Go to Part 1

Modya can be found either at work (a small suite of BdNY offices in the center of Tower Babylon) or at home (a single-room coffin+ apartment buried in the skin of Metis).

• A taggant thumb hive was secreted into the cushions of her couch by Neuralite agents; she herself has several taggants on her.

DESCRIPTION: A mousy-featured flat with a bob cut of dark brown hair.

ROLEPLAYING:

• Russian accent.
• Scared, traumatized, frightened, and confused.
• Constantly thirsty. She will repeatedly offer to get the PCs drinks and will frequently fetch herself another glass of water.

BACKGROUND:

• Modya was an infugee until eight months ago when BdNY pulled her out of cold storage for her actuarial skills.
• Hasn’t been socializing much. Her coworker Tanya finally convinced her to come out to the Black Light. Tanya never showed up. (This is a dead end: Tanya got invited to an arthouse orgy and ditched Modya without even the courtesy of a mesh ping.)
• Modya has been spending most of her spare time and credits trying to figure out what happened to her husband’s ego; they’d been transmitted off Earth at the same time, but her file had been shuffled around so much that she has no idea where he might have ended up.

NOTES:

• Blood or tissue samples from Modya can be subjected to medical analysis (see Node 3).
• Modya is constantly thirsty because she has subconsciously manifested the High Pain Threshold psi-chi sleight (Eclipse Phase, pg. 224) due to the psi-epsilon primer. She has to keep drinking the water because otherwise the primer wears off and her body, having acclimated to the psi-chi, interprets the result as severe pain.
• This morning, Modya was questioned by employees of Neuralite. They claimed to have been hired as a freelance investigation team following up on the Black Light incident. Modya told them she left before the incident and they seemed to accept that.

Go to Node 3: Medical Analysis

Go to Part 1

Located on the 276^th sunward floor of the Harrington Torque, one of the kilometers-tall spindle-scrapers that criss-cross Nova York.

INTERIOR

The interior décor is black-on-black with every single item limned in a blue light. In the UV spectrum, however, the club is a polychromatic disaster; a nouveau style that’s being referred to as “invisible pollocking”.

GHOSTS: Those subscribing to the Black Light’s custom AR channel (for a nominal fee) will find that the club is “haunted” by a number of spectral blue spirits who float here and there. These are all delta forks developed from egos that only survived the Fall as vapors.

LAYOUT: There’s a hemispherical bar area with tables studded across the floor. The dome of the bar is a dance floor designed for people wearing grip-pads. There are also two lounge areas (one for VIPs). The employee-only area contains a kitchen, storage, a break room, and the manager’s office.

ACTIVITY: During the day, the Black Light is largely deserted with just a few desultory drinkers. At night, the bar and lounge areas are thickly crowded. (The recent incident only created a sensation and increased the club’s demand; people are reporting that real ghosts are haunting the place.)

INVESTIGATION TEST – BAR: Will find the protoplasmic vomit (see below).

INVESTIGATION TEST – KITCHEN: Will find the component recently added to the drink fabber (see below).

CHARACTERS

MANAGER – EVANDER MOON: A gruff man in a splicer morph; blue, pseudo-prehensile dreadlocks and a slight potbelly. He’s convinced that the whole thing was a prank; some sort of “living art” piece somebody is prepping in anticipation of the Intergalactic Art and Culture Show. More than happy to take the free publicity, though.

BARTENDER – PAULA BANWIN: Friendly face in a dark-skinned splicer. She’s still badly shaken by what she experienced during the incident (which included a detailed vision of her watching TITAN drones kill her family and her original body… events she has no memory of because she escaped Earth as an infomorph fork before they happened).

Paula keeps a lifelog. She’s been teasing the events of last night and hasn’t publicly released all the footage, but they would function as surveillance footage (see below).

CLUE – SURVEILLANCE FOOTAGE

Can be obtained from the club’s security system, Paula Banwin’s lifelog, or possibly from other witnesses.

FOOTAGE: Average night at the club. Then all the lights spark brightly; people in the room and various items are clearly drawn towards a point near the center of the hemisphere (as if drawn by a strong gravitic field). People are clinging to tables or to each other and screaming. A few items implode, sending dull shards of safe-glass and ceramics careening around. Then, abruptly, its over; gravity reasserts itself and everyone falls (albeit slowly) towards the floor.

