Encounter Ideas: A Night at the Opera

[Glawackus]

I'm becoming somewhat notorious in my D&D group for being the "crazy setting DM". We've gone from a circus full of killer clowns under the sway of a mind-controlling Gray Jester to a desolate, opulent lightning rail station haunted by zombies.

Now, the other night, after negotiating the last bit of said station, one member of the group insisted that we all watch The Phantom of the Opera. I'm not gonna lie: it was a freakin' excellent movie. And then, I made a big mistake.

Me: "Man, this would be a pretty sweet one-shot D&D adventure. You've got a dungeon, traps, an evil villain, a damsel in distress..."
Group: "Hey, yeah! You should stat that out and run it!"
Me: "...oh."

So, now I'm thinking about running it as a quick break from the campaign just for kicks--I won't play it totally straight off the movie/musical in order to avoid metagaming (for one thing, the Christine character's tutor will literally be an 'angel of music'--an outsider that's taken a special interest in her who has no connection to the real Phantom whatsoever). My problem is that I feel like Phantom (and I'm basing my knowledge off of what I know from the movie version I saw, with Gerard Butler as the Phantom) just doesn't seem to have a lot of encounter-y moments, save for Raoul and the Phantom's big swordfight in the graveyard.

The only idea I've come up with so far is the chandelier crash releasing fire elementals into the opera house, but I feel like I can do so much better than this. Does anyone have any ideas they'd like to share?

[F.L.]

Well, at some point, you might be able to work it so that the police falsely accuse one of the PCs, and have a big subdual damage fight/escape possibly followed by a jailbreak encounter.

Any attempted travel to the phantom's lair should involve a few monster encounters with abberations and such.

[Serenity]

The Phantom has some pretty nasty traps lying around if you do a bit of research. A hall of mirrors with illusions would be appropriate, and hanging traps could probably be simulated with the Shadow Garrote maneuver from ToB. His masterpiece in the book was a chamber that grew progressively hotter; the only furnishing was an iron tree with a noose. Most victims couldn't stand the heat, and ended up hanging themselves to end the pain.

[Azerian Kelimon]

On the subject of the OTHER night at the opera: Make your players play the game and have a normal adventure, and then at the end pull a twist: They haven't been doing everything, rather, they've been caught in a stasis. The players finally break free, and have a final battle with the Big Bad that did that, to the tune of Bohemian Rhapsody.

...What? It IS a good idea!

[Illiterate Scribe]

Players in the Spookables III game that I'm DMing, DO NOT LOOK -

Spoiler

Show

Curses, I had an idea fairly similar to this. The PCs would be in a theatrical production that gradually began to turn into real life, Inland Empire style; eventually, people that you killed in the play would actually be real people dying, and not just faking it for the stage. This would have culminated in killer nimblewright dance partners (ya rly), and much exploring of decaying opulence.

Also, many GODDAMN SPLOICERS.

[Hal]

Hm, opera house hijinks, eh? Whatever you do, give them the chance to either swing from a chandelier or jump through a sky-light.

[Illiterate Scribe]

Hm, opera house hijinks, eh? Whatever you do, give them the chance to either swing from a chandelier or jump through a sky-light.

Why not both?

[Pie Guy]

Also, you could have a side thing. An assassin, let's call him "John", kills somebody named, I don't know "Abe" and you can also test their knowledge of civil war history

[Dark Knight Renee]

In a D&D-style situation, your Angel of Music/Opera Ghost should probably be either an outsider (if bad, succubus/incubus does well) or an actual undead (ghost, vampire, etc). In either case, do NOT make the villain’s true nature obvious, and mislead them into thinking it’s something else. If social intrigue doesn't suite you or your players, the sewers/catacombs/whatever can contain plenty of traps and minions/undead, especially if the villain is undead himself. If social intrigue really isn’t your style, it’s possible to drop the plot background into their ears and then drag them into it almost immediately, a la the Point of No Return scene.

My sister and I did something similar to this. In our case, the ‘ghost’ was really a powerful wizard (the recurring BBEG) pretending to be a ghost. However, the scenario was mostly played for laughs, since the PCs didn’t believe for a moment that it was anything but their BBEG being obnoxious. This would be because it was a multiverse game full of wackiness, and most of the characters in the party were quite familiar with the plot of Phantom of the Opera (and the BBEG knew this, but did it anyway).

[BRC]

Get your hands on Complete Scoundrel then throw them up against some Cloaked Dancers and Masters of Masks, both of which can work well in an opratic setting.

[AslanCross]

The Phantom could rely on illusions to supplement his traps, or else be a very obscure type of duelist who dabbles in the ToB Shadow Hand discipline.

I think the chandelier releasing fire elementals is a good twist on the crashing chandelier. I did the crashing chandelier shtick in my last session and the PCs did their very best to step around the chandelier. Somehow they just knew it was going to fall. <_< Having it do more than flatten someone is a good idea.

There could also be some bizarre creatures in his underground river dwelling.

...if I were to run this I would so use Nightwish's version of the title song as the "boss theme."

[Dark Knight Renee]

In regards to threats prior to venturing under the opera house, undead shadows or similar undead would be scarier than fire elementals for a chandelier crash, if undead is the theme. If wizard is the Phantom’s theme, fire elementals work fine. If your Phantom is both, use both for added chaos. Also, the inclusion of a gargoyle or guardian golem of some kind would be a good idea. Beneath the opera house and the graveyard are good places for this.

