Piedmon_Sama
2017-05-02, 02:53 PM
So, last thread (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?519641-Characters-responsible-for-enormous-accidental-death-can-their-reputations-be-saved) which off the top of my head I can't remember if I've done one or two sessions since making, since which there have been two sessions, one good for the PCs and one returning things to the precipice of disaster, we established -
1. My players obviously don't want to be traditional fantasy heroes; they want to rise to power in the semi-established frontier town area rather than do traditional D&D stuff out in the wilderness.
2. They have made this difficult for themselves by first being nuisances and then accidentally causing a horrific mass death in the frontier hamlet of Grifflet. Their reputations within the central frontier Barony are now coal black and they are feared and mistrusted by the commons.
3. They were nonetheless rising upwards thanks to the patronage of this Baron they'd glommed onto, acting as his messengers/gofers. One PC was given a commission in a mercenary company working for the Baron which gave him ties to other Noble Houses in the region; another actually agreed to marry into a local backwater squire's household, which would at least have given him firm roots in the area.
4. This was all (or nearly all) dashed last session when a representative of the Thieves' Guild in the nearest large city over showed up and demanded a meeting with the party's two leaders. The major issue was that following the Tragedy at Grifflet, when the party was surrounded by what nearly became an angry mob of bereaved villagers, the Paladin protested that he and his alone were not responsible, but that a bunch of NPC adventurers who'd joined them in their delve had an equal hand in unleashing the magic that killed 80 citizens of the town (this is just straight up not true BTW). Thus the unfortunate NPC adventurers were brigaded into sharing the PCs' blame. Whatever, but one of those adventurers belongs to a powerful and wealthy Thieves' Guild in the next town over. And inevitably when he returned to his hometown, the Thief "made complaint" (as the Guild calls it).
https://i.imgur.com/vx5vMuM.jpg
Everything you need to know about my friend's Paladin is contained in this drawing.
So the way the Thieves' Guild works is this: when you're in, if you have a problem, they take care of it. That's their guarantee to all their members. So this particular Thief explained to the Bosses that he had been the victim of a false accusation which disrupted his adventuring activities in the wilderness, harming his fortune and reputation. Naturally, they promised him restitution would be given.
So a messenger was sent to the PCs out in the frontier town. He said that the Guild was not open to negotiating terms, rather they had already worked out what the PCs needed to do to save their lives (this was somewhat of a bluff, the PCs probably could have wheedled some concessions)---the Paladin needed to pay 100 gp and cover the Court Fees (another 20 gp) and swear in a House of the Saints that he had committed calumny against [the wronged Thief adventurer]. So yeah, 120 gp and a mea culpa "and you never have to hear from us again," the herald put it.
https://i.imgur.com/tuJHylD.jpg
The Guild's Herald. See, he got a drawing, which is how the players know this is an important scene!
So the Paladin said that being asked to give his oath on behalf of a thief was wrong and that furthermore the NPC adventurers indeed shared blame in the regrettable incident because they didn't stop him from blowing up the town [????], that under no circumstances would he ever do it and, before the herald could say anything, got up and walked away from the meeting. (I said to the Paladin's player "...do you like, just walk away ranting?" and he said "yeah, I get up from the table and walk out of the tavern finger in the air still filibustering" basically.)
The Cavalier quickly tries to cover for his idiot friend saying basically "he's a little crazy, sorry I can't deliver on the oath thing but I'll pay all the money you want." The herald was in nowise pleased and said "you understand this is about more than money---if your friend disrespects us like this it becomes a Matter of Honor."
What "Matter of Honor" Means
Basically any large-scale criminal enterprise is only held together by its reputation and the loyalty of its members. Cliches about thieves and honor aside, the Guild has to be as good as its word, as close to 100% of the time as can be, or it becomes not worth the rental price of the Guild Hall. Because as is understood by the common use of the word 'guild' (don't faff at me about historical accuracy pz) it's basically a regulatory body for the Black Market, which means just like any bank every transaction is underwritten by trust. So the Guild literally cannot just turn around and be like "sorry they were uncooperative and it'd be really inconvenient for us to deal with some mid-levels out on the frontier," even if its leaders were the kind of men who didn't care about personal honor (and they very much are). They take the "mess with one of us mess with all of us" thing very seriously.