PERCEPTION (+30): One person (and only one person) is unaffected (Modya Oborskaia). Modya remains at her table. Her eyes are wide, but her pupils are rolled back to reveal only the whites of her eyes (which slowly turn red).

Rolling the footage back will reveal that Modya had just arrived and taken her first drink. (The drink was, of course, made in the drink fabber, see below.)

Rolling the footage forward will show that, after the incident, she stumbled away and vomited into a modern art piece that’s been extruded from the wall of the club. (The protoplasmic vomit she spewed up is still there, see below.)

CLUE – DRINK FABBER

Located in the kitchen. Standard model, but a strange, fluted canister made from some sort of black polymer compound has been added to it.

CANISTER: The canister was installed by workers from Neuralite and added epsilon psike-out to everything the fabber made. It has an inventory taggant attached to it that clearly identifies it as coming from a Neuralite storeroom.

Surveillance footage can reveal the person installing the canister. If successfully traced, it will turn out to be Neuralite employee named Evren Nissel (he knows nothing; he was just told to install the canister).

OPENING THE CANISTER: The canister is completely sealed except for the intake and output valves. Breaching the canister will trigger a self-destruct unless an encrypted passkey is broadcast. If the canister is opened, the chemical residue inside can be subjected to medical analysis (see Node 3).

CLUE – PROTOPLASMIC VOMIT

Located in a modern art piece that’s extruded from the wall of the club. Modya vomited into the art piece after the incident.

The vomit is semi-gelatinous and looks something like a decaying jelly fish. In substance, it’s made up almost entirely of protoplasm – as if a huge mass of cells had their plasma membranes stripped from them.

The vomit can be subjected to medical analysis (see Node 3).

Go to Node 2: Modya Oborskaia

FIREWALL BRIEFING

SUMMONS: PCs are summoned to Nova York. No indication of what their mission may be. Fake IDs are not required, although caution never hurt anyone.

RESEARCH (-20): May allow PCs to pick up some of the details from the briefing before arriving.

VIRTUAL CONFERENCE: Hosted in a VR simulspace as soon as the last PCs’ transport is close enough to mitigate transmission delays.

HOST: Depicted as a featureless shadow. Infomorph in a heavily secured eidolon using a suite of kinesic-denying software.

ITINERARY: Firewall has been tracking a series of apparent async events on Nova York over the past six weeks. Rumors or confirmed reports include:

• A telepathic blast allowing someone to summon medical assistance for someone injured in one of the nickel mines.
• A beaten wife causing her husband to collapse through sheer anger. (The muslim community on Nova York is interpreting the incident as a punishment of sin.)
• A series of minor robberies which may have been aided by post-hypnotic suggestions. (Although traditional cyberbrain-hacking may be the actual culprit.)
• Everyone in an area reportedly “sharing the same thoughts”.

Firewall’s initial suspicion was this might be evidence for a new async. Or possibly an async gang trying to expand into Nova York.

Over the last ten days (which may have been while the PCs were in transit), however, there have been three major incidents:

• Over the course of a week, roughly a dozen people were struck with complete and total amnesia. (They’ve been restored from backups. Medical examinations have found no physical cause for their condition.)
• Twenty people in a Banco de Nova York facility simultaneously experienced a “shared delusion” in which they all dived into the caldera of Olympus Mons.
• A fifty-foot-long section of corridor in the Skin was found transmuted into gold.

A fourth incident – the most significant to date – occurred last night at a club named the Black Light.

• Initial reports suggest a massive incident featuring Casimir force repulsion. To date, only exsurgent asyncs have demonstrated the ability to manipulate the Casimir effect.
• The Black Light is located on the 276^th sunward floor of the Harrington Torque, one of the kilometers-tall spindle-scrapers that crisscross Nova York.

The Black Light Incident represents our best lead. Your mission is to identify the cause of the Nova York Events and, if it represents a threat, put an end to it.

BACKGROUND – NOVA YORK (9 METIS)

Nova York is described in detail in Rimward, pg. 26. This section is a brief summary of information from Rimward and also contains original material pertinent to this scenario.

• Population: 500,000 (third largest habitat in the belt)
• 9 Metis: Large nickel-iron and silicate asteroid. (Not to be confused with the moon of Jupiter by the same name.)

