CTrees
2011-06-20, 08:57 AM
Well, this is a sure way to find out if anyone else in my group reads these fora.. (and to identify myself, in the process)
Currently, we're working our way into the home of a high level witch. The "house" is working as an extension of her soul, in reality-warping ways (bigger on the inside than the outside, very difficult and unwise for us to attempt to alter, makes some scrying return gibberish, et cetera). Our party consists of a paladin, cleric, ranger (all good), alchemist(CN), and my wizard(N), all at level nine. We know the witch has captured and is torturing (but keeping alive indefinitely) two lawful good NPCs.
Currently, we ended the session in a large, round chamber with a juvenille Umbral Dragon (large sized, for reference), who we've been chatting with. With all of us working together, that fight is enough to be in the potential TPK-range. For some reason I can't discern, the good characters haven't run in to attack the (obviously evil) dragon and rescue the NPCs from torture. Anyway.
The alchemist and my wizard have... difficult to understand motivations. We've basically played both sides of the field, at times helping the witch combat our party (for pay, of course). It would be pretty easy for us to work with the dragon to wipe out the party, but I'm shying away from that for purely out of character reasons (I do want everyone to have *some* fun, rather than just ending the campaign short). However, while chatting with the dragon, I've gone a long ways towards making friends with it. Apparently, this house has some weird timelessness effect going on, and one of the effects is that summons don't disappear when they die. Thus, I've fed the dragon three celestial ponies* (which he appreciated greatly). Also, I've convinced the others that they're just summons - they aren't *really* here, so they aren't *really* hurt (no matter how much they scream when being energy drained and eaten alive). No, I'm not sure how I passed that one off on the players.
The question for the playground is... what do I do, now? The obvious, but not terribly exciting solution is to suggest to the dragon that it really enjoyed chasing my ponies, but that the guy over there in the heavy armor knows how to summon a really big horse, that can run much faster than my ponies, is tougher, and would be MUCH more fun to chase (all true, and the paladin is VERY protective of his horse), thus instigating the dragon to pick a fight with the paladin when he refuses to let his mount be eaten. This has the advantage of moving the plot along, but not much else (I'd make this suggestion in abyssal - with a 39 rolled on the knowledge check to identify, I should know that umbral dragons commonly speak abyssal, and while the alchemist and I speak pretty much every language, no one else in the party does).
I'm guessing something much more fun could be proposed, and you guys are fantastic at coming up with creative brainstorming. Any ideas on what to do with a moderately friendly umbral dragon, and a laconic party? I'm open to whatever (creative spell use?), and I could definitely get the alchemist to help with any proposed antics (unfortunately, with no good social skills, I can't really convince it to switch sides and ally with me - DM would never allow that)
*We don't have a dedicated rogue, so my method of finding traps is a wand of summon monster I which I crafted. Cheap as can be, and ponies are *very* effective trap detectors. Potentially trapped hallways/pressure plates/doors? Apply a pony - it only lasts one round, but it only needs to - if it explodes, it was trapped! Also, the trap is probably "disarmed." Friendship is explosions!
Currently, we're working our way into the home of a high level witch. The "house" is working as an extension of her soul, in reality-warping ways (bigger on the inside than the outside, very difficult and unwise for us to attempt to alter, makes some scrying return gibberish, et cetera). Our party consists of a paladin, cleric, ranger (all good), alchemist(CN), and my wizard(N), all at level nine. We know the witch has captured and is torturing (but keeping alive indefinitely) two lawful good NPCs.
Currently, we ended the session in a large, round chamber with a juvenille Umbral Dragon (large sized, for reference), who we've been chatting with. With all of us working together, that fight is enough to be in the potential TPK-range. For some reason I can't discern, the good characters haven't run in to attack the (obviously evil) dragon and rescue the NPCs from torture. Anyway.
The alchemist and my wizard have... difficult to understand motivations. We've basically played both sides of the field, at times helping the witch combat our party (for pay, of course). It would be pretty easy for us to work with the dragon to wipe out the party, but I'm shying away from that for purely out of character reasons (I do want everyone to have *some* fun, rather than just ending the campaign short). However, while chatting with the dragon, I've gone a long ways towards making friends with it. Apparently, this house has some weird timelessness effect going on, and one of the effects is that summons don't disappear when they die. Thus, I've fed the dragon three celestial ponies* (which he appreciated greatly). Also, I've convinced the others that they're just summons - they aren't *really* here, so they aren't *really* hurt (no matter how much they scream when being energy drained and eaten alive). No, I'm not sure how I passed that one off on the players.
The question for the playground is... what do I do, now? The obvious, but not terribly exciting solution is to suggest to the dragon that it really enjoyed chasing my ponies, but that the guy over there in the heavy armor knows how to summon a really big horse, that can run much faster than my ponies, is tougher, and would be MUCH more fun to chase (all true, and the paladin is VERY protective of his horse), thus instigating the dragon to pick a fight with the paladin when he refuses to let his mount be eaten. This has the advantage of moving the plot along, but not much else (I'd make this suggestion in abyssal - with a 39 rolled on the knowledge check to identify, I should know that umbral dragons commonly speak abyssal, and while the alchemist and I speak pretty much every language, no one else in the party does).
I'm guessing something much more fun could be proposed, and you guys are fantastic at coming up with creative brainstorming. Any ideas on what to do with a moderately friendly umbral dragon, and a laconic party? I'm open to whatever (creative spell use?), and I could definitely get the alchemist to help with any proposed antics (unfortunately, with no good social skills, I can't really convince it to switch sides and ally with me - DM would never allow that)
*We don't have a dedicated rogue, so my method of finding traps is a wand of summon monster I which I crafted. Cheap as can be, and ponies are *very* effective trap detectors. Potentially trapped hallways/pressure plates/doors? Apply a pony - it only lasts one round, but it only needs to - if it explodes, it was trapped! Also, the trap is probably "disarmed." Friendship is explosions!