Wanna help my story (or suggest some spells)?

[Endril]

Hi all,

I think this might be my first post on here, which is surprising.
Anyway, I'm running a 3.5 game where the characters are around level 9 (Vago if you're reading this... stop), and I would like some possible opinions about an NPC's conflict of interest, and some ideas on how an evil NPC can force a good NPC into an evil act.

First we have the evil NPC, who is capable of casting level 5-6 arcane and divine magic, and can buy damn near anything. He was in possession of a thinuan sword containing the soul of a PC's relative. After obtaining it, he teleported to that relative's wife and offered to make a deal with her. By offering to make a deal, I mean he threatened to throw the sword into a sphere of annihilation. He wants her to teleport to another good NPC, kill him, trap his soul in the sword, and hand it back over to him. So that's where I could use some opinions on her conflict of interest. She (the wife, also the PC's aunt) is a good cleric, and committing this vile act would most likely rob her of her class benefits. It doesn't help that her victim is an aasimar cleric of an upper planes deity... any god would probably demand she get the soul back before she could even atone. What could drive her to do this? I'd like opinions, but the reason is already there... she doesn't want her husband's soul to be destroyed. But she suspects the same fate may await the man she has to kill.

Furthermore, I'm less worried about opinions on why she did it, because she has already accepted the sword and the uncle has already interacted with the PCs again. I just might want to have some explanation for her to give later. The real hard part is how this evil NPC can have a full proof way to make her do this. After all, it would set up a great game later where they have to recover the sword to save the aasimar's soul. I know there is a geas/quest spell, but that would be a minor hindrance compared to what would happen to the aasimar. I would have to force her into a situation so terrible that she would rather kill an innocent man than let it come to pass. She might be willing to trade another man for her husband's soul, but she would probably rather die than hand the aasimar's soul over to the evil NPC. So what kind of spell is there that, once she agreed to it, would force her to do something evil, even if she would rather die than commit that act? I may even have to homebrew this one. But that's a last option, since I tend to give my PC's access to what my NPC's can use.

[BrokenChord]

Just write it off as plot magic or say that her desire to save her husband let Dominate Person not classify the act as highly out of character. NPC interactions really shouldn't get a whole lot of spotlight.

[Blackhawk748]

Honestly you dont need magic to convince her to do that, the villain is threatening to destroy her husband's SOUL. Not body, not just killing him, not destroying his mind, but annihilating his immortal SOUL. Seriously thats a huge deal.

[Honest Tiefling]

What if there was no spell? What if the aasimar volunteered? I mean, she has to be close enough to the aasimar to make for an effective assassin. Else, why not just hire some thugs and have at it? And if she is a close enough friend to the aasimar, perhaps the entire point was not to have her be forced into it, but to cause her so much grief (either sacrifice her hubby or her friend) that the aasimar would enter the sword willingly.

Perhaps there is an aspect of the aasimar's personality that would have made this effective. Perhaps stubborn enough to never let another die in their place, loyal enough to make the ultimate sacrifice for their friend, or even arrogant enough to assume that they could not be held from their god with a mere mortal's magic.

[Endril]

Thanks to you 3 for responding

Just write it off as plot magic or say that her desire to save her husband let Dominate Person not classify the act as highly out of character. NPC interactions really shouldn't get a whole lot of spotlight.
Definitely not trying to make the game revolve around the NPCs. The players will have their own interactions, and will not know about this until they uncover it through roleplay. But these NPC's are connected to the PCs, and someone might ask the aunt why she helped the evil NPC. If I don't give a good explanation, it forces the players to suspend disbelief. The dominate person might work, as he could insist she voluntarily let it work on her if she doesn't want to see the sword destroyed.


Honestly you dont need magic to convince her to do that, the villain is threatening to destroy her husband's SOUL. Not body, not just killing him, not destroying his mind, but annihilating his immortal SOUL. Seriously thats a huge deal.
It is, although the villain might do the same thing to her victim. But I agree it's serious enough to force her to commit evil. But I've already had the uncle interact with the PCs. They know the aunt has the sword and they don't know why the villain gave it to her. So without changing the story, he no longer has that leverage, unless he did something when he gave it to her. At the same time, she may have had enough time to teleport to the victim and do the deed while the villain still had the sword, and he just changed them out before the uncle went to tell the PCs what happened. But they still think the aunt has the sword, so they'll wonder why the uncle left that part out.


What if there was no spell? What if the aasimar volunteered? I mean, she has to be close enough to the aasimar to make for an effective assassin. Else, why not just hire some thugs and have at it? And if she is a close enough friend to the aasimar, perhaps the entire point was not to have her be forced into it, but to cause her so much grief (either sacrifice her hubby or her friend) that the aasimar would enter the sword willingly.

Perhaps there is an aspect of the aasimar's personality that would have made this effective. Perhaps stubborn enough to never let another die in their place, loyal enough to make the ultimate sacrifice for their friend, or even arrogant enough to assume that they could not be held from their god with a mere mortal's magic

I'm not sure how I could fit that into the story since the villain already returned the sword. And both the aasimar and the NPC cleric would rather give their life than see the other fall victim, but they don't know each other. He didn't hire thugs because he came across the sword and knows the NPC is powerful enough to do it, while thugs would not be. As for forcing either into that decision, that does fit with how he's thinking. It just would have happened in a different order. Perhaps the cleric explains to the aasimar what happened and he lets her put his soul in the sword, but that still leaves the question of what leverage the villain has over them when they have the sword.

So I'm thinking it will go like this... after a couple games, the party is informed that their former patron (the aasimar) has been assassinated, and the clerics are unable to resurrect him. They later find out his soul isn't in his body and go to the PC's aunt to find out if she still has the sword, suspecting it might have been used on him (since it was already used on the PC's uncle). Overcome with guilt, she tells the party she was forced to relent to the magical control of the villain under threat of her husband's soul being destroyed. So she killed the aasimar and stored his soul in the sword and handed it over to the villain. So now the party has to recover the sword. Thank you for the ideas.