Hell on Earth, the worst city in the world

[Morithias]

I've been playing Simcity 4, and been working on some mind control builds and I've been trying to think of how to combine the two into an encounter for my PCs to run into.

The core concept is that this enchantress/cleric with the domination domain/thrallherd has basically locked down the whole city and turned it into a world for her to grind out gold pieces with no care for her population.

So I've been trying to come up with ideas on how to make this work. So far I have the following

1. Import Garbage. Like it or not this works in D&D too, neighbouring cities still make garbage.
2. Animating the dead to use as slaves, you die, you become zombie.
3. Rampant overtaxing, basically if it's not necessary for you to live from day to day, it's going into her coffers.
4. Allowing "testing areas" where those too weak or sick to work are sold as test subjects for mages looking for hands-on experimentation.

The idea is that she has access to the monsterous thrall spell which is permanent and as far as I can tell has no limit to the number you can control, so every day that passes, she places more civilians under her dominance. If travellers come across the city and she decides she needs more slaves she tries to take command of their minds as well.

So any other ideas how she could grind the gold pieces without any regard for her citizens?

[Sidmen]

1. While, yes, cities do produce garbage even in D&D, it would cost WAY too much to bother with transporting it to another city. Just dump the stuff 1/3 mile outside the city limits in some lake or whatever. So, in other words, I wouldn't try and use this one.

2. Animating the dead, yeah - though you need to ask yourself if she is also a fan of necromancy. The dead stink, and even though they might net some small amounts of cash, is she willing to live with the reek of rotting flesh for some copper coins?

3. Why bother taxing? Just say "the fruits of your labors are mine, I will provide you with food and housing." that way you can just cut out the middle man of them getting money at all.

4. Wouldn't it be far more beneficial to hire a few clerics on retainers to keep the populace healthy? That way, they can keep toiling away night and day for you until they die.

Now, I'm not just about to poke holes in your stuff without offering some in return, so here is how I'd represent it:

- Eliminate everything to do with keeping people happy: no more taverns (they drink money), no more statues (sell those), no more fairs or circuses, etc.

- Replace all the fields outside of town with cash crops and only grow the barest minimum of wheat to keep the people fed.

- No more personal housing; instead have everyone sleep in large warehouses with row after row of bedrolls (a well-rested minion is a productive minion). And don't ever have a bedroll empty - work 12 hour shifts with sleeping periods 6 hours long, overlapping the shifts so that only 1/4 of your people are sleeping at a time.

- You know all that bad industry that messes with a town's ecology - do it all. Metal smelting, dye making, distilling, etc.

[Slipperychicken]

Monstrous Thrall costs a bunch of xp, in addition to being a 9th level spell, so that's the limitation right there. Even if you got around the xp-cost, it would still take forever to hit enough people with the spell (how many 9th level slots does this lady have per day?), giving plenty of time for a resistance to form. Monstrous Thrall's Permanent duration means it can also be dispelled (by a sufficiently powerful caster) and suppressed by all sorts of effects.


The spell you want is Mindrape. It's free and instantaneous, and it lets you rewrite people's brains, and know everything they ever knew. Anyone trying to cure people has to go one at a time, with Break Enchantment. Still 9th level, though, so it would take a long time to hit everyone with it.

[Morithias]

Monstrous Thrall costs a bunch of xp, in addition to being a 9th level spell, so that's the limitation right there.

I just checked in my copy of the spell compendium, and I don't see any XP cost...

Thanks for the suggestions everyone.

[Arbane]

The spell you want is Mindrape.

It's perversely impressive how that spell manages to be the single worse thing to come out of a book that also has feats for necrophilia.

[Slipperychicken]

I just checked in my copy of the spell compendium, and I don't see any XP cost...

Thanks for the suggestions everyone.

Mine either... I was looking at this, the version that appears in Complete Divine has an xp cost. I forgot which one supersedes the other.

[Reluctance]

What you're thinking would work better as either vampire or illithid run. Both can mess with your head, both can control just enough guards to keep the rest of the population controlled, both have reasons for multiple enemies to work together, both add the ick factor of farming humans.

Hell on earth, I believe I saw someone else write up a better way to make that happen. A city where most government duties, including clerical (think office, not temple) and enforcement work, were performed by bound demons. Food for thought for another evil empire.

I try not to go with a single strongman controlling a decently sized adventuring area unless they and their plot device strike me as cool enough. One person means one unlucky saving throw or one gap in their defenses can cause an instant shortcut to the end of the plot. If there's one thing any good DM learns, it's to build fault tolerance into their plots.

[Emmerask]

Hmm well you could go with the dystopian everything burns, murders and homeless slave labors everywhere OR you could go with the everything looks beautiful at first glance approach and then hammer your players with the underlying ugliness of the place (which I think is far more effective ^^).

In any event the controlling every single citizen is not necessary, just key figures, the mayor/king (whatever), law enforcement and any other figure of authority the place may have is more then enough.


How about a city where everyone has to be (pretend) perfectly happy at any time, has to wear perfectly uniform clothing (Monday is green jacket day! etc), any use of swearwords is prohibited etc.
There is only one punishment for not complying with the rules, you will see "her" and be turned into a mindless slave then send back to your family

[Ashtagon]

- You know all that bad industry that messes with a town's ecology - do it all. Metal smelting, dye making, distilling, etc.

You forgot leather-making. Seriously. That's the industry that single-handedly caused zoning laws to be invented.