So like, at this point I'm kinda done thinking of ways to WORK THINGS OUT and RE-RAIL THE CAMPAIGN. What's going to happen is since a gang of adventurers is very much a hard target, the Guild will do like any smart business and delegate/outsource to a proven contractor they have a solid relationship with---the Assassins' Guild. The Assassins are a prestige class meaning everyone who gets to call themselves an Assassin is at least level seven; they are serious dudes and they don't take contracts for less than 8,000 gp (travel expenses alone will make this job 10,000, push it up to 12,000 due to the dangers of taking on a group of adventurers. That's an insane amount of money for the life of some jerk in the middle of nowhere, but like, there is no other answer to direct effrontery. When someone just straight up directly calls you out your hands are kinda tied).
That's still stupid. You can't go to war every time some nobody talks trash.
Very true. But at this point the PCs are not nobody. They're locally notorious not just for the Grifflet incident but as the Baron's new hatchet-men; the Cavalier has a reputation as a powerful knight for his slaying of a manticore, they've won several pitched battles on the Barony's highways etc. if the Paladin just blows a raspberry in the Guild's face and gets away with it, it would very well add to the legend of "the Poison Paladin." The Guild's city is "only" 46 miles from the frontier, so while it's not exactly their backyard word could still get back and pollute their local standing (the difference between a Thieves' Guild and a Gang is the Illusion of Respectability. Being treated like churls/villeins/varlets by some newfangled squire's son really craps on that).
You could still think of some reason it doesn't have to come to this
Yeah but I don't want to. I'm done protecting my players from themselves. No more safety rails. That's entirely the gosh dang problem with safety rails---once the players realize you have them, they start pushing against them. My players are that type. They don't want to be "spared the worst," they want a world that reacts naturalistically to their prodding. Seriously I think the Paladin's player knows exactly what he's doing---like the guy playing the character's no dummy, he's been doing this since the 80's. I don't think he will break down and cry when/if his character gets eviscerated Gangland-Style but we'll see.
Okay Jerk, get back to the story
Right so later that day the Baron, Otgar, calls the Paladin up to his keep. He proceeds to slap the heck out of Msr. Newly-Dubbed The Paladin, then exiles him from the Barony of Stormcrown. Because Otgar isn't exactly the world's best baron but even he draws the line at you starting a war in his "very expensive, very flammable" town.
The Paladin accepts his fate, rides in and tells his expectant Father-in-Law the Squire of Greenfield that he can no longer ally himself the gentry of Stormcrown and must leave the Barony. The Squire is like "you were looking like a bad bet anyway TBH." I'm personally steamed because THE WEDDING PICTURE I drew is now NON-CANONICAL
The Wedding Picture:
https://i.imgur.com/QmQMnDd.jpg
Paladin is the one on the left, obviously
A few days later the Herald returns to Stormcrown and informs the Cavalier not to worry, everything's worked out---both Otgar and the Cavalier's patron the Mercenary Captain will be going in together on a payment to the Thieves' Guild. The herald is much friendlier this time. In reality, the Assassins' Guild has already taken the contract on the Paladin. The Guild will be taking the money and murdering the Paladin and then kindly inform the PCs to never come to their city or cross them ever again and to take this as a lesson.
But the twists don't end there. So last session I instituted this new rule: it takes you four weeks of training to level up, but you can take a week off the time for each one of these things you have: 1) a GP sacrifice of 150 gp x level to be attained (roleplayed however you want--as tithes, sacrifice, whatever); 2) benefit of an institution (a Shrine/Abbey for clerics, an Arcane Library for wizards, a Military Company for martial types etc.); 3) A higher-leveled character of your class or a class close enough to your own to mentor you.
My main goal with this new rule was to slow the pace of the campaign down because in-game the characters had climbed up five levels in about two months which is insane, from an in-world perspective/my perspective. So the Cavalier immediately assumed his mercenary captain patron had nothing better to do than tutor him which is like, okay guy, but whatever. The Paladin, Slayer and Bloodrager all rolled percentile die to see if a suitable trainer was in the area.
