been locked away for centuries now walked the streets of Ptolus.

Agnarr was also able to pick up the mage-touched chain that Hirus had been working on for Seeaeti. While the others discussed the troll-spawn, he took Seeaeti out near the Minstel’s stables and spent some time training him in the wearing of the mail.

Around noon, Tor returned to the Ghostly Minstrel and they went upstairs to check on Elestra. They found her missing: Her communion with the Spirit of the City had taken her on a walk-about through the streets of Ptolus, collecting bits of brick and rough cast which she eventually took to the heart of Midtown and there assembled into a geometrically fractal cairn. This final act of symbolic linkage complete, the cairn had risen up as the animated extrusion of the Spirit itself: A homunculus of the city.

Elestra returned to the Ghostly Minstrel and introduced the others to her new companion. They gathered in the common room for lunch and then left for the Necropolis.

POLLEN PLAGUE

With the information Ranthir had retrieved from the Administration Building on the 22^nd they found the tomb easily enough. Near the apex of a gently sloping hill (which Ranthir’s papers named Darklock Hill) they spotted several stone sarsens jutting up from the ground, forming a rough and imperfect circle. Each of the sarsens bore the sigil of Alchestrin and were worn with age and crept-over with moss. The grass had grown tall around them, and here and there even taller plants had sprung up with broad, shiny leaves and brightly-colored flowers. More disturbingly, they could see the corpses of small animals scattered here and there around the sarsens.

A faint whiff of pungent decay wafted down the hill towards them, but they decided to brazenly ignore the animal carcasses and head straight up the hill towards the sarsens. As they drew near the circle, they could see in its center a large iron plug etched with bronze and set into the earth.

Before they could actually enter the circle, however, Agnarr spotted dark scales slithering through the grass – marking the passage of a massive, coal-black serpent with scales that glimmered like black ice beneath the stars. In its wake, it left a thin veil of frost upon the grass. At nearly twenty feet in muscle-rippled length, it must have been wrapped around one of the sarsens to escape their notice. Now it reared up, gaping a mouth from which issued faint plumes of glittering, icy mist.

Tor and Agnarr moved forward to meet the serpent, but as they did so a sudden nausea settled over the group. The serpent must have been exuding some sort of disquieting aura or perhaps noxious fumes. The effect only seemed to intensify as it focused the gaze of its coal-black eyes upon Nasira, locking her in a paralytic gaze that stopped her stone cold.

The nausea, which sent Tor reeling, disrupted their concerted attack and Agnarr – although largely unaffected – found himself getting bound in its icy, limb-numbing coils. Before the serpents’ tightening curves could draw tight, however, Agnarr was able to stretch his mighty thews and break free, sending the serpent spasming away.

But then the real panic set in as Tor started coughing up black blood and oozing black blood from his eyes. The symptoms of the others were beginning to worsen as well, and with only Agnarr fit to face the serpent, it seemed unlikely that its threat would be ended before they were all unconscious or dead or worse.

Fortunately, Tee – trying to suppress a cough that seemed as if it would rip out her lungs – spotted one of the tall, brightly-colored flowers turning towards them with an almost sadistic purpose. Making an intuitive leap she realized that the flowers – not the serpent – were the true source of the noisome plague. She shouted out a warning to the others while lurching towards the nearest flower, but her weakly-swung sword failed to produce any effect on its thick, armored stalk as she collapsed.

Ranthir and Elestra, meanwhile, managed to retreat to a safe distance. Near the foot of the hill they discovered that they were beyond the plague-pollen of the flowers. With her lungs almost immediately alleviated, Elestra sent her homunculus to start hauling people to a safe distance.

Then Agnarr managed to finally plunge his flaming sword down the icy throat of the ebon snake. Wrenching his blade free he swung it towards the nearest corpse flower, but as he hacked it apart the flower exploded in a massive cloud of poisonous vapor and pollen – a visible blackening of the air that seemed to cling to skin and eyes, clawing its way through mouth and nose and down into the lungs.

Agnarr (at the heart of the explosion) and Ranthir (caught unexpectedly in its edge) collapsed. Elestra, in a panic, rushed in to heal the badly wounded Agnarr… and promptly collapsed from the pervasive pollen of the remaining flowers.

Thus all of them were unconscious upon the flanks of the hill, their bodies being slowly consumed by the plague pollen.