THE CAVERN

• CENTRAL CAVERN: Spherical, 4 km in diameter, 200m beneath the asteroid’s surface.
• LIGHTING: Huge light tubes in the outer walls. At night, the lights of the buildings cause the surface of the sphere to resemble an enormous geode.
• GRAVITY: Microgravity of 1/140^th g. (Up and down have little meaning. Falling is irrelevant as air pressure and low gravity eliminate any risk of injury.)
• SPINDLE-SPIRES: Thousands of exceptionally tall and fragile-looking buildings that extend between 100 and 150m above the surface, with a large number that extend all the way across the cavern.
  • Durable frame, with reflective or translucent materials that play with ambient light in the cavern.
  • Residents often jump from one building to another.

THE SKIN: Refers to all the tunnels burrowing through the asteroid around the central cavern. Most of these are the result of mining, but many have been converted to low-rent housing and the like.

NOYO ECONOMICS

• NOYO: The locally produced currency. No other form of currency is accepted.
  • Value of the noyo decreases over time from the date of issue, which is meant to stimulate spending, discourage currency speculation, and prevent wealth accumulation.
  • Value of noyo is pegged to local reputation network, so people with high Noyo rep have their currency devalue at a slower pace.
  • Tends to warp the local rep economy – people tend to avoid “narcing” on their friends because it can create a negative feedback loop when money is on the line.

• BANCO de NOVA YORK (BdNY): Manages all financial transactions and is the habitat’s legal custodian.
  • Residents and businesses rent their roofs; no one owns property.

• EXTROPIAN: Other than the Noyo and BdNY, Nova York is generally extropian.
  • Private contracts for security, insurance, legal code, etc.
  • Each building is often a collective (either closely-knit or purely functional), often sharing contractural services.

NOYO CULTURE

• Cultural melting pot.
  • Wide variety of religious memeplexes.
• Heavily based around visual arts – sculpture, architecture, light-sculpting, sensory experiences, AR experiences, aerial dance routines, etc.
  • Planning to host an Intergalactic Art and Culture Show next year to draw tourists and residents.

BACKGROUND – PSI-EPSILON OPENER

Psi-opener drugs, as described in the core rulebook (pg. 325), are a variant of the Watts-MacLeod strain that temporarily imbue users with the ability to use one particular psi sleight. Neuralite (a well-cloaked subsidiary of the Cognite hypercorp) has been developing an experimental psi-epsilon opener. They’re hoping to unlock the powerful psi-epsilon abilities available only to exsurgents, but crossing the relatively benign Watts-MacLeod virus with active strains of the exsurgent virus is obviously incredibly dangerous.

The psi-epsilon opener is a binary compound: The epsilon primer and the epsilon psike-out. The opener only becomes fully active when the epsilon psike-out is taken by a primed subject.

Testing of the compound proved difficult because it had a very low success rate in laboratory trials. Neuralite’s scientists estimated that for every 1,000 test subjects they brought in, only one might actually manifest psi powers due to the safeguards they had added to the virus’ DNA.

As a result, Neuralite decided to test the compound by pumping the first part of the compound into the H2O supply of Nova York in order to saturate the population in preparation for the “activation event”. Their theory is that when they add the epsilon psike-out to the water supply in a few days, they’ll create roughly 500 powerful asyncs.

The early, minor async events in Nova York are due to an unexpected side effect from the epsilon primer: Citizens who are already asyncs (many of them minor asyncs who don’t even realize they have powers) are experiencing spontaneous and uncontrollable outbursts of psi energy.

The major async events in the last few weeks are the result of Neuralite performing isolated tests of the epsilon psike-out compound.

Epsilon Primer: The primer is essentially a complicated receptive capsid and does not contain any active exsurgent virus. This means that most people exposed to the virus are at no risk and their bodies will flush the primer out of their system within two weeks. The exception to this are asyncs, who must make a Moxie x 20 test once per day while exposed to the drug. On a failure, they’ll manifest a powerful and out-of-control version of a psi sleight. This experience generally inflicts 1d10+5 SV.

Epsilon Psike-Out: If taken by someone under the effects of the epsilon primer, the victim must make a Moxie x 10 test. (An async suffers a -30 penalty on this check.) On a success, the drug only has the effect of a normal psi-opener and psike-out (see Eclipse Phase, pg. 325). On a failure, the victim receives the permanent use of a random psi-epsilon sleight and also benefits from the effects of psike-out. Unfortunately, this also means that he victim is infected with the haunting version of the exsurgent virus (see Eclipse Phase, pg. 366). Each time they use the psi-epsilon sleight, there is a 10% chance that this will upgrade to the mindstealer version of the exsurgent virus (see Eclipse Phase, pg. 367).