Paladin and Slayer both rolled in the upper 90s so they got exactly what they needed---a 9th level (just shy of name-level), retired member of their own character class who really literally has nothing better to do than train up some talented youngster. Thus, though exiled from the Barony of Stormcrown, the Paladin spent the next two weeks in the Barony of New Bastion (which is actually run by a retired Paladin!) being trained by this mentor. When the Paladin explained his problem with the Thieves' Guild, the old Paladin guy was like (I am paraphrasing, I did say this in the manner of a kindly old Paladin-turned-Rancher) "man you are really dumb. Your honor isn't worth putting people in needless danger over. If you wanna be this dumb you should just charge the Thieves' Guild headquarters and die as quickly as possible while getting as few people around you killed as possible. I didn't live through nine levels by being precious over my every uttered word." I'm not sure if I'm getting too heavy-handed or we're Really Roleplaying Now.
Meanwhile, Slayer and Bloodrager are going south. Bloodrager rolled in the 60s so he didn't get exactly what he needed... but he did get the Baron of Surgarde himself (whose adopted goblin son was one of the NPC Adventurers the Paladin threw mud on---and the Cavalier has been tripping over himself for the last 7-8 sessions trying to make up for that).
https://i.imgur.com/Eeo2mCx.jpg
Adopted Goblin Son is on the right. He's a Factotum!
https://i.imgur.com/3NrP19Q.jpg
The Baron of Surgarde. This is actually a prep-sketch for a big elaborate sextych of all the Shield Barons I'll probably never finish.
Surgarde's Baron is a Sorcerer [Gold Dragon bloodline] 9/Fighter 4 who loves adventure, and adventurers and is happy to host the Bloodrager for two weeks of training. This doesn't exactly make the Baron a new patron, but whatever. Bloodrager sucks up good and hard and acts interested in all the Baron's stories so that gets him a lot of credit even though the Goblin is like "why can't I get rid of you jerkssss"
In fact the Baron of Surgarde loves adventure and adventurers so much he has a building in his town called The Adventurers' Lodge which is part living history museum and part shrine, with a staff of old, retired (and mostly crippled) adventurers. It just so happens that one of these "fossils" is a level 9 Slayer whose only serious impediment other than age is a crippling love of cream ale, and so is easily bribed by the Slayer PC for two weeks of mentorship.
Following this period of training the party reconvenes in New Bastion, which is where we ended last session.
So I'm thinking next session I just try this opening gambit: "[Cavalier], you receive a note from Captain Skeletor* telling you he has received a sign from the Assassins; that your friend the Paladin is as good as dead and you need to leave him and clear out immediately."
*Sir Jon Skeletor, son of the Baron Skeletor, Captain of the Trueswords Free Company, the Cavalier's current employer.
https://i.imgur.com/ZnxDhlv.jpg
Jon Skeletor. I know I know, not really a skeleton, I'm so lame.
I kind of don't expect my players to give up on their buddy without a fight, obviously. So I have to into some depth about the mentor the Paladin picked up.
https://i.imgur.com/RkFDqyT.jpg
The Mentor the Paladin Picked Up
So he's Sir Hogarthe Crowne, formerly the leader of an adventuring troupe called The Band of Oxbridge, of which two others now live with him in pastoral New Bastion.
https://i.imgur.com/AyFM0fE.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/c1unPs1.jpg
The Other Two Guys. All three drawings still unfinished, obviously.
The other two guys are "Black" Angus Gilraven, a 9th-level Fighter, now a tavern-owner, and Sir Hengest "Henk" Macaroy, a 9th-level Cavalier now an orchard farmer. All these guys are basically good-types; the Paladin's mentor is not gonna let him get murdered even if he is a jackass, so assuming the Cavalier tells everybody they got Assassins coming (there's no reason he wouldn't, right?) Hogarthe immediately offers to put his trainee up in his hacienda, vowing that no one will take his life without a fight, and calls up his two old buddies to join in. So the Party gets a trio of 9th level old guys---with age penalties and obesity in Henk's case I reckon they're down to CR 6-7ish but they can still fight.