Fortunately, the homunculus continued carrying out its last orders: To carry the unconscious to the base of the hill and out of the pollen cloud. Several of those who were hopelessly ill before managed to recover once they were taken far enough away from the flowers and they were able to tend to the rest.

Once everyone had been restored to at least a semblance of health, they backed off to an even safer distance and then sent the homunculus to kill the rest of the flowers.

Running the Campaign: Monster + Environment – Campaign Journal: Session 45C
In the Shadow of the Spire: Index

Look, the robbers are living right next door to the man-eating ghouls! The Crypt of St. Bethesda is a textbook example of how not to write an adventure.

Review Originally Published May 21st, 2001

Let me just cut to the chase on this one: The Crypt of St. Bethesda strains credulity beyond the boundaries of sanity.

You’ve got a band of robbers living right next door to man-eating ghouls. Man-eating ghouls who wander through the lair of a giant spider. Giant rats which compete with a carrion crawler over the food provided by an inn’s garbage dump. And all of them live within shouting distance of a pseudo-undead on a killing spree to replace its decaying host.

And all of them live in the basement of an abandoned church!

Ummmm….

(Actually, now that I think about it, it sounds like a bad premise for a sitcom.)

Add in the dash of an illogical adventure hook (which the author knows is illogical because he spends nearly two pages discussing exactly how to force your players to swallow this ridiculous pill – and only succeeds in making it more ridiculous), and you’ve got a truly… ummm… memorable experience.

This one’s a very big dud, folks. Pass it by.

Style: 3
Substance: 1

Title: The Crypt of St. Bethesda
Author: James Macduff
Publisher: Alderac Entertainment Group
Line: Adventure Keep
Price: $2.49
Product Code: 8307
Pages: 16

Because these adventures are so short, the reviews are also short. When I started reviewing them, I actually grouped multiple reviews together to give them a little more bulk. But it turned out that messed with people’s ability to find them through RPGNet’s search function, so as I continued my reviews of the series I started doing them one at a time. Even if they were brief.

Next AEG Booster Review: Out of Body, Out of Mind

For an explanation of where these reviews came from and why you can no longer find them at RPGNet, click here.

DISCUSSING
In the Shadow of the Spire – Session 45A: By Commissar’s Decree

“I’m glad you could come here today,” Carrina said. “The Commissar appreciates all of the work and sacrifices you have made for this city.”

“Happy to oblige,” Tor said.

“As your recent actions in the Temple District suggest, you’re already familiar with the recent surge in cultist activities within the city,” Carrina continued.

“Intimately so,” Tee said.

“Just so,” Carrina smiled thinly. “That’s why the Commissar has chosen to deputize you to investigate the cultist activity.”

“We’re already doing that,” Elestra blurted.

“Then it should be no great hardship to do it in the Commissar’s name,” Carrina said. “You will each be paid 75 gold pieces a month, with additional bonuses to be paid at my discretion for tangible results.”

One of my favorite things to do as a GM is having powerful and important people – the people in charge – recognize and acknowledge what the PCs have been doing in the campaign. Sometimes this is a good thing. Sometimes it isn’t. Often it’s a little bit of both. But either way, this is almost always guaranteed to excite the players.

Focusing on just the good stuff for the moment, recognition in my games have resulted in the PCs being:

• Recruited to exclusive organizations
• Featured in news reports
• Invited to exclusive social events
• Deputized to solve a problem
• Given a spaceship
• Granted lucrative contracts
• Knighted
• Given noble titles

Sometimes this acts as a kind of reverse patronage: Instead of having someone rich and powerful offer them payment up front, they instead materialize after the fact and give the PCs a monetary or material reward for something they did for completely different reasons.

An earlier example of recognition as reward in this campaign was the Harvesttime party at Castle Shard. In that case, the social event reward also served as a way to advance several threads of the campaign, introduce new NPCs, and drop a number of clues.

Similarly, in this session, the PCs are getting deputized, giving them official recognition and a small stipend for doing the thing they’re already doing (investigating the chaos cults). Deputization is also an example of the techniques I talk about in Random GM Tips: Calling in the Little Guys, where the official response to the PCs calling the cops (or the local equivalent) is to say, “Wow! Yeah! That’s definitely a problem! Can’t wait to see how you resolve it!” So, in this case, I’m kind of preemptively taking “let’s go to the authorities!” off the table: Yes, the Commissar would definitely be interested in stopping the chaos cults. Rather than letting that potentially sideline the PCs, let’s instead seize the opportunity to put them in the spotlight!

