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haplot
2016-08-19, 10:18 AM
Need advice and suggestions as to plot for 4 level 10 adventurers. They are as follows:

Dwarf fighter LG going into dwarven defender prestige class.
Reason for current adventuring lifestyle: Funnelling his 'excess' gold back to home so clan can improve security sort of thinking

Human Wizard NG going into Master prestigue class next, either that or Effigy master (and yes current skill set means can do either / or / both. Itemcreation expert :D
Reason for current adventuring lifestyle: thirst for knowledge for creating new trent in 'pets'

Elf Rogue CG Going into temple raider of Olidammara (and yes lots of RP ideas between this char and the dwarf, and the cleric thinking on it)
Reason for adventuring lifestyle: Looking for the 'big one' to retire on

Human Cleric NG of Pelor going into radiant servant of Pelor
Reason for adventuring lifestyle: looking for cure for sister's mysterious illness

Thoughts for adventures they can have together please

Segev
2016-08-19, 11:18 AM
They honestly sound like most of the typical "go out and find a dungeon to raid" hooks should work for them. Most are in this for wealth in one way or another. The wizard wants knowledge, which will narrow his interests a bit. The cleric seeks a cure, which is harder, unless you introduce a time-buying but expensive potion or the like which the cleric can use his share of loot to keep his sister supplied with.

The trickiest part with the cleric is that he will eventually be able to cast remove disease. You'll want to either provide him more motive than just "find a cure" if this spell will work on his sister.

So the question is, do you want them to be self-motivated, or do you want a driving plot that will give them reason to go out and keep working even if the cleric finds his cure and the rogue finds his "big score?"

Starting at 4th level means the cleric, for instance, will have his solution in just one level if you don't make the disease something that can't be cured by remove disease. If you were starting lower-level, you could use that as his initial impetus, and even have the story of how he learned the magic to do it be part of his early personal story arc (even if, mechanically, he just had to reach level 5).

Building some plot around her disease, therefore, seems wise. Is it really a disease? Is it a curse? Could be as simple as lycanthropy, though that's a very specific story and harder to tie into something larger.

If you're looking for an over-arching plot, though, figuring out something to which her disease and/or its cure would be a hint would be a good place to start. Bonus points if it's related in some way to areas of knowledge or the like which would be useful to somebody inventing construct-pets (or whatever the wizard is hoping his "new line of pets" to be).

OldTrees1
2016-08-19, 11:41 AM
A cloaked warforged hires the PCs to break into a previously impassible ancient vault to retrieve some innocent sounding augmentation. As a down payment he will give a lead on the mysterious illness. In actuality he wants something else that is significantly less innocent that was locked away. He overheard the lead about the illness from his superior that he is trying to betray. So curse his inevitable betrayal but his corpse will act as a hook to a future adventure.

haplot
2016-08-19, 12:25 PM
many thanks guys much appreciated

To be honest, forgot all about the remove disease spell..... curse the game designers coming up with some sensible spells :D

thank you again and im sure the ideas will come in useful

Segev
2016-08-19, 01:21 PM
Don't feel too bad. A lot of classic motivating hardships are one-spell solutions in D&D. It can be a problem if you aren't aware of them and know how to write around it. Best if you can avoid the problem by making it something that isn't in the category that's easily solved. Otherwise, try to make the solution harder by additional complications. The worst way that still solves the problem tends to be "THIS disease is immune to remove disease" or "For some reason, you can't cure his blindness with remove blindness."


That's why a curse or other plot-relevant ailment that isn't technically a disease might be better. (Admittedly, remove curse is also a spell, but there are a lot of curses it doesn't actually work on, including Lycanthropy.)

For instance, if his sister is a nascent oracle, perhaps her "ailment" is the horrific nightmares that aren't letting her sleep. The lack of sleep leads to its own problems, and even when she sleeps, it's not restful. Her oracular powers are being triggered by your greater plot event. Or maybe she's linked to the greater plot event somehow.

Or maybe he receives word, after travelling for a while, that she's been making a remarkable recovery! But when he returns, she sickens even more rapidly than before. It was his presence making her ill. Specifically, his aura of goodness and divine favor. As he got more powerful, that aura got stronger, and now it's making her sicker. The reason being that she's connected, somehow, to a malevolent force that is opposed by his god's divine favor. Which of course leads now to a question of what this force is and how it can be stopped, hopefully without harming his sister in the process.

If you really wanted to steal a plot, maybe he'd always had this little sister...but he's only always had her since about a month ago, when she was retconned into his whole family's memories. She's a construct of the sort the wizard would be interested in, and is being used as part of a seal on a greater evil of some sort. She "runs" on the power drained from that evil; it's part of how she helps seal it. But her brother's clerical aura suppresses that power, making her less able to "run." This was perhaps an oversight on the part of whatever agency is responsible for putting her into his family's care, who just thought a cleric of his god would be a good guardian for such a sacred seal.

LibraryOgre
2016-08-19, 02:57 PM
A good option might be an ancient dwarven delve.

The dwarves of Stoborhaim were known in days of old for their wisdom and cunning; they developed great devices and mighty spells, but disappeared from the world ten generations ago*. Now, some ancient elves know of the location of Stoborhaim, but none alive know how to reach it; that was lost when the derro overran it all those years ago.

Where precisely you place it and how you guard it is up to you. To make things interesting, I'd make Stoborhaim into a thriving city, still, but one closed off from the outside. Remains of the dwarves of Stoborhaim fight the derro invaders, still, and they are aided by devices of their own creation (want to introduce warforged? There you go), while the derro use undead. Duergar and Drow merchants still come to Stoborhaim, supplying both sides. I'd throw in a couple of unrelated factions with limited territory (maybe some sort of chiropterian?), just to make things interesting, and maybe some mercenaries who can be bargained with.

In a way, it winds up playing like Pool of Radiance... you're trying to take back a city from evil forces, and find powerful magics in the meantime.

*For dwarves, so we're talking close to a thousand years.

haplot
2016-08-19, 03:03 PM
More brilliant ideas ... what can i say apart from ...


You guys rock!!

Thanks again.