ALL HELL BREAKS LOOSE

The epsilon psike-out is scheduled to be released 1d10+1 days after the PCs arrive. (It may happen sooner if Neuralite realizes they’re being investigated and Radom or Vangelis decide to pull the trigger.)

If the PCs fail to prevent the release of the epsilon psike-out, it’s a catastrophe: Neuralite’s estimates are off by a factor of ten (and they also don’t realize they’re creating exsurgents instead of empowered transhuamns). 5,000 psi exsurgents will be created in Nova York (emerging over the course of 1-2 weeks). At fully 1% of the population, they probably can’t be contained. The end result is that Nova York is likely to be quarantined or destroyed.

REVELATION LIST

INVESTIGATING OTHER INCIDENTS

Following up on the events prior to the Black Light is not necessarily fruitless, but there’s not much to go on:

• The people who experienced the telepathic blast have not repeated the experience (although one is, in fact, a weak async and just doesn’t know it).
• The beaten wife is currently being sheltered by her mosque. (She’s an async trying to deny her abilities due to a religious belief that they come from Shaitan.)
• There are no functional leads on the robberies.
• The people suffering from amnesia have no memory of the event (no pun intended). None of them are responsible for the amnesia and neither their egos nor their morphs have anything abnormal about them.
• There’s no indication of who (or what) was responsible for the transmutation (and the owners of the mine have sealed the area off).

Tissue samples taken from the telepath or the beaten wife contain high concentrations of the psi-epsilon opener. It’s difficult to isolate by itself (-20 modifier), but comparing these samples to other relevant samples provides a +10 modifier to those checks. (See Node 3.)

Go to Node 1: The Black Light

This mini-scenario was originally incorporated into my first 3rd Edition campaign in 2000 or 2001. In 2003, I adapted it as a submission to Atlas Games’ En Route II adventure anthology. Unlike my other submissions, this was one was rejected. I retooled it for Dungeon Magazine in 2004, which also rejected it. In both cases, the objection was to the inclusion of time travel. If you don’t like time travel, the odds are you won’t be a fan, either. Otherwise, I think you’ll enjoy this little taste of the weird.

The following encounter has been designed for four characters of 8^th level. Although not a full adventure unto itself, it can be used to add a little spice to an existing adventure or fill a gap when the need arises. It can be incorporated into any journey which takes the PCs along a road.

SUMMARY

While traveling down a road, the PCs have an opportunity to save the Duke of Alasson – also known as the Black Eagle – from worg-riding orcs. An hour later, the PCs have an opportunity to save another Duke of Alasson, this time from wolf-riding ogres. In the process, they discover that they have been at the center of a strange temporal anomaly: The first Duke of Alasson they met lived and died two hundred years before they were born.

THE FIRST EAGLE

The PCs are traveling down a road. Have them make a Listen check (DC 15). If they succeed, read the following to them:

It’s early in the afternoon. The road before you gently rises into a low hill. From beyond the hill, however, you can hear the clear sounds of combat – the clash of sword, the shouts of men, the cries of the wounded.

If the PCs fail their check, tell them that they’re approaching a hill. As they reach the top of the hill – whether they heard the sounds of combat or not – read the following to them:

As you reach the top of the hill, you are met with a scene of fierce and desperate combat below you. More than a dozen squat, swarthy figures astride monstrous wolves have surrounded a group of mounted men in full armor. The men seem to have fallen back some distance from the road now, forming a defensive circle. One man, dressed in black plate with a gold design embossed upon the chest, stands out from the rest – and you easily spot a heraldic banner flying above the group, bearing a golden eagle upon a background of black.

Erren, the third Duke of Alasson is returning from breaking the siege upon Dweredell by the orcish hordes. His army marches several days behind him, but he has galloped ahead after hearing news of an assassination attempt upon his son.

The orcs attacking him seek revenge for his breaking of the siege at Dweredell. Elite leaders within the horde, these orcs saw their army forced into rout and ruin. With their power destroyed or scattered, they gathered and rode in pursuit of the “black eagle of doom” which had broken them.

