Dread Angel
2013-01-10, 07:07 PM
So, as all my adventure ideas tend to, this one hit me while I was listening to music.
The entire campaign based around a few phrases in the song The Demon's Blade by 3 Inches Of Blood.
I was looking for something to draw the party away from the constant slog they're having of slowly making their way closer to being able to get a crack at the BBEG.
The song is called The Whistler, by Demons and Wizards. It is based off of the Pied Piper (no idea if I spelled that correctly...) tale. But some of the lines kept niggling at me, as did a faint recollection of the very first Terry Pratchett book I ever read, and this is the result so far:
As the party travels, they reach a town. It is a nice town, prosperous...but everyone is depressed, quiet, subdued and there is a distinct lack of childish laughter or children in general. The PCs will eventually find out that the village was plagued by rats that simply would not go away, until a youth of about 13 or 14 showed up and offered to deal with their rat problem, in exchange for X amount of cash. The grateful villagers all pitched in to meet his rather exceptionally high fee, and he pulled out his flute and musicked the rats away. But when the villagers went to get the money they gathered to pay him with, it was gone. They couldn't pay him, so he charmed all their children away...
The REAL Story: This "villain" is a child of 13 summers. Many characters would be very hesitant to cut him down just on that basis.
When he was an infant, he was abandoned in a gutter. The rats found him, but before they would eat him, they were stopped by a Rat-Queen, a creature made of seven rats with their tails knotted together. They form a kind of hive-mind, a telepathic creature that controls the rat swarm. The Queen sensed the potential for powerful magic within the infant, and instead of feeding it to her rats, she had it infected with lycanthrope, giving it just enough rat DNA to enable her to steer its thoughts.
The infant grew, nourished by the rats, and soon enough displayed a remarkable talent for bardic magic. And the Rat-Queen hatched a plot...
The swarm infests a village until they become deeply desperate. The young boy appears, offering to cure their plague in exchange for an exorbitant sum. The villagers cobble together the sum, and he removes the rats...but meanwhile, more of the swarm make off with the funds intended for the Whistler. He then takes their children as penance....and the clan eats well indeed.
So. The PCs will be about 11th level by the time they run into him, and he's a powerful bard, helped along by a telepathic creature he carries with him in his bag, as well as a swarm of hive-mind-controlled rats. An interesting fight anyway...throw into the mix that the players will likely have no idea the boy regards the clan as his family and humans as food for his family (himself included), that the boy is exactly that - a child...
...but on the other hand, he's just fed a village-ful of children to a swarm of rats. So he's obviously evil! Kill it with swords and fire!
...but wait! What's that I smell, says the party magic user... a mild-altering effect? On the boy? Why, he wasn't in control of his actions! He must be innocent!
So...what was controlling him? Search search search search hand in backpack YOW BITEY OWCH! What is THIS ugly thing...etc etc.
And when they try to reason with him he protects his Goddess first and foremost...the Queen.
Comments?
The entire campaign based around a few phrases in the song The Demon's Blade by 3 Inches Of Blood.
I was looking for something to draw the party away from the constant slog they're having of slowly making their way closer to being able to get a crack at the BBEG.
The song is called The Whistler, by Demons and Wizards. It is based off of the Pied Piper (no idea if I spelled that correctly...) tale. But some of the lines kept niggling at me, as did a faint recollection of the very first Terry Pratchett book I ever read, and this is the result so far:
As the party travels, they reach a town. It is a nice town, prosperous...but everyone is depressed, quiet, subdued and there is a distinct lack of childish laughter or children in general. The PCs will eventually find out that the village was plagued by rats that simply would not go away, until a youth of about 13 or 14 showed up and offered to deal with their rat problem, in exchange for X amount of cash. The grateful villagers all pitched in to meet his rather exceptionally high fee, and he pulled out his flute and musicked the rats away. But when the villagers went to get the money they gathered to pay him with, it was gone. They couldn't pay him, so he charmed all their children away...
The REAL Story: This "villain" is a child of 13 summers. Many characters would be very hesitant to cut him down just on that basis.
When he was an infant, he was abandoned in a gutter. The rats found him, but before they would eat him, they were stopped by a Rat-Queen, a creature made of seven rats with their tails knotted together. They form a kind of hive-mind, a telepathic creature that controls the rat swarm. The Queen sensed the potential for powerful magic within the infant, and instead of feeding it to her rats, she had it infected with lycanthrope, giving it just enough rat DNA to enable her to steer its thoughts.
The infant grew, nourished by the rats, and soon enough displayed a remarkable talent for bardic magic. And the Rat-Queen hatched a plot...
The swarm infests a village until they become deeply desperate. The young boy appears, offering to cure their plague in exchange for an exorbitant sum. The villagers cobble together the sum, and he removes the rats...but meanwhile, more of the swarm make off with the funds intended for the Whistler. He then takes their children as penance....and the clan eats well indeed.
So. The PCs will be about 11th level by the time they run into him, and he's a powerful bard, helped along by a telepathic creature he carries with him in his bag, as well as a swarm of hive-mind-controlled rats. An interesting fight anyway...throw into the mix that the players will likely have no idea the boy regards the clan as his family and humans as food for his family (himself included), that the boy is exactly that - a child...
...but on the other hand, he's just fed a village-ful of children to a swarm of rats. So he's obviously evil! Kill it with swords and fire!
...but wait! What's that I smell, says the party magic user... a mild-altering effect? On the boy? Why, he wasn't in control of his actions! He must be innocent!
So...what was controlling him? Search search search search hand in backpack YOW BITEY OWCH! What is THIS ugly thing...etc etc.
And when they try to reason with him he protects his Goddess first and foremost...the Queen.
Comments?