Aotrs Commander
2017-05-15, 06:08 PM
As usual with my threads, there is a load of preamble as I tortously come to the point, so bear with me...
I have (FINALLY) finished preparing Rise of the Runelords (which required some modifications to meet my 3.Aotrs standards, but mostly because of the double-the-number of characters), and now need to make a start on writing my day-quest for summer. Tiem is not hugely on my side, and so I ocne again turn to the boards and how I missed them last week!) for some ideas and suggestions. (And this will likely be one of two or three grovelling for-ideas
The party in question is basivally the Dark Lord's dirty black ops. A group that the good-guy Northern Nations do not even know exists, and who operate in total secrecy doing the Dark Lord's will right under their noses. In this particular instance, the PCs are basically in Not-Rome, in the 1300AD-tech level Not-Roman Empire. The party has just hit 5th level.
My outline for the adventure (and indeed a short arc of 3-4 quests) is that they will be tasked to get themselves (and Some Backup1 inflitrated aboard the convoy of vessels which will be making the long trip over what amounts to the Not-Atlantic/Pacific/etc over the the imperial colonies on the Great Continent. (Which, as far as is known, is characterised by no currently known races and a lot of dinosaurs.) There, they are to do some recon and come home. The idea being that there should be at adventure on the outbound and inbound streches, and one in the middle.
For the outbound stretch, the adventure will be the convoy reaching A.N. mid/early trip island, where a city (relatively new) allows them to resupply. but a magical, saptient/sentient virus has been quietly infecting and controlling the entire populace, and it wants to spread across the world. But it doesn't affect the PCs. The reason being, ironically, because they are Evil. The PCs wil eventually somehow defeat the virus, and go alogn their way, hopefully with no survivors to the
wiser as to what just happened...!
However, before we get to that, there is the slight problem of getting the PCs into the convoy/trading ships in the first place. If not a forth part of the adventure I'm not sure), it warrents at least some effort, since a good chunk of this party is all about planning, intelligence gathering and executing said plans.
And this is the part that is leaving me a bit stumped. I would welcome any suggestions on ways that they might accomplish this (so that I can write the appropriate hooks in), bearing in mind there level. They are no magic shops that they can just go and buy scrolls in (they might be able to request something from their bosses if they really need it), but mundane (or at least self-sufficient to the party) options would be best.
Rough breakdown or party capability follows, as a rough guideline. As we have not organised the date yet, not all of the characters may be present in the foreground, though they may be "on-tap" if required, and the number of players is expected to be about five to eight (maximum!)
Warblade, rogue, ranger, monk/rogue, all of whom are evil races, but who have been provided with hats of disguise (which, considering magic is reasonably rare on this world, is a major resources from the bosses and woe betide them if they lose them!) so the can pass for human without fuss.
Two Dark Mistresses (based on the Dungeon Keeper 1 Mistress, a two-level monster class), opne fighter, the other a homebrew psionic/martial adept ninja (with a strong (early) Naruto flavour), both of which can pass for human naturally.
A human rogue/cleric, a dark elf wizard (generalist, pretty much blasting and the usual suspects, since the player only plays day quest and doesn't play very often), human wizard (more tending towards battlefield control, but also probably one of the least likely to be make it)
Finally, a young Great Drake (currently only Small size, and dragons are their own mnonster class), notably with the abillity to shapeshift into small-to-dimunitive creatures.
(Though note that the world does not use any of the standard D&D monsters and is entirely ground-up homebrew; the ecology is roughly 1 mya North America ('cos tat's where all the cool stuff lived), with magical creatures and elements of dinosaurs, pterosaurs and any other prehistoric creature I happen to think is awesome.)
Any suggestions would be welcome! (And I can provide, likely at tediously exhaustive length, other information you might think pertinent (and if I can't can go away and think about it!)
1Basically so I have some room to tailor for what players can make what session.
I have (FINALLY) finished preparing Rise of the Runelords (which required some modifications to meet my 3.Aotrs standards, but mostly because of the double-the-number of characters), and now need to make a start on writing my day-quest for summer. Tiem is not hugely on my side, and so I ocne again turn to the boards and how I missed them last week!) for some ideas and suggestions. (And this will likely be one of two or three grovelling for-ideas
The party in question is basivally the Dark Lord's dirty black ops. A group that the good-guy Northern Nations do not even know exists, and who operate in total secrecy doing the Dark Lord's will right under their noses. In this particular instance, the PCs are basically in Not-Rome, in the 1300AD-tech level Not-Roman Empire. The party has just hit 5th level.
My outline for the adventure (and indeed a short arc of 3-4 quests) is that they will be tasked to get themselves (and Some Backup1 inflitrated aboard the convoy of vessels which will be making the long trip over what amounts to the Not-Atlantic/Pacific/etc over the the imperial colonies on the Great Continent. (Which, as far as is known, is characterised by no currently known races and a lot of dinosaurs.) There, they are to do some recon and come home. The idea being that there should be at adventure on the outbound and inbound streches, and one in the middle.
For the outbound stretch, the adventure will be the convoy reaching A.N. mid/early trip island, where a city (relatively new) allows them to resupply. but a magical, saptient/sentient virus has been quietly infecting and controlling the entire populace, and it wants to spread across the world. But it doesn't affect the PCs. The reason being, ironically, because they are Evil. The PCs wil eventually somehow defeat the virus, and go alogn their way, hopefully with no survivors to the
wiser as to what just happened...!
However, before we get to that, there is the slight problem of getting the PCs into the convoy/trading ships in the first place. If not a forth part of the adventure I'm not sure), it warrents at least some effort, since a good chunk of this party is all about planning, intelligence gathering and executing said plans.
And this is the part that is leaving me a bit stumped. I would welcome any suggestions on ways that they might accomplish this (so that I can write the appropriate hooks in), bearing in mind there level. They are no magic shops that they can just go and buy scrolls in (they might be able to request something from their bosses if they really need it), but mundane (or at least self-sufficient to the party) options would be best.
Rough breakdown or party capability follows, as a rough guideline. As we have not organised the date yet, not all of the characters may be present in the foreground, though they may be "on-tap" if required, and the number of players is expected to be about five to eight (maximum!)
Warblade, rogue, ranger, monk/rogue, all of whom are evil races, but who have been provided with hats of disguise (which, considering magic is reasonably rare on this world, is a major resources from the bosses and woe betide them if they lose them!) so the can pass for human without fuss.
Two Dark Mistresses (based on the Dungeon Keeper 1 Mistress, a two-level monster class), opne fighter, the other a homebrew psionic/martial adept ninja (with a strong (early) Naruto flavour), both of which can pass for human naturally.
A human rogue/cleric, a dark elf wizard (generalist, pretty much blasting and the usual suspects, since the player only plays day quest and doesn't play very often), human wizard (more tending towards battlefield control, but also probably one of the least likely to be make it)
Finally, a young Great Drake (currently only Small size, and dragons are their own mnonster class), notably with the abillity to shapeshift into small-to-dimunitive creatures.
(Though note that the world does not use any of the standard D&D monsters and is entirely ground-up homebrew; the ecology is roughly 1 mya North America ('cos tat's where all the cool stuff lived), with magical creatures and elements of dinosaurs, pterosaurs and any other prehistoric creature I happen to think is awesome.)
Any suggestions would be welcome! (And I can provide, likely at tediously exhaustive length, other information you might think pertinent (and if I can't can go away and think about it!)
1Basically so I have some room to tailor for what players can make what session.