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View Full Version : My hand-me-down Eberron game



seedjar
2007-11-09, 08:39 PM
So, I posted a while back regarding this 10th-level Eberron game I've been playing. Several people expressed interest in what my group was doing so I figured I would post a run-down and open things up for comment.
When I joined the game, the party was on the run from Inspired agents after getting involved in some sort of Reidran smuggling plot in Sharn. Following some hints found at the scene of a murder that two of the PCs were investigating, we traced things back to a party of Reidran nobles studying at a university in Korranberg. A series of physical confrontations sparked an outright rivalry with the Reidrans and we became involved in sabotaging Reidran/Inspired research and industry in Xen'drik. After a while we were approached by a joint representative of the Library of Korranberg, Zilargo and Breland and incorporated as an independent mercenary outfit. Our first mission of sorts was to pose as bandits and raid a gnomish elemental binding facility to steal an airship. One of our PCs was on the lam from the Blood of Vol, so the party decided to try to lay low in Xen'drik for a while. Of course, the Reidrans found us in short order and we had to book it out of Stormreach.
At the same time, our warforged PC had been tinkering with an artifact we stumbled across while intercepting the Reidran research party on our first expedition to Xen'drik. It turned out to be a docent which became permanenty affixed after being equipped, and now occasionally causes said PC to lose voluntary motor control and fight tooth-and-nail whenever targeted by mental domination effects. So, when faced with no safe harbor in Khorvair or Xen'drik, the party next decided to put in to Sarlona, hoping to find psionicists to help identify the docent. After a long trip across the Syrkarn border, the party found refuge at the Xephanan monastery. The party managed to convince the heads of the monastery to investigate, but upon examining the artifact, the leader of the group was mind switched with the soul that had been trapped in the docent during it's construction. (DM got a 1 on a hand-of-fate roll.)
Then, the game was handed to me.
So, I have a few problems now. There is only one named villain, and he's a minor one that only my PC had a vested interest in tangling with. Luckily, my character is also the one that signed on as the leader of our company (as our fighter-type was now blacking out and behaving erratically thanks to his artifact and the other candidate for leader has a habit of breaking down and crying in verbal confrontations,) and so I have a reasonable mechanism to move him into a supporting role while still using him to contribute to the story. But the Reidran threat is what really keeps the party together - as we're all targets of the Inspired - and so I desperately need to introduce some interesting faces along those lines. There are also a lot of other potential places for character-villain interaction, but I want to take things one step at a time. Second, my players are bored. Our old DM was good at creating scenarios by the numbers, but he wasn't much of a planner and so, as you can see above, we have a bunch of hanging plot elements that aren't closely related, and the players are having a hard time getting involved in the story.
So, this is the state of the game up to our last session, when I took over. I've planned out some minor story elements to move the focus off of the Inspired for a little while and allow the party to gather up some new tools and intelligence. Let me know what you think - I'll be posting some specific info about our last game and where I want to go with it later.
~Joe