RFLS
2014-10-22, 05:44 PM
Not so quick question: I've been running this adventure for my group for a while now, and it's been fairly smooth up until this point. They acquired the Ghostlord's phylactery and were promptly scryed and messaged by him. He offered a deal: bring him his phylactery and he'd remove his support from the Red Hand. Fairly straightforward.
Sidenote: I'm running him as a Magnificent Bastard (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MagnificentBastard). His goals aren't focused on the Vale, though - he's waging a war south of his borders in order to protect the Vale (it's his birthplace, he's not the full-blown evil monster he was shortly after becoming a lich, yadda yadda). Mostly an adventure hook for later, assuming he'd survived.
The party showed up at his lair, fought and defeated Varanthian (2 rounds, no deaths), and started mowing through hobgoblins. When the Ghostlord realized they were there, he annihilated the remaining hobgoblins (Ulwai narrowly escaped the PCs).
So, here's the problem. I had him in the pool of rebirth area, with his 6 lesser bonedrinkers standing guard around the edges. The party entered the room and entered negotiations. They weren't entirely sure that he was operating in good faith, so they were looking for some way to guarantee that. As they were about halfway through negotiating, the played-straight CG wizard had enough and opened fire with a curse of magic negation (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic/all-spells/c/curse-of-magic-negation). The Ghostlord made his save pretty easily, and returned fire with ice spears (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic/all-spells/i/ice-spears), knocking the wizard flat on his ass. At this point, the party is standing away from the wizard with their hands up in the best "I'm not with him" poses they've got.
Except for the melee bard, who immediately chooses to engage the bonedrinkers.
All hell breaks loose at this point, with most of the party nearly dying and somehow (I'm still impressed by this) all escaping. Unfortunately for them, they still have the Ghostlord's phylactery. I'm unsure of how to proceed here. Does he attempt to open negotiations again? Does he go for blitzkrieg warfare in the hopes of getting them before they can destroy it? Does he give them a few days before going scry and fry?
The follow-up to this, of course, is what to do if the party destroys his phylactery. He'll almost certainly still be alive at that point, so it's a question of what he does. I see a couple of courses of action from here. He can accept his lumps and go back to what he's doing to the south. He can go on a personal vendetta against the PCs. And finally, he can willingly throw everything he's got into helping the Red Hand level the Vale, which....would have some serious ramifications for the next act, but would not be in character for him as I have him now (although that can be altered. Maybe he's waging a war against a zealous order of paladins that's intent on wiping him out).
Thoughts?
Sidenote: I'm running him as a Magnificent Bastard (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MagnificentBastard). His goals aren't focused on the Vale, though - he's waging a war south of his borders in order to protect the Vale (it's his birthplace, he's not the full-blown evil monster he was shortly after becoming a lich, yadda yadda). Mostly an adventure hook for later, assuming he'd survived.
The party showed up at his lair, fought and defeated Varanthian (2 rounds, no deaths), and started mowing through hobgoblins. When the Ghostlord realized they were there, he annihilated the remaining hobgoblins (Ulwai narrowly escaped the PCs).
So, here's the problem. I had him in the pool of rebirth area, with his 6 lesser bonedrinkers standing guard around the edges. The party entered the room and entered negotiations. They weren't entirely sure that he was operating in good faith, so they were looking for some way to guarantee that. As they were about halfway through negotiating, the played-straight CG wizard had enough and opened fire with a curse of magic negation (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic/all-spells/c/curse-of-magic-negation). The Ghostlord made his save pretty easily, and returned fire with ice spears (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic/all-spells/i/ice-spears), knocking the wizard flat on his ass. At this point, the party is standing away from the wizard with their hands up in the best "I'm not with him" poses they've got.
Except for the melee bard, who immediately chooses to engage the bonedrinkers.
All hell breaks loose at this point, with most of the party nearly dying and somehow (I'm still impressed by this) all escaping. Unfortunately for them, they still have the Ghostlord's phylactery. I'm unsure of how to proceed here. Does he attempt to open negotiations again? Does he go for blitzkrieg warfare in the hopes of getting them before they can destroy it? Does he give them a few days before going scry and fry?
The follow-up to this, of course, is what to do if the party destroys his phylactery. He'll almost certainly still be alive at that point, so it's a question of what he does. I see a couple of courses of action from here. He can accept his lumps and go back to what he's doing to the south. He can go on a personal vendetta against the PCs. And finally, he can willingly throw everything he's got into helping the Red Hand level the Vale, which....would have some serious ramifications for the next act, but would not be in character for him as I have him now (although that can be altered. Maybe he's waging a war against a zealous order of paladins that's intent on wiping him out).
Thoughts?