subject42
2009-12-04, 01:02 PM
I've been running the Paizo "Rise of the Runelords" module for my players and I'd like to take them on a side quest. I've included some background below, as well as a rundown of what I plan to do for the quest. I would appreciate any advice or suggestions that you all could offer.
Background:
For those of you who don't know the RotRL module, there are a few critical points to the story, as well as a few divergences.
Goblin Holocaust
Early in the module, the players had to halt a goblin invasion that was being organized by a demon-tainted human and her subordinates. They circumvented one challenge by charming a goblin Druid named Gogmurt that was meant to attack them and sound the alarm. The goblin agreed to let them pass, but asked them to minimize casualties among the goblin population.
The party, being adventurers, came quite close to committing an act of genocide on the goblin tribe, leaving only females, infants, and a few wily survivors alive. They even barricaded themselves in rooms and took naps now and then.
After leaving the goblin stronghold, some of the goblin survivors fought back with guerilla tactics, firing crossbow bolts at the party members as they clung to a collapsed bridge over a 60 foot drop into rocky waters. The party drove the goblin guerillas off, but did not kill them, leaving two party members nearly dead in the process.
Ghoul Skirmish
Later in the module, the party tried to save a farmstead from attacking ghouls. They were able to save a healthy child and two adults infected with ghoul fever, but one party member ended up in negative hitpoints, and every party ended up injured and infected with ghoul fever.
At present, the only in-party healing is from a healing belt worn by one of the party members. Father Xantus, the head cleric of the local cathedral is the most powerful cleric in the area, but he is only able to cast remove disease once per day. Xantus cures the woman survivor, as she is the weaker of the two and likely would die in minutes without aid. After healing (but not curing) the party, the entire chapel's order tries to keep the man's symptoms at bay by casting Bear's Endurance and (sometimes) Lesser Restoration on the man as the disease ravages his body. Unfortunately, it is likely that without some form of intervention the other farmer will likely die before Xantus can remove the disease. Unable to do more, Xantus retreats to the holy of holies to meditate.
The Side Quest
After a few hours, Xantus bursts out of the holy of holies and rushes to the chapel doors, asking the party to come with him.
He takes them outside and tells the party that he remembers a story from his youth of a man who contracted rabies. The nearest healer with the necessary skills was two weeks away, and the man would likely go mad and die well before then. After three days, he ran into the nearby "Trollwood" in the hope that one of the native animals would kill him before the disease took its toll. When his brother pursued him into the woods, he found him lying unconscious near a strange fungus. The man stayed comatose without food or water for eleven days, until small filaments grew from his pores and discharged a fine powder onto the wind. It must have been incredibly painful, because the man screamed and convulsed for over an hour until he passed out again. When he regained consciousness, the disease had not progressed and the healer was able to cure the infection.
Xantus tells the party that the Trollwood is about two hours of hard riding from Sandpoint. He asks them to retrieve a piece of this fungus, which he describes as a "a two-foot wide shelf fungus that looks like a blue-spotted cabbage, feels like rotten wood, and smells like pickled oatmeal". He tells the party that they will be able to save the man if they can bring a piece back by sundown, which gives them six hours to search the woods and two hours to return. He implores the party to help, saying that he would go himself, but he needs to stay at the temple to give the acolytes time to rest.
Unfortunately, Gogmurt has been listening in the whole time, and a few seconds after Xantus falls silent, a flock of crows takes off from a nearby rooftop, with one of them cackling wildly as the flock flies in the direction of the Trollwood.
If the party asks more about the Trollwood, or makes a successful Knowledge (Local), Knowledge (Geography), or Knowledge (Nature) check, they learn that there are no Trolls in the Trollwood, but that it has the name because farmers have been trying to clear cut it for generations, but the forest's growth is too wild for them to succeed. They may also find out some details of its geography, which are detailed below.
If the party makes a successful Knowledge (Nature) or Heal check regarding the fungus, they learn that it is called "slumberwrack". It reproduces when a host creature injures itself on the sharp spines that grow between its gills. Once infected, the host falls into a state of suspended animation for several days until the fungus matures. Once it matures, it forces its way out through any available orifice and disperses as spores. This effect is not fatal, though it is incredibly painful (Subject acts as if under a curse effect for 1 hour and receives 1 point of nonlethal damage per 10 minutes until the effect ends). On greater successes, they will learn that the fungus grows in dark areas of forest near stagnant water. Other local NPCs may also be able to provide them with some of this information.
The Trollwood itself is divided into sixteen sections. Each section will take approximately 30 minutes to thoroughly search for the fungus, meaning that they will not be able to simply search the entire forest if they want to return in time to save the dying man. They will have to use their previous successful knowledge checks or common sense planning to narrow the search unless they wish to split the party.