There are eighteen wolf-riding orcs facing off against the Black Eagle and his eight men. The orcs are fierce fighters and fairly intelligent, but they are not particularly cunning: One group has already charged into combat, and is now engaging in melee. The others are held in reserve. If the PCs make any move to engage the orcs, the nine orcs circling in reserve will charge once at them, and then engage in melee.

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THE ORCS OF THE WASTES: Ftr4; CR 4; HD 4d10+11; hp 33; Init +2 (Dex); Spd 30 ft.; AC 17 (+2 Dex, +5 chain shirt); Atk +7 melee (1d8+4/x3, heavy lance) or +6 ranged (1d6/x3, short bow); AL CE; SV Fort +6, Ref +3, Will +0; Str 16, Dex 14, Con 15, Int 10, Wis 8, Cha 8

Skills and Feats: Listen +4, Ride +6, Spot +4; Mounted Combat, Power Attack, Spirited Charge, Toughness

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RIDING WARGS: Medium-size Magical Beast; CR 2; HD 4d10+8; hp 30; Init +2 (Dex); Spd 50 ft.; AC 14 (+2 Dex, +2 natural); Atk Bite +7 melee (1d6+4); Face 5 ft. by 5 ft.; Reach 5 ft.; SA Trip; SQ Scent; SV Fort +6, Ref +6, Will +3; Str 17, Dex 15, Con 15, Int 6, Wis 14, Cha 10

Skills: Hide +7, Listen +9, Move Silently +7, Spot +9, Survival +2*

Trip (Ex): A worg that hits with a bite attack can attempt to trip the opponent as a free action without making a touch attack or provking an attack of opportunity. If the attempt fails, the opponent cannot react to the trip of the worg.

Skills: A worg receives a +1 racial bonus to Listen, Move Silently, and Spot checks, and a +2 racial bonus to Hide checks. A worg has a +4 racial bonus to Survival checks when tracking by scent.

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AFTER THE FIRST FIGHT

Assuming that the PCs join the fight and help to destroy the orcs, they are approached by the Black Eagle (although the Duke’s men keep a wary eye on the PCs until they have proven themselves trustworthy). The Black Eagle professes, truthfully, that he carries with him no wealth or reward to give in boon to the characters. But he promises that, if the PCs will but ride with him for another three days, then a just reward will be theirs.

If the PCs Continue on Their Way: If the PCs decide to continue on their way, the Black Eagle thanks them again for their heroism – promising that their deeds will be praised in the songs of his halls. He and his retinue then ride out of sight down the road and back into history – the PCs probably never see him again. About an hour later, trigger the encounter with the Second Eagle (below).

If the PCs change their mind and try to catch up with the Black Eagle, they will be unable to find them. PCs who attempt to locate the party’s tracks may make a Survival check at DC 20. On a success, they will be unable to find any tracks but have a certainty that they would have if any existed.

If the PCs Accompany Him: The PCs ride astride with the Black Eagle as part of his entourage for the rest of the day. The Black Eagle will regale them with tales of his deeds (see below) and ask for tales of their deeds, as well. Allow PCs to make a Spot check (DC 25). On a success, let them note that something about the road seems oddly out of place – as if this weren’t quite the same road they had come down. But don’t let them put their thumb on what it is, exactly, that unsettles them.

At dusk, the party makes camp – raising a number of fine tents in an open field. Try to discourage the PCs from keeping a watch (the Black Eagle might take it as an insult if they don’t trust his entourage, for example). If they don’t, then when they awake in the morning they will find the Black Eagle and the entire camp gone without trace. If someone does keep watch, then mid-way through the night they will see the camp fade out of sight and disappear without trace. Either way, when the PCs begin traveling down the road again, trigger the second encounter (see below).

TALES OF THE FIRST EAGLE

The Secret Triumph upon the archery fields of Seranth. The Duke, in defiance of the king’s edict that none of noble blood should compete upon the tourney field in any event save the joust, secretly journeyed to Seranth to participate in the archery contest. There he competed against a man dressed all in black, who was almost his equal with the bow. In the end, the Duke split his own arrow upon the bull’s-eye twice in order to win. His opponent than unmasked, and was revealed to be the king himself.

The Seizing of the Ruby of Westernesse from the Red Prince during the western wars. It was then given as gift to the king, and sits still within the crown.

The Breaking of the Siege of Dweredell. When the dwarven kingdoms fell, the men of Dweredell held siege upon the fallen city of the dwarves for nearly two months before they were forced to fall back. For six weeks the orcs laid siege to Dweredell. In that time, the Duke of Alasson raised a great army and led it to Dweredell – breaking the siege and freeing the city.