Now if the PCs basically get what I'm going for and want to go along with it---I mean, when you're forewarned that some Bad Men have been hired to gun you down and you basically Make A Stand in some tavern or farmhouse, right---then the interesting question will be whether or not the Slayer's mentor comes along to the fight. Because Old Paladin, Old Fighter and Old Cavalier are pretty much just immobile, over-the-hill tanks they're actually going to be almost worthless in a fight against a bunch of dedicated ninja-snipers who are determined to kill one person in particular. OTOH Jon Broque, the old Slayer, despite being a drunk and no longer strong enough to properly fire his composite bow, has a Perception of +15, so if he joins their stand suddenly the PCs have a real chance of not getting just headshotted through a window before Inits even get rolled (I use Called Shots IMC btw, makes the prospect of a bunch of Rogues coming for you a lot scarier. This is basically what Jon Skeletor told Cavalier last session: "these people aren't going to challenge you in the open like jackasses. If the Assassins come for you they'll come in the night, in enough numbers to make it a sure thing, slit your throat in your sleep or put a bullet in your brain from a hundred yards. They never fight fair and they never fail.")
Back up a step. This whole Band of Oxbridge thing seems totally arbitrary. Why not give the PCs more useful allies?
Right. So when Paladin and Slayer first made their Mentor Search Rolls (Bloodslayer wasn't there that session so didn't make his roll til the start of the next one), they both got 95+ so I gave them someone who (IMO) would be an ideal mentor---good-aligned, not much better to do, just short of name-level (e.g lvl 9). New Bastion is the Barony with a 14th level Paladin in charge (he's venerable and long retired) so I thought it made sense for an old LG adventurer to settle there. I had already come up with the idea of the Adventurer's Lodge in Surgarde so I thought that was a logical place for an old Slayer in his sunset years to be. However I didn't really have any idea what other leveled NPCs would live in those Baronies.
So when I got home that night I broke out my 3.5 DMG and rolled for it based on the size of either Barony's major population center. Using Pathfinder classes so I had to invent a little but I tried to keep it similar to their closest equivalents among the core classes. So in the case of New Bastion, I had a 9th level Paladin to start with and the other two level 9s I got were a Fighter and Cavalier; so I decided they were all a retired band of adventurers who'd settled down in the same neighborhood.
Now by those rulesguidelines, every high-level NPC generates double the number of NPCs half a level lower---so a level 9 Paladin = two level 4 Paladins = four level 2 Paladins = 8 level 1 Paladins. True enough. And so there are 42 persons with levels in Fighter, Cavalier or Paladin living in the Barony of New Bastion. However the DMG does not say those characters must all be related (although the Power Center section kinda implies it). So just because two 4th level Paladins are staying in NB atm doesn't mean they're related to Hogarthe or that he can/is willing to call upon them. So far I have decided that Hengest has a daughter who's a 4th-level Cavalier, but while he personally is willing to come and if necessary die fighting by Hogarthe one last time he would never drag his (engaged) daughter into it.
https://i.imgur.com/SNvFgJ7.jpg
Henk's daughter. Debatable if worth finishing.
Move along to the Assassins already
Right. So, I looked at the Pathfinder Assassin PrC and it's dumb, I'll be using the 3.5 one with the spells. The Assassins are sending a Kill Team to the Shield Baronies led by a 12th level journeyman---Ftr [Two-Weapon Warrior] 6/Rogue 1/Assassin 5. He is backed up by two Initiates (Ftr 3/Rog 4/Ass 1), with a Rogue [crossbow sniper] lvl 5 as Overwatch and a gaggle of Rutterkin/Waghalters as chaff/distraction.
No, that's not fair. I wasn't kidding about the Assassins always sending more than they think they need to do the job. It's how they get their reputation. The PCs will need to act fast because the Kill Team's arrived in New Bastion today.
Your beloved Western genre aside, you realize there's no chance they essentially agree to hang out in some dude's ranch-house and wait for the Assassins to come to them, right?
Yeah. Probably won't happen. But I need to do something so I'm going to map Hogarthe's house, stat up the Band of Oxbridge and see what my players choose to do instead.
But...?
Even if this big battle happens the way I'm envisioning, like, who cares? I dunno I'm just tired of dealing with the fallout of my PCs being jerks over and over and over.... this campaign was about Magic And Wonders Underground and Saving the Kingdom of the Fairies(!) when I wrote it up and it's turned into a game of Mafia meets Deadwood (I always crap on poor Deadwood... I've never even watched it).
I mean, this needs to happen. They yanked the bull's chain, they gotta get the horns. My players would be actively disappointed if I didn't. They're practically daring me. It's just, even if I massacre the party I won't feel good. It's just like, I made all this stuff---in a weird way it's like my players are going in the wrong direction: the whole thing with this campaign is they're supposed to explore the eastern wilderness and forge their own path but they keep getting more and more enmeshed in things back west. And now they gotta die.