When the party enters the forest, they realize that it isn't a normal forest. A faint magical effect suffuses the entire wood; fueling its incredible growth. The Land itself wants this primordial forest to exist, and nothing wrought by the hand of mankind will change that. The magical nature of the forest has other effects.
Those gifted with a special connection to nature will see the forest react oddly to them, and they can control the trees that grow there to a limited extent. As a full round action with a concentration check they may make a tree limb grow by 10 feet in any direction or shape wooden objects out of deadfall. The entire forest is so thickly canopied that creatures without at least low-light vision will have difficulty seeing. While searching, the party will see any number of fantastical creatures, including butterflies the size of dinner plates, pitch-black stags, and serpents the size of tree limbs that appear as simple deadfall when closely examined.
The slumberwrack fungus exists in an area near the center fo the forest. Unless the party is incredibly paranoid, they likely won't noticed a heavily camoflaged emplacement built by Gogmurt's guerillas about fifty feet from the area. Once the party begins (carefully) harvesting the fungus, several events will occur in rapid succession.
1. Gogmurt will launch a rope-bundled object at the party.
2. One of his goblins will cast Animate Rope to untie the bundle, revealing a pair of black bear cubs that begin squalling in alarm.
3. A second goblin will toss a tanglefoot bag at the most dangerous looking party member.
4. A third goblin will fire an opportunistic crossbow bolt.
5. The party will hear enraged roars from a short distance away and a crashing noise as angry mother black bears plow straight through the nearby saplings in order to reach their cubs.
As the fight begins, Gogmurt and his Sorcerer will cast spells meant to keep the party away from their emplacement. His rogue and ranger will fire opportunistic shots at weak-looking party members in an effort to pick off their opponents one by one.
After the first round completes, the mother black bears will arrive at the top of the initiative. They will attack whoever is closest to their cubs, including the Goblins. They will fight until they consider their cubs safe.
Gogmurt and his goblins will attempt to flee at the very instant that the party is getting the upper hand.
After neutralizing this challenge, the party will be able to harvest up to five pieces of the fungus. One is necessary for the infected man, but with a successful alchemy check the party may be able to convert the other four pieces into a maximum of two doses of an injury-based poison that has the same effect as the fungus.
After returning to the chapel, Father Xantus will use the fungus to put the man into stasis and cure one of the party members of their ghoul fever.
Thoughts?
Background:
For those of you who don't know the RotRL module, there are a few critical points to the story, as well as a few divergences.
Goblin Holocaust
Early in the module, the players had to halt a goblin invasion that was being organized by a demon-tainted human and her subordinates. They circumvented one challenge by charming a goblin Druid named Gogmurt that was meant to attack them and sound the alarm. The goblin agreed to let them pass, but asked them to minimize casualties among the goblin population.
The party, being adventurers, came quite close to committing an act of genocide on the goblin tribe, leaving only females, infants, and a few wily survivors alive. They even barricaded themselves in rooms and took naps now and then.
After leaving the goblin stronghold, some of the goblin survivors fought back with guerilla tactics, firing crossbow bolts at the party members as they clung to a collapsed bridge over a 60 foot drop into rocky waters. The party drove the goblin guerillas off, but did not kill them, leaving two party members nearly dead in the process.
Ghoul Skirmish
Later in the module, the party tried to save a farmstead from attacking ghouls. They were able to save a healthy child and two adults infected with ghoul fever, but one party member ended up in negative hitpoints, and every party ended up injured and infected with ghoul fever.
At present, the only in-party healing is from a healing belt worn by one of the party members. Father Xantus, the head cleric of the local cathedral is the most powerful cleric in the area, but he is only able to cast remove disease once per day. Xantus cures the woman survivor, as she is the weaker of the two and likely would die in minutes without aid. After healing (but not curing) the party, the entire chapel's order tries to keep the man's symptoms at bay by casting Bear's Endurance and (sometimes) Lesser Restoration on the man as the disease ravages his body. Unfortunately, it is likely that without some form of intervention the other farmer will likely die before Xantus can remove the disease. Unable to do more, Xantus retreats to the holy of holies to meditate.
The Side Quest
After a few hours, Xantus bursts out of the holy of holies and rushes to the chapel doors, asking the party to come with him.
