Ideas on how to bring down the Rundeen

[Drestlin]

Me and my group of lvl 5 evil adventurers have been screwed over by the Rundeen, and we are very very decided on bringing them down.

Do you guys have any suggestions? we have a sizable amount of money (around 50k), a pretty fast ship armed with ballistas, a zombie minotaur and a zombie Skum.
I was thinking of starting to go after their money, burn down warehouses, free slaves/whores in brothels - i don't think we are strong enough to go after their heads.
We know harpers are their enemies, so we could try to contact them, but, well, we are evil and im going around with 2 zombies (even if i mantain them properly with spells and are "dressed up" so they are not completely nauseating).

We are a barbarian goliath, me (sole(maybe?) cleric of a sleeping netherese deity of beauty, undeath and moral corruption), a battlesorcerer and a halfling rogue.

So, yeah, any advice?

[Telonius]

A little information on the Rundeen might be helpful. (Google is showing some random references to 2nd-edition material, and general stuff like that it's a criminal organization in the Shining South). How powerful are they (and what level are you? Would the local authorities be interested in then being gone?

[Baroknik]

In Faerun one of the best ways to deal with any organization is to call in another organization. Taking care of the Rundeen is tricky since they're shadowy. My advice would be to get in touch with Larloch. He is (generally) in that area of the world (don't think near the Sword Coast though, but it's been awhile). He also is super useful as a contact as he likes having additional pawns or hirelings (read: adventurers) and is generally easier to find than others of his power level (who tend to be off in the planes -- like The Elminster). Find a minor artifact or info on a Nether Scroll and he'll probably be happy to give you information or even an artifact to use against whoever you please!

[Drestlin]

A little information on the Rundeen might be helpful. (Google is showing some random references to 2nd-edition material, and general stuff like that it's a criminal organization in the Shining South). How powerful are they (and what level are you? Would the local authorities be interested in then being gone?
We are lvl 5, and the goliath is lvl 4.
The Rundeen is a slavers/merchants organization in calimshan - they are mostly interested in profits, and have strong ties to the political scene.
They attack merchants who are not paying for protection, and offer the most succesful ones a place into their organization.
They are basically the mafia.
Im not sure if the local authorities would be really willing to help bring down an organization that almost run the place.
Harpers really hate them, so much that they killed like 5 of the 9 bosses in a recent attempt to bring them down.

Aside from that, we don't know a lot.
They tried to kill us tho. (Attempt who failed miserably and we are now in one of their..."bases". I think we'll burn it to the ground maybe? Or just slaughter anyone in it).


In Faerun one of the best ways to deal with any organization is to call in another organization. Taking care of the Rundeen is tricky since they're shadowy. My advice would be to get in touch with Larloch. He is (generally) in that area of the world (don't think near the Sword Coast though, but it's been awhile). He also is super useful as a contact as he likes having additional pawns or hirelings (read: adventurers) and is generally easier to find than others of his power level (who tend to be off in the planes -- like The Elminster). Find a minor artifact or info on a Nether Scroll and he'll probably be happy to give you information or even an artifact to use against whoever you please!

Well, i am from Netheril - like, actually lived there before the Kartus did what he did - but as a cleric i was never really into anything related - and im not sure my dm would let me bring someone as powerful as larloch into this...and it's also quite north from where we are, iirc.

[Baroknik]

Since you are evil the Harpers are probably out as an organization then. Maybe look into a rival slacing organization like the red wizards? Or even bring in the church of Bane, they probably run out anyone is not super lawful.

OR see if the Shadow Thieves or Shadow Masks want to take over a new city. I'm AFB ATM, but will check out Lords of Darkness when I get home for more ideas.

[jedipotter]

Me and my group of lvl 5 evil adventurers have been screwed over by the Rundeen, and we are very very decided on bringing them down.

So, yeah, any advice?

Don't do it.

By the book the Rundeen are way too powerful.....like the mafia. The idea that a couple of adventurers will just ''take them down'' is silly. Unless the DM dumb downs the Rundeen to an easy target. Otherwise you will just get foes sent after you, until your characters die.

You'd be better off just working for the Rundeen....

[Drestlin]

Don't do it.

By the book the Rundeen are way too powerful.....like the mafia. The idea that a couple of adventurers will just ''take them down'' is silly. Unless the DM dumb downs the Rundeen to an easy target. Otherwise you will just get foes sent after you, until your characters die.

You'd be better off just working for the Rundeen....

it's already happening, and we are already triple playing for:

a) a secret group of casters bound to conquer Velen and Zazzespur
b) a black dragon associated with an efreeti, a lich, and a devil
c) said lich who is double crossing everyone with his group of powerful undeads to turn that region into an undead paradise
d) the city of velen who thinks we're heroes after killing a powerful naga sorceress who was trying to conquer a village. well, she was actually almost killed by a high level good aligned druid, we just took the last couple tens of hp off :D

problem is, they are not right here and im not sure they would like to help us atm.

but you are wrong by thinking they are too powerful.
sure, they have an obscene amount of money.
but we are already too strong for the average mook AND the more than average, and there's only so much you can do when you start losing ships and goods and said mooks aren't paid...or killed left and right.
but yeah, they can send assassins after us.
that's why i was thinking about finding some allies so that they have more targets to think about.
we don't even HAVE to go all in right now...but maybe in a couple of levels and after gaining some credits from some powerful beings/organizations...

point is, we need a decent plan, and we need to start making our moves right now if we want to, at least, deal a very heavy blow to whoever is in charge in the near future.

[jedipotter]

point is, we need a decent plan, and we need to start making our moves right now if we want to, at least, deal a very heavy blow to whoever is in charge in the near future.

For the type a game you have....why not just head over to the Rundeen headquarters and kill them all?

[ngilop]

For the type a game you have....why not just head over to the Rundeen headquarters and kill them all?

Before I give an answer I need to get a question of my own off here :)

is the 3rd ed rundeen the same as it was in 2nd ed?

and by that I mean in 2nd ed they were the mafia of faerun.

[Drestlin]

For the type a game you have....why not just head over to the Rundeen headquarters and kill them all?

Cos we would get killed by a level 10 mage who was passing by


Before I give an answer I need to get a question of my own off here :)

is the 3rd ed rundeen the same as it was in 2nd ed?

and by that I mean in 2nd ed they were the mafia of faerun.

from what i gather and have been told, they are the mafia of the calimshan and not much else - they seems to be quite regional.

[Drestlin]

This is what i came up with:

Try to bull**** the harpers into helping in some ways (enemy of my enemy is my friend or something like that) - in the end we don't want anything more than take them down, it's not like we want to take their place or something - so it should be doable.
Convince the Nelentar's islands pirates that they could be just work for themselves instead of the rundeen, and stop discriminating between the rundeen protected ships and the free ones - they are the richest and less guarded one after all, why not start to mess with them for free, since the rundeen would be too taken by the harpers and us to bother mounting a punitive expedition against them. Maybe take out a rundeen or two at the heads of a couple pirate ships?
Seems doable in one or two levels...

While this is in motion, just cause all the problems we can with the help of low level divinations to be sure not to find high levels assassins waiting for us (or at least, scout each warehouse or whatnot beforehand).

What do you guys think?