Well, maybe the next generation of PCs will be more interested in my Fairies. o ___ o
1. My players obviously don't want to be traditional fantasy heroes; they want to rise to power in the semi-established frontier town area rather than do traditional D&D stuff out in the wilderness.
2. They have made this difficult for themselves by first being nuisances and then accidentally causing a horrific mass death in the frontier hamlet of Grifflet. Their reputations within the central frontier Barony are now coal black and they are feared and mistrusted by the commons.
3. They were nonetheless rising upwards thanks to the patronage of this Baron they'd glommed onto, acting as his messengers/gofers. One PC was given a commission in a mercenary company working for the Baron which gave him ties to other Noble Houses in the region; another actually agreed to marry into a local backwater squire's household, which would at least have given him firm roots in the area.
4. This was all (or nearly all) dashed last session when a representative of the Thieves' Guild in the nearest large city over showed up and demanded a meeting with the party's two leaders. The major issue was that following the Tragedy at Grifflet, when the party was surrounded by what nearly became an angry mob of bereaved villagers, the Paladin protested that he and his alone were not responsible, but that a bunch of NPC adventurers who'd joined them in their delve had an equal hand in unleashing the magic that killed 80 citizens of the town (this is just straight up not true BTW). Thus the unfortunate NPC adventurers were brigaded into sharing the PCs' blame. Whatever, but one of those adventurers belongs to a powerful and wealthy Thieves' Guild in the next town over. And inevitably when he returned to his hometown, the Thief "made complaint" (as the Guild calls it).
https://i.imgur.com/vx5vMuM.jpg
Everything you need to know about my friend's Paladin is contained in this drawing.
So the way the Thieves' Guild works is this: when you're in, if you have a problem, they take care of it. That's their guarantee to all their members. So this particular Thief explained to the Bosses that he had been the victim of a false accusation which disrupted his adventuring activities in the wilderness, harming his fortune and reputation. Naturally, they promised him restitution would be given.
So a messenger was sent to the PCs out in the frontier town. He said that the Guild was not open to negotiating terms, rather they had already worked out what the PCs needed to do to save their lives (this was somewhat of a bluff, the PCs probably could have wheedled some concessions)---the Paladin needed to pay 100 gp and cover the Court Fees (another 20 gp) and swear in a House of the Saints that he had committed calumny against [the wronged Thief adventurer]. So yeah, 120 gp and a mea culpa "and you never have to hear from us again," the herald put it.
https://i.imgur.com/tuJHylD.jpg
The Guild's Herald. See, he got a drawing, which is how the players know this is an important scene!
So the Paladin said that being asked to give his oath on behalf of a thief was wrong and that furthermore the NPC adventurers indeed shared blame in the regrettable incident because they didn't stop him from blowing up the town [????], that under no circumstances would he ever do it and, before the herald could say anything, got up and walked away from the meeting. (I said to the Paladin's player "...do you like, just walk away ranting?" and he said "yeah, I get up from the table and walk out of the tavern finger in the air still filibustering" basically.)
The Cavalier quickly tries to cover for his idiot friend saying basically "he's a little crazy, sorry I can't deliver on the oath thing but I'll pay all the money you want." The herald was in nowise pleased and said "you understand this is about more than money---if your friend disrespects us like this it becomes a Matter of Honor."
What "Matter of Honor" Means
Basically any large-scale criminal enterprise is only held together by its reputation and the loyalty of its members. Cliches about thieves and honor aside, the Guild has to be as good as its word, as close to 100% of the time as can be, or it becomes not worth the rental price of the Guild Hall. Because as is understood by the common use of the word 'guild' (don't faff at me about historical accuracy pz) it's basically a regulatory body for the Black Market, which means just like any bank every transaction is underwritten by trust. So the Guild literally cannot just turn around and be like "sorry they were uncooperative and it'd be really inconvenient for us to deal with some mid-levels out on the frontier," even if its leaders were the kind of men who didn't care about personal honor (and they very much are). They take the "mess with one of us mess with all of us" thing very seriously.