He takes them outside and tells the party that he remembers a story from his youth of a man who contracted rabies. The nearest healer with the necessary skills was two weeks away, and the man would likely go mad and die well before then. After three days, he ran into the nearby "Trollwood" in the hope that one of the native animals would kill him before the disease took its toll. When his brother pursued him into the woods, he found him lying unconscious near a strange fungus. The man stayed comatose without food or water for eleven days, until small filaments grew from his pores and discharged a fine powder onto the wind. It must have been incredibly painful, because the man screamed and convulsed for over an hour until he passed out again. When he regained consciousness, the disease had not progressed and the healer was able to cure the infection.
Xantus tells the party that the Trollwood is about two hours of hard riding from Sandpoint. He asks them to retrieve a piece of this fungus, which he describes as a "a two-foot wide shelf fungus that looks like a blue-spotted cabbage, feels like rotten wood, and smells like pickled oatmeal". He tells the party that they will be able to save the man if they can bring a piece back by sundown, which gives them six hours to search the woods and two hours to return. He implores the party to help, saying that he would go himself, but he needs to stay at the temple to give the acolytes time to rest.
Unfortunately, Gogmurt has been listening in the whole time, and a few seconds after Xantus falls silent, a flock of crows takes off from a nearby rooftop, with one of them cackling wildly as the flock flies in the direction of the Trollwood.
If the party asks more about the Trollwood, or makes a successful Knowledge (Local), Knowledge (Geography), or Knowledge (Nature) check, they learn that there are no Trolls in the Trollwood, but that it has the name because farmers have been trying to clear cut it for generations, but the forest's growth is too wild for them to succeed. They may also find out some details of its geography, which are detailed below.
If the party makes a successful Knowledge (Nature) or Heal check regarding the fungus, they learn that it is called "slumberwrack". It reproduces when a host creature injures itself on the sharp spines that grow between its gills. Once infected, the host falls into a state of suspended animation for several days until the fungus matures. Once it matures, it forces its way out through any available orifice and disperses as spores. This effect is not fatal, though it is incredibly painful (Subject acts as if under a curse effect for 1 hour and receives 1 point of nonlethal damage per 10 minutes until the effect ends). On greater successes, they will learn that the fungus grows in dark areas of forest near stagnant water. Other local NPCs may also be able to provide them with some of this information.
The Trollwood itself is divided into sixteen sections. Each section will take approximately 30 minutes to thoroughly search for the fungus, meaning that they will not be able to simply search the entire forest if they want to return in time to save the dying man. They will have to use their previous successful knowledge checks or common sense planning to narrow the search unless they wish to split the party.
When the party enters the forest, they realize that it isn't a normal forest. A faint magical effect suffuses the entire wood; fueling its incredible growth. The Land itself wants this primordial forest to exist, and nothing wrought by the hand of mankind will change that. The magical nature of the forest has other effects.
Those gifted with a special connection to nature will see the forest react oddly to them, and they can control the trees that grow there to a limited extent. As a full round action with a concentration check they may make a tree limb grow by 10 feet in any direction or shape wooden objects out of deadfall. The entire forest is so thickly canopied that creatures without at least low-light vision will have difficulty seeing. While searching, the party will see any number of fantastical creatures, including butterflies the size of dinner plates, pitch-black stags, and serpents the size of tree limbs that appear as simple deadfall when closely examined.
The slumberwrack fungus exists in an area near the center fo the forest. Unless the party is incredibly paranoid, they likely won't noticed a heavily camoflaged emplacement built by Gogmurt's guerillas about fifty feet from the area. Once the party begins (carefully) harvesting the fungus, several events will occur in rapid succession.
1. Gogmurt will launch a rope-bundled object at the party.
2. One of his goblins will cast Animate Rope to untie the bundle, revealing a pair of black bear cubs that begin squalling in alarm.
3. A second goblin will toss a tanglefoot bag at the most dangerous looking party member.
4. A third goblin will fire an opportunistic crossbow bolt.
5. The party will hear enraged roars from a short distance away and a crashing noise as angry mother black bears plow straight through the nearby saplings in order to reach their cubs.
As the fight begins, Gogmurt and his Sorcerer will cast spells meant to keep the party away from their emplacement. His rogue and ranger will fire opportunistic shots at weak-looking party members in an effort to pick off their opponents one by one.
After the first round completes, the mother black bears will arrive at the top of the initiative. They will attack whoever is closest to their cubs, including the Goblins. They will fight until they consider their cubs safe.
Gogmurt and his goblins will attempt to flee at the very instant that the party is getting the upper hand.
After neutralizing this challenge, the party will be able to harvest up to five pieces of the fungus. One is necessary for the infected man, but with a successful alchemy check the party may be able to convert the other four pieces into a maximum of two doses of an injury-based poison that has the same effect as the fungus.
After returning to the chapel, Father Xantus will use the fungus to put the man into stasis and cure one of the party members of their ghoul fever.
Thoughts?