In other words, delivering recognition as reward can often serve multiple purposes at the same time.

As such, no matter how positive the immediate recognition, it’s also almost always a double-edged sword: Being recognized as important also means painting a target on yourself. You’re an important superhero? Then supervillains may want to preemptively take you off the board. You’re known to have the ear of the crown prince? That makes you a target for grifters, conmen, and others who see the PCs as a means to their ends. (This is also what happened when Rehobath schismed the Imperial Church.)

To flip this one last time, though, the reason recognition attracts negative attention like moths to flame is specifically because the PCs are burning so bright! Even without a formal position (like becoming deputies), recognition can be as empowering as any magic item. Often moreso. Having the ear of the crown prince isn’t just really cool, it also lets you do things that would otherwise be impossible.

This not only enhances your current camapign. It’s also a signal that you’re ready for a new kind of adventure.

Campaign Journal: Session 45B – Running the Campaign: Monster + Environment
In the Shadow of the Spire: Index

SESSION 45A: BY COMMISSAR’S DECREE

October 31st, 2009
The 24th Day of Kadal in the 790th Year of the Seyrunian Dynasty

They emerged from the incense-drenched depths of Porphyry House into the surreal, sunlit streets of Ptolus.

Still gasping for breath, they decided to return to the Ghostly Minstrel, regroup, and recoup.

But when they arrived, the watchman from the Delvers’ Guild station who had been intermittently harassing them since Ranthir’s encounter with a shivvel addict was waiting for them in the lobby. For the first time, they learned his name – Marco – and he asked them to come to the watch station with him.

It seemed like an innocent enough request, so they readily agreed. Marco escorted them to the station and then to a small room near the back of the building. Then he left them alone.

“What’s going on?” Nasira asked.

“Are we being arrested?”

“Should we try to escape?” Tor said.

“We haven’t done anything wrong!” Elestra said.

“Well… we have killed some people,” Nasira pointed out.

“And Tee has all of that illegal shivvel in her bag of holding.”

“Maybe we shouldn’t be discussing it here,” Tee said, gritting her teeth.

THE COMMISSAR’S DEPUTIES

A young woman with short-cropped red hair and wearing a signet with the Commissar’s seal stepped into the room. She introduced herself as Carrina.

“I’m glad you could come here today,” she said. “The Commissar appreciates all of the work and sacrifices you have made for this city.”

“Happy to oblige,” Tor said.

“As your recent actions in the Temple District suggest, you’re already familiar with the recent surge in cultist activities within the city,” Carinna continued.

“Intimately so,” Tee said.

“Just so,” Carrina smiled thinly. “That’s why the Commissar has chosen to deputize you to investigate the cultist activity.”

“We’re already doing that,” Elestra blurted.

“Then it should be no great hardship to do it in the Commissar’s name,” Carrina said. “You will each be paid 75 gold pieces a month, with additional bonuses to be paid at my discretion for tangible results.”

“What sort of results?” Tee said.

“I leave it to your imagination,” Carrina said. “I expect regular reports.”

“How do we contact you?”

“Through Marco here at the watch station.” Carrina pulled out an official-looking piece of parchment and handed it to them: It was an official decree by the Commissar enforcing their deputization and empowering them to act as such.

They didn’t really seem to have much choice in the matter. And although the government pay was clearly meager, it was money for doing something they were already committed to. So they started briefing her; rapidly filling her in on all of the major cult hotspots they were aware of around the city.

“Excellent,” Carrina said. “When can you start dealing with them?”

After some soul-searching, they decided to also brief her on the Banewarrens. If nothing else, they suspected that the Pactlords were another cult and, thus, under the purview of their commission.

Carrina had known nothing about the Banewarrens, but she listened carefully to their report. (Which, truth to be told, was not entirely complete. They edited carefully around the involvement of Rehobath and the Inverted Pyramid.) When they were finished, she promised to report the matter back to the Commissar. “Certainly if you think it to be a cult-related threat, you should act on it as quickly as possible.” But beyond that she saw little reason for panic: It was hardly the first vault of powerful artifacts to be found beneath the streets of Ptolus. Nor was it likely to be the last.