So like, at this point I'm kinda done thinking of ways to WORK THINGS OUT and RE-RAIL THE CAMPAIGN. What's going to happen is since a gang of adventurers is very much a hard target, the Guild will do like any smart business and delegate/outsource to a proven contractor they have a solid relationship with---the Assassins' Guild. The Assassins are a prestige class meaning everyone who gets to call themselves an Assassin is at least level seven; they are serious dudes and they don't take contracts for less than 8,000 gp (travel expenses alone will make this job 10,000, push it up to 12,000 due to the dangers of taking on a group of adventurers. That's an insane amount of money for the life of some jerk in the middle of nowhere, but like, there is no other answer to direct effrontery. When someone just straight up directly calls you out your hands are kinda tied).
That's still stupid. You can't go to war every time some nobody talks trash.
Very true. But at this point the PCs are not nobody. They're locally notorious not just for the Grifflet incident but as the Baron's new hatchet-men; the Cavalier has a reputation as a powerful knight for his slaying of a manticore, they've won several pitched battles on the Barony's highways etc. if the Paladin just blows a raspberry in the Guild's face and gets away with it, it would very well add to the legend of "the Poison Paladin." The Guild's city is "only" 46 miles from the frontier, so while it's not exactly their backyard word could still get back and pollute their local standing (the difference between a Thieves' Guild and a Gang is the Illusion of Respectability. Being treated like churls/villeins/varlets by some newfangled squire's son really craps on that).
You could still think of some reason it doesn't have to come to this
Yeah but I don't want to. I'm done protecting my players from themselves. No more safety rails. That's entirely the gosh dang problem with safety rails---once the players realize you have them, they start pushing against them. My players are that type. They don't want to be "spared the worst," they want a world that reacts naturalistically to their prodding. Seriously I think the Paladin's player knows exactly what he's doing---like the guy playing the character's no dummy, he's been doing this since the 80's. I don't think he will break down and cry when/if his character gets eviscerated Gangland-Style but we'll see.
Okay Jerk, get back to the story
Right so later that day the Baron, Otgar, calls the Paladin up to his keep. He proceeds to slap the heck out of Msr. Newly-Dubbed The Paladin, then exiles him from the Barony of Stormcrown. Because Otgar isn't exactly the world's best baron but even he draws the line at you starting a war in his "very expensive, very flammable" town.
The Paladin accepts his fate, rides in and tells his expectant Father-in-Law the Squire of Greenfield that he can no longer ally himself the gentry of Stormcrown and must leave the Barony. The Squire is like "you were looking like a bad bet anyway TBH." I'm personally steamed because THE WEDDING PICTURE I drew is now NON-CANONICAL
The Wedding Picture:
https://i.imgur.com/QmQMnDd.jpg
Paladin is the one on the left, obviously
A few days later the Herald returns to Stormcrown and informs the Cavalier not to worry, everything's worked out---both Otgar and the Cavalier's patron the Mercenary Captain will be going in together on a payment to the Thieves' Guild. The herald is much friendlier this time. In reality, the Assassins' Guild has already taken the contract on the Paladin. The Guild will be taking the money and murdering the Paladin and then kindly inform the PCs to never come to their city or cross them ever again and to take this as a lesson.
But the twists don't end there. So last session I instituted this new rule: it takes you four weeks of training to level up, but you can take a week off the time for each one of these things you have: 1) a GP sacrifice of 150 gp x level to be attained (roleplayed however you want--as tithes, sacrifice, whatever); 2) benefit of an institution (a Shrine/Abbey for clerics, an Arcane Library for wizards, a Military Company for martial types etc.); 3) A higher-leveled character of your class or a class close enough to your own to mentor you.
My main goal with this new rule was to slow the pace of the campaign down because in-game the characters had climbed up five levels in about two months which is insane, from an in-world perspective/my perspective. So the Cavalier immediately assumed his mercenary captain patron had nothing better to do than tutor him which is like, okay guy, but whatever. The Paladin, Slayer and Bloodrager all rolled percentile die to see if a suitable trainer was in the area.
Paladin and Slayer both rolled in the upper 90s so they got exactly what they needed---a 9th level (just shy of name-level), retired member of their own character class who really literally has nothing better to do than train up some talented youngster. Thus, though exiled from the Barony of Stormcrown, the Paladin spent the next two weeks in the Barony of New Bastion (which is actually run by a retired Paladin!) being trained by this mentor. When the Paladin explained his problem with the Thieves' Guild, the old Paladin guy was like (I am paraphrasing, I did say this in the manner of a kindly old Paladin-turned-Rancher) "man you are really dumb. Your honor isn't worth putting people in needless danger over. If you wanna be this dumb you should just charge the Thieves' Guild headquarters and die as quickly as possible while getting as few people around you killed as possible. I didn't live through nine levels by being precious over my every uttered word." I'm not sure if I'm getting too heavy-handed or we're Really Roleplaying Now.