THE SECOND EAGLE

Once again have the PCs make a Listen check (DC 15). If they succeed, read the following to them:

About an hour passes before the sound of combat again reaches your ear: Over the next rise it seems as if you hear again the clash of steel, the cry of men, and the bestial howl of the inhuman.

Read the following as the PCs reach the top of the hill:

The scene before you is eerily familiar: A handful of armored men has been surrounded by large, hairy figures astride monstrous wolves. Again, it seems the men have fallen back some distance from the road – forming a defensive circle. Again, you see the distinctive black plate of the Duke of Alasson – and their the banner of the golden eagle upon the black. The figures upon the wolves are larger now – as are the wolves themselves — and it seems that the men fare worse: At least one of their number has already fallen, and you see the signs of bloodying upon several others.

There are eight men accompanying the Duke of Alasson here. They are faced by fifteen Wolf-Riders (see sidebar).

The ogres are far more clever than the orcs of the past: They possess an uncanny advantage with their ability to perform ride-by attacks with reach, and they will not hesitate to make the most of it. Even if the PCs ready an attack against the ogre’s mounted charge, their reach should still allow the ogres to avoid it. Plus, the ogres will have their dire wolves ready an attack after the charge – so if anyone closes with them, the wolves will attack. Combined with the triple damage they do on their attacks, this should make the ogres extremely deadly in melee. The ogres are also smart enough to keep themselves spread out – hemming the duke and his men in, but keeping enough distance between themselves so that area-effect spells are as ineffective as possible.

Five of the ogres will immediately break away from attacking the duke and his men to focus on the PCs. If it becomes clear that the PCs are a credible threat, five more will break off and engage them.

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WOLF-RIDERS: Ogre Ftr 2; CR 5; Large Giant; HD 4d8+2d10+12; hp 41; Init –1 (Dex); Spd 30 ft.; AC 19 (-1 size, -1 Dex, +5 natural, +6 +1 chain shirt); Atk +9 melee (2d6+7, huge greatclub) or +9 melee (2d6+7/x3, large heavy lance); Face 5 ft. by 5 ft.; Reach 10 ft. (15-20 ft. with heavy lance); AL LE; SV Fort +9, Ref +0, Will +1; Str 21, Dex 8, Con 15, Int 11, Wis 10, Cha 7

Skills and Feats: Listen +2, Spot +2, Ride +4; Mounted Combat, Ride-By Attack, Spirited Charge

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THE RED WOLVES (Dire Wolves): CR3; Large Animal; HD 6d8+18; hp 45; Init +2 (Dex); Spd 50 ft.; AC 19 (-1 size, +2 Dex, +5 chain barding, +3 natural); Atk +10 melee (Bite 1d8+10); Face 5 ft. by 10 ft.; Reach 5 ft.; SA Trip; SQ Scent; SV Fort +8, Ref +7, Will +6; Str 25, Dex 15, Con 17, Int 2, Wis 12, Cha 10

Skills: Hide +5, Listen +6, Move Silently +5, Spot +6, Wilderness Lore +1*

Trip (Ex): A dire wolf that hits with a bite attack can attempt to trip the opponent as a free action without making a touch attack or provking an attack of opportunity. If the attempt fails, the opponent cannot react to the trip of the dire wolf.

Skills: A dire wolf receives a +1 racial bonus to Listen, Move Silently, and Spot checks and a +2 racial bonus to Hide checks. *It also receives a +4 racial bonus to Wilderness Lore checks when tracking by scent.

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AFTER THE SECOND FIGHT

As soon as the Black Eagle, Tenth Duke of Alasson, doffs his helm, it should be clear to the PCs that this is a completely different person. Their first thoughts will probably run to impersonation of one sort or another, but if they tell their tale to the Duke his brow will furrow and he will tell them a tale of his ancestor – the third Duke of Alasson – who was beset upon this very road by orcs… and saved by a strange band of heroes. The story was chronicled in the song of the Duke’s life, and is still sung today in his family’s halls today. Marveling at the PCs’ tale, the Duke will ask them to accompany them. If the PCs go with him, he spins for them tales of his ancestor upon the road; treats them to a feast of “long-delayed and newfound honor” in his halls, and rewards them in a fitting manner.