SOMETHING STIRS…

After the shellacking they had received in Porphyry House, they decided that they would spend the next day resting and recuperating. Their stores had been badly depleted and they had some deep bruises to heal.

They also agreed that a return to Porphyry House – particularly a Porphyry House likely to be armed and alerted – was beyond their present resources. So they decided to turn their attention back to the Banewarrens: They would pursue their leads to Alchestrin’s Tomb.

Ranthir, delighted at the down time, retreated to his room and his tomes.

Elestra, still mourning the loss of her python viper, retreated to her own room to begin a long communion with the Spirit of the City in the hope that she might be granted a new companion through whom the city’s voice could be heard and its will made manifest.

Tee spent the afternoon hocking their loot. Nasira tagged along with her and they spent the next few hours chatting amiably. In the evening they retired to the Ghostly Minstrel and Tee offered to teach her the game of Dragonscales. (Tee’s thoughts turned for a moment to Dominic with a sad sense of loss: She missed playing the game with him.)

Midway through their series of training games, however, they abruptly realized that the tiles had spelled out the words SOMETHING STIRS. This was not entirely unusual, but as the game continued the phrase appeared again… and again…

Tee cleared the board and they began a new game… SOMETHING STIRS.

They paused and considered their options. Tee tried manipulating the other tiles in various ways to explicate the message (“What stirs?” and so forth)… but then the message stopped occurring altogether.

Running the Campaign: Recognition as Reward – Campaign Journal: Session 45B
In the Shadow of the Spire: Index

Bringing the group together during Session 0 can take a lot of forms, but it ultimately boils down to figuring out why this specific group of PCs is going to stick together and go on adventures / solve mysteries / get in trouble / work with each other week after week.

Whatever the modus operandi of the campaign might be, one of the most reliable ways to make this happen is for the PCs to have existing relationships with each other: If they’re family, friends, and/or coworkers, then they’ll care about each other, routinely be in the same place together, and/or be pursuing the same goals. That makes it a lot easier to explain why they’re all at the ski lodge where the murder happened or taking a freelance contract to raid the Salem-Watts biolabs.

The nice thing is that you don’t need all of the PCs to have the same relationships with each other, nor does every PC need a direct relationship with every other PC. As long as there’s a web of relationships weaving everyone together, the events of the campaign will slowly draw everyone closer and closer to each other.

The Dresden Files Roleplaying Game had an ingenious method for setting up these relationships which was, sadly, stripped out of the current Dresden Files Accelerated version of the game. Fortunately, it can be easily adapted to almost any game and setting.

SHARED HISTORY

Once the players have created their characters and have a firm grasp on who they are, you can plug this module in by creating an Adventure for each PC.

Note: This assumes, of course, that the start of the campaign won’t be the PCs’ first rodeo: They’ll be coming to the table with some experience under their belts.  If that isn’t the case, then you may need to make some adjustments. (For example, maybe the campaign takes place on the UCLA campus. Rather than adventure, you could create a Freshmen Year event for each PC, establishing some big, dramatic event that happened to them.)

To begin creating your PC’s adventure, start by grabbing a notecard. This will be your adventure card.

STEP 1: TITLE

Write a title for your adventure at the top of your adventure card. If you’re having trouble coming up with a cool title, think about books, movies, and short stories from the same genre as the campaign and then give them a twist:

• The Bourne Identity could become The Sampson Identity.
• Gone With the Wind could, with a twist to both noun and verb, become Arrival by Sea.
• The Lord of the Rings, by similar process, becomes The Duke of Swords.
• Escape from New York just needs a location shift to become Escape from Casablanca.

Alternatively, you might use any of these simple title formulas:

• The [Adjective] [Noun] (e.g., The Black Prince or The Remarkable Mr. Smith)
• The [Noun] of the [Place] (e.g., The Anxiety of Mars or The Uncle of London)
• They [Verb] (e.g., They Dream or They Hunt)
• A [Noun] [Past-Tense Verb] (e.g., A Crow Murdered or A Funeral Bound)
• The [Adjective] and [Adjective] [Noun] (e.g., The Macabre and Tragic Vision or The Gruesome and Forgotten Murder)

You can also create your own title formulas like this by taking many existing titles and breaking them down by word type.

Like any title, your goal is to create something evocative and intriguing. You might already have a premise in mind for your adventure (as described in Step 2) and craft your title to it; but starting with a cool title and then figuring out what the adventure for it is can be equally effective.