Meanwhile, Slayer and Bloodrager are going south. Bloodrager rolled in the 60s so he didn't get exactly what he needed... but he did get the Baron of Surgarde himself (whose adopted goblin son was one of the NPC Adventurers the Paladin threw mud on---and the Cavalier has been tripping over himself for the last 7-8 sessions trying to make up for that).
https://i.imgur.com/Eeo2mCx.jpg
Adopted Goblin Son is on the right. He's a Factotum!
https://i.imgur.com/3NrP19Q.jpg
The Baron of Surgarde. This is actually a prep-sketch for a big elaborate sextych of all the Shield Barons I'll probably never finish.
Surgarde's Baron is a Sorcerer [Gold Dragon bloodline] 9/Fighter 4 who loves adventure, and adventurers and is happy to host the Bloodrager for two weeks of training. This doesn't exactly make the Baron a new patron, but whatever. Bloodrager sucks up good and hard and acts interested in all the Baron's stories so that gets him a lot of credit even though the Goblin is like "why can't I get rid of you jerkssss"
In fact the Baron of Surgarde loves adventure and adventurers so much he has a building in his town called The Adventurers' Lodge which is part living history museum and part shrine, with a staff of old, retired (and mostly crippled) adventurers. It just so happens that one of these "fossils" is a level 9 Slayer whose only serious impediment other than age is a crippling love of cream ale, and so is easily bribed by the Slayer PC for two weeks of mentorship.
Following this period of training the party reconvenes in New Bastion, which is where we ended last session.
So I'm thinking next session I just try this opening gambit: "[Cavalier], you receive a note from Captain Skeletor* telling you he has received a sign from the Assassins; that your friend the Paladin is as good as dead and you need to leave him and clear out immediately."
*Sir Jon Skeletor, son of the Baron Skeletor, Captain of the Trueswords Free Company, the Cavalier's current employer.
https://i.imgur.com/ZnxDhlv.jpg
Jon Skeletor. I know I know, not really a skeleton, I'm so lame.
I kind of don't expect my players to give up on their buddy without a fight, obviously. So I have to into some depth about the mentor the Paladin picked up.
https://i.imgur.com/RkFDqyT.jpg
The Mentor the Paladin Picked Up
So he's Sir Hogarthe Crowne, formerly the leader of an adventuring troupe called The Band of Oxbridge, of which two others now live with him in pastoral New Bastion.
https://i.imgur.com/AyFM0fE.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/c1unPs1.jpg
The Other Two Guys. All three drawings still unfinished, obviously.
The other two guys are "Black" Angus Gilraven, a 9th-level Fighter, now a tavern-owner, and Sir Hengest "Henk" Macaroy, a 9th-level Cavalier now an orchard farmer. All these guys are basically good-types; the Paladin's mentor is not gonna let him get murdered even if he is a jackass, so assuming the Cavalier tells everybody they got Assassins coming (there's no reason he wouldn't, right?) Hogarthe immediately offers to put his trainee up in his hacienda, vowing that no one will take his life without a fight, and calls up his two old buddies to join in. So the Party gets a trio of 9th level old guys---with age penalties and obesity in Henk's case I reckon they're down to CR 6-7ish but they can still fight.
Now if the PCs basically get what I'm going for and want to go along with it---I mean, when you're forewarned that some Bad Men have been hired to gun you down and you basically Make A Stand in some tavern or farmhouse, right---then the interesting question will be whether or not the Slayer's mentor comes along to the fight. Because Old Paladin, Old Fighter and Old Cavalier are pretty much just immobile, over-the-hill tanks they're actually going to be almost worthless in a fight against a bunch of dedicated ninja-snipers who are determined to kill one person in particular. OTOH Jon Broque, the old Slayer, despite being a drunk and no longer strong enough to properly fire his composite bow, has a Perception of +15, so if he joins their stand suddenly the PCs have a real chance of not getting just headshotted through a window before Inits even get rolled (I use Called Shots IMC btw, makes the prospect of a bunch of Rogues coming for you a lot scarier. This is basically what Jon Skeletor told Cavalier last session: "these people aren't going to challenge you in the open like jackasses. If the Assassins come for you they'll come in the night, in enough numbers to make it a sure thing, slit your throat in your sleep or put a bullet in your brain from a hundred yards. They never fight fair and they never fail.")