IF THE PCs DON’T SAVE THE EAGLES

If the PCs fail to save the second Duke (the one contemporary with their own time), then the Duke is dead. It’s unfortunate, but no big deal.

If the PCs failed to save the first Duke, however, things change slightly: Now, the second Duke tells a sad tale of the death of his ancestor in a fell ambush by orcs after the breaking of the siege of Dweredell. He still marvels at the PCs’ tale, and invites them to his tent to share stories, food, and drink.

THE BLACK EAGLE AND HIS MEN

These stats can be used for both Black Eagles and their men.

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THE BLACK EAGLE: Ftr9; Medium-sized humanoid; CR 9; HD 9d10+18; hp 84; Init +1 (Dex); Spd 30 ft.; AC 26 (+1 Dex, +10 +2 plate, +4 +1 adamantine shield of light fortification, +1 ring of protection +1); Atk +15/+10 melee (1d8+7/17-20, +1 keen longsword), +15/+10 melee (1d8+7/x3, +1 heavy lance), or +10/+5 ranged; SV Fort +8, Ref +4, Will +3; Str 19, Con 14, Dex 12, Int 14, Wis 14, Cha 10

Skills and Feats: Diplomacy +3, Handle Animal +5, Knowledge (etiquette) +5, Knowledge (heraldry) +4, Ride +15, Spot +7; Mounted Combat, Power Attack, Ride-by Attack, Spirited Charge, Trample, Weapon Focus (lance), Weapon Focus (longsword), Weapon Specialization (lance), Weapon Specialization (longsword)

Possessions: +1 keen longsword, +1 heavy lance, +2 plate, +1 adamantine shield of light fortification, ring of protection +1, gauntlets of ogre strength, 2 potions of cure serious wounds, 2 potions of cure moderate wounds,1 potion of endurance, 2 potions of jump

Mount: Light warhorse, half-plate barding (+7 AC)

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MEN-AT-ARMS (x5):

Ftr2; Medium-size humanoid; CR 2; HD 2d10+4; hp 21; Init +1 (Dex); Spd 30 ft.; AC 18 (+1 Dex, +5 masterwork breastplate, +2 large steel shield); Atk +6 melee (1d8+2/19-20, masterwork longsword), +5 melee (1d8+2/x3 heavy lance), or +3 ranged; SV Fort +5, Ref +1, Will +0; Str 15, Con 14, Dex 12, Int 14, Wis 10, Cha 10

Skills and Feats: Diplomacy +1, Handle Animal +3, Knowledge (etiquette) +3, Knowledge (heraldry) +3, Ride +6, Spot +3; Mounted Combat, Ride-by Attack, Weapon Focus (longsword)

Possessions: Masterwork longsword, heavy lance, masterwork breastplate, large steel shield

Mount: Light warhorse

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CONCLUSION

There is no explanation for what caused the PCs to slip through time: Perhaps it was a sympathetic connection between the plights of the two dukes. Perhaps it was the intercession of some god (known or unknown). Perhaps the PCs didn’t slip through time at all, but instead were visited by spirits of the past (the true heroes of the tale are long dead and forgotten).

The Wolf-Riders faced by the PCs here may be only one small part of a larger organization (possibly consisting of an entire ogre tribe or more). This may mean that there are additional attempts on the Black Eagle’s life that the PCs must help fend off. Or it might mean that the PCs have earned the enmity of dangerous giants.

The PCs also have a chance here to forge a friendship with the current Duke of Alasson.

The Black Eagles of Alasson have a long history of greatness, with a single exception: The Fifth Duke, it is said, went mad and disappeared into the west – taking with him the ancestral sword of the house. Perhaps it is time for someone to uncover the sword’s resting place and return it to the Duke.

Go to Eternal Lies: The Alexandrian Remix

Tim Höregott is providing a German translation of both the Alexandrian Remix of Eternal Lies and the system cheat sheet I designed for Trail of Cthulhu. He will not be translating the handouts (he intends to use the originals), but will be translating all the various guides and cheat sheets. (If anyone else is interested in translating the handouts, please feel free to contact me.)

Tim is also the author of the Listen to the Gods blog (which is not in German), so make sure you check that out.

ETERNAL LIES REMIX (GERMAN)

1.0 Kampagnenübersicht
1.1 New York
1.2 Savannah
1.3 Los Angeles

TRAIL OF CTHULHU CHEAT SHEET (GERMAN)

(click here for PDF)