STEP 2: ADVENTURE PREMISE

Next, write down a simple premise for your adventure. The Dresden Files Roleplaying Game suggests this template:

When [something happens], [your protagonist] [pursues a goal]. But will [your protagonist] succeed when [antagonist provides opposition]?

For example:

When SpaceX engineers start turning up dead with blood streaming from their eyes, Jack Hammer is hired to discover the dark truth. But will Jack Hammer succeed when it becomes clear Elon Musk wants to shut the investigation down?

But there are a lot of different premises you could use. For example, S. John Ross’ Big List of RPG Plots is a fantastic resource, including entries like:

MANHUNT

Someone is gone: they’ve run away, gotten lost, or simply haven’t called home in a while. Somebody misses them or needs them returned. The PCs are called in to find them and bring them back.

Which can give you a premise like this:

Duchess Scarlet Madara is kidnapped from the Cannes Film Festival! Jack Hammer is at the festival attending the opening of a film written about his life. Can he solve the case even while standing in the limelight?

In writing up your premise, make sure your character’s role in the story is clear and phrase the conclusion as a question, leaving the ultimate outcome uncertain. You’ll also want to keep it short: ideally no more than two or three sentences.

STEP 3: GUEST STAR

Everyone should now read their character’s adventure premise out loud and place their notecard in the center of the table. Then, taking turns in whatever manner seems appropriate, everyone should select an adventure belonging to a different PC. (Alternatively, everyone could pass their card to the left. Or you could shuffle the cards and deal them out randomly.)

However the decision is made, you should now be holding the notecard for an adventure starring a PC other than your own. Your character will now be guest starring in this adventure!

To do this, simply add one or two sentences to the card explaining your character’s supporting role in the story. When brainstorming your contribution, it can be a good idea to talk things over with the player of the starring character and make sure you’re both on the same page and happy with the outcome. Your character should be significant — either complicating the situation or aiding the protagonist (or possibly both) — but not usurping the role of main character. (You don’t want to be a Mary Sue.)

It can be useful to think of a single dramatic situation involving your character, the protagonist, and, optionally, the antagonist(s). For inspiration, you might want to check out Thirty-Six Dramatic Situations by Georges Polti. (You can find of Polti’s original book here, but it may be easier to consult of the hundreds of summary lists scattered around the internet to glean the essential idea.)

For example, one of Polti’s dramatic situations is:

13. ENMITY OF KINSMEN

“Hatred of one who should be loved” is a powerful antithesis.

(…)

(3) Hatred Between Relatives for Reasons of Self-Interest: “La Maison d’Argile” (Fabre, 1907). Example from fiction: “Mon Frere” (Mercereau).

Which might lead you to:

Rick Cuthain, the bastard brother of Duchess Scarlet who has always resented her, is the #1 suspect of the Gendarmerie! But after convincing Jack Hammer of his innocence, Rick helps him discover Scarlet’s connections to the strange Cult of Serpents.

Once you’ve added your character to the adventure card, take a moment to jot down the title and other details in your own character’s background. This is, after all, part of their story, too! Note, for example, how Rick’s player has discovered not only a sister, but an entire family wrought with drama through their participation in Jack’s story.

STEP 4: SECOND GUEST STAR

Repeat Step 3, with each player selecting a different character’s story and casting their PC as a guest star. (It’s okay to guest star in someone else’s story if they’re also a guest star in yours, but you shouldn’t guest star in the same story twice.)

For this step, it’s okay if your contribution also wraps the story up, but it doesn’t have to.

Once you’re done with this step, everyone should (a) have an adventure starring their character and guest starring two other PCs and (b) be the guest star in two other PCs’ adventures.

(If you only have two players, skip this step.)

STEP 5: WRAPPING UP

If your second guest star’s contribution to your adventure didn’t provide a conclusion, add one now.

You can flesh your adventure out a bit if you want, but you don’t have to. The capsule descriptions should provide you with a fundamental understanding of what happened that you and the other players can riff on and develop during play. (“Remember that time we broke into the Starlink facility in Bastrom and hacked the whole network?”)

If they don’t already, make sure everyone involved in your adventure has a copy of it. (Or, at least, their part in it.) You want to make sure everyone knows the canonical version of events.

Back to Session 0 Modules