Back up a step. This whole Band of Oxbridge thing seems totally arbitrary. Why not give the PCs more useful allies?
Right. So when Paladin and Slayer first made their Mentor Search Rolls (Bloodslayer wasn't there that session so didn't make his roll til the start of the next one), they both got 95+ so I gave them someone who (IMO) would be an ideal mentor---good-aligned, not much better to do, just short of name-level (e.g lvl 9). New Bastion is the Barony with a 14th level Paladin in charge (he's venerable and long retired) so I thought it made sense for an old LG adventurer to settle there. I had already come up with the idea of the Adventurer's Lodge in Surgarde so I thought that was a logical place for an old Slayer in his sunset years to be. However I didn't really have any idea what other leveled NPCs would live in those Baronies.
So when I got home that night I broke out my 3.5 DMG and rolled for it based on the size of either Barony's major population center. Using Pathfinder classes so I had to invent a little but I tried to keep it similar to their closest equivalents among the core classes. So in the case of New Bastion, I had a 9th level Paladin to start with and the other two level 9s I got were a Fighter and Cavalier; so I decided they were all a retired band of adventurers who'd settled down in the same neighborhood.
Now by those rulesguidelines, every high-level NPC generates double the number of NPCs half a level lower---so a level 9 Paladin = two level 4 Paladins = four level 2 Paladins = 8 level 1 Paladins. True enough. And so there are 42 persons with levels in Fighter, Cavalier or Paladin living in the Barony of New Bastion. However the DMG does not say those characters must all be related (although the Power Center section kinda implies it). So just because two 4th level Paladins are staying in NB atm doesn't mean they're related to Hogarthe or that he can/is willing to call upon them. So far I have decided that Hengest has a daughter who's a 4th-level Cavalier, but while he personally is willing to come and if necessary die fighting by Hogarthe one last time he would never drag his (engaged) daughter into it.
https://i.imgur.com/SNvFgJ7.jpg
Henk's daughter. Debatable if worth finishing.
Move along to the Assassins already
Right. So, I looked at the Pathfinder Assassin PrC and it's dumb, I'll be using the 3.5 one with the spells. The Assassins are sending a Kill Team to the Shield Baronies led by a 12th level journeyman---Ftr [Two-Weapon Warrior] 6/Rogue 1/Assassin 5. He is backed up by two Initiates (Ftr 3/Rog 4/Ass 1), with a Rogue [crossbow sniper] lvl 5 as Overwatch and a gaggle of Rutterkin/Waghalters as chaff/distraction.
No, that's not fair. I wasn't kidding about the Assassins always sending more than they think they need to do the job. It's how they get their reputation. The PCs will need to act fast because the Kill Team's arrived in New Bastion today.
Your beloved Western genre aside, you realize there's no chance they essentially agree to hang out in some dude's ranch-house and wait for the Assassins to come to them, right?
Yeah. Probably won't happen. But I need to do something so I'm going to map Hogarthe's house, stat up the Band of Oxbridge and see what my players choose to do instead.
But...?
Even if this big battle happens the way I'm envisioning, like, who cares? I dunno I'm just tired of dealing with the fallout of my PCs being jerks over and over and over.... this campaign was about Magic And Wonders Underground and Saving the Kingdom of the Fairies(!) when I wrote it up and it's turned into a game of Mafia meets Deadwood (I always crap on poor Deadwood... I've never even watched it).
I mean, this needs to happen. They yanked the bull's chain, they gotta get the horns. My players would be actively disappointed if I didn't. They're practically daring me. It's just, even if I massacre the party I won't feel good. It's just like, I made all this stuff---in a weird way it's like my players are going in the wrong direction: the whole thing with this campaign is they're supposed to explore the eastern wilderness and forge their own path but they keep getting more and more enmeshed in things back west. And now they gotta die.
Well, maybe the next generation of PCs will be more interested in my Fairies. o ___ o