For a twist, your manager(s) may be in on the game as the villain’s flunkies, rather than clueless idiots on the protagonists’ side. Have someone attempt to assassinate a troublesome PC at some point, if any of the villains notice their meddling or if the action gets too slow.

Otherwise, the majority of the action should probably focus on the area beneath the opera house. If this doesn’t provide enough action to fill a session, don’t end it with the encounter in the villain’s lair; have the villain flee give the PCs more trouble, taking the damsel in distress with him and delaying the PCs with traps if need be.

[UglyPanda]

Ever play Final Fantasy VI (FF III in America)? The star of the Opera is sent a letter telling her she'll be kidnapped, so the protagonists replace her, only for their replacement to be the target of an unrelated boss and they save her while trying to make it seem that the Oprah hasn't been disrupted.

[Tsotha-lanti]

And here I thought you were going to use the Marx Brothers in an adventure.

Anyhow, Erik would be a hit-and-run horror villain, using secret doors, trapdoors, traps, and other dirty tricks; replace the lasso with a whip. (Bards are proficient with those anyway.) The catacombs under the opera house can be full of minor monsters. And, naturally, being who he is, he's got to kill a lot of NPCs around the PCs.

[F.L.]

In a D&D-style situation, your Angel of Music/Opera Ghost should probably be either an outsider (if bad, succubus/incubus does well) or an actual undead (ghost, vampire, etc). In either case, do NOT make the villain’s true nature obvious, and mislead them into thinking it’s something else. If social intrigue doesn't suite you or your players, the sewers/catacombs/whatever can contain plenty of traps and minions/undead, especially if the villain is undead himself. If social intrigue really isn’t your style, it’s possible to drop the plot background into their ears and then drag them into it almost immediately, a la the Point of No Return scene.

My sister and I did something similar to this. In our case, the ‘ghost’ was really a powerful wizard (the recurring BBEG) pretending to be a ghost. However, the scenario was mostly played for laughs, since the PCs didn’t believe for a moment that it was anything but their BBEG being obnoxious. This would be because it was a multiverse game full of wackiness, and most of the characters in the party were quite familiar with the plot of Phantom of the Opera (and the BBEG knew this, but did it anyway).

I thought the lillend would be more appropriate as an angel of music, even though they aren't exactly angels (CN in fact).

[Keld Denar]

Whatever happens, you have to have a special guest appearance by a huge purple octopus. What opera adventure isn't complete without that loveable guy?

[Archpaladin Zousha]

Whatever happens, you have to have a special guest appearance by a huge purple octopus. What opera adventure isn't complete without that loveable guy?

I don't get the joke.

[Azerian Kelimon]

Final fantasy 6 joke. The octopus was so odd and crazy he was teh pwnzorz.

[Dark Knight Renee]

I thought the lillend would be more appropriate as an angel of music, even though they aren't exactly angels (CN in fact).

I interpreted the OP as at least implying that the Angel of Music and the Phantom/Opera Ghost/Villain Dude were to be seperate people, so I was refering only to the villain.


Edit (why must I always edit?): But I second the Lillend for the Angel.

[Telonius]

Get your hands on Complete Scoundrel then throw them up against some Cloaked Dancers and Masters of Masks, both of which can work well in an opratic setting.

MoM was my first thought.

Grab a Cape of the Mountebank and you're all set.

[The Gilded Duke]

There was a similar sort of encounter in one of the Eberron campaign books. A fight breaks out during a formal ball. One of the neatest things about the encounter was how the crowd became potentially deadly obstacles. Basically, you took the mob template from DMG II, and applied it to different groups of people in the party/audience.

Then you figure out which ways the various mobs would attempt to flee the building, or have them move randomly. If anyone is in a mobs way, they overrun the target trying to get past.

The audience becomes deadly monsters who you don't actually want to hurt. Also at some point, someone should get bull rushed off a balcony.

[Chronos]

I thought the lillend would be more appropriate as an angel of music, even though they aren't exactly angels (CN in fact).

CG, according to d20srd.org. They even have the Good subtype.

There was a thread about six months ago on bard BBEGs that might be of use... Ah, here we go.

[Ascension]

There was a thread about six months ago on bard BBEGs that might be of use... Ah, here we go.

There was also another thread about evil bards, more recently than that one. IIRC it ended up coming up with a guy who had a magical fiddle with mithril strings which would only play properly when soaked in human blood, or something like that, so he had to cut people in order to play music. It sounded more awesome when they described it.

That particular concept wouldn't work for the Phantom, but that wasn't all that they came up with. I'm sure you could find something to use in that thread... but I never have any luck with the search functions here, so I'm not going to try. Good luck!

[Doomsy]

Theatrical constructs would, personally, really creep me out. Nimblewright background dancers wearing filthy time-worn outfits and covered in the patina of disuse would be creepy - especially if you had other dolls that were not active mixed in with them.

Incorporeal undead or malicious fey would also seem the operatic types - they like the illusion and emotion of theater, etc.

[ThePhantom]

Give the Phantom the phantom template from MMV. It allows him to be incorpeal, letting him move through the opera house with ease and without being seen. Also, the name is the same. The Phantom of the Opera is a phantom