Gray Eminence |
So I made my first submission to PFS and it was rejected, which is OK, but I would like to ask you folks, what do you think about it? Also, please do not post your own submission to this thread, it is much better to have only one submission per thread. So, here it goes...
Decline of Glory
A century before, the family du Merau was the pride of Taldor. Adrian du Merau, the “noble of the future” was the beloved lord of several towns and villages near the western border of the empire. He studied the economy of Absalom and used his own fortune and experience to enhance the economy. As a result, the du Merau lands prospered like never before.
After his death, his son Mikeal and later his grandson, Pelaton inherited the land, but not his talent and noble heart. In fact, Pelaton du Merau is viewed by most as the incarnation of greed himself. He is only interested in collecting taxes and he does so by selling licenses to traders, hunters and shop owners. In order to facilitate the obtaining of a license, he invented the “clean license”, a license he already signed that can be purchased from a tax collector by anyone, only the name must be filled in and the tax collector must place a stamp on it.
Two weeks ago Grogen Brens, a tax collector of the town of Straightwall was robbed, and a dozen clean licenses, along with his signet ring disappeared. The thief could not savor his loot however, as he was killed in the severs only half an hour later by an otyugh just as he wanted to enter his hideout.
When Grogen learned about the robbery, he knew he would loose his position would the loss of the ring and the licenses get into the ears of Pelaton. He promptly organized a band to find the ring and the papers, and to get rid of the thief. At the same time the local thieves’ guild decided to find the papers too, as according to their code of ethics, it was rightfully theirs; after all, one of their members stole it.
Even if both parties tried to work as quietly as possible, Tork Bereston, a local member of the Pathfinder Society found out what happened and decided that it would be for the benefit of the society to find the papers. It would be quite an advantage to have a tax collector on the side of the Society in Taldor, after all…
Adventure synopsis: The characters try to find out who stole the papers and what happened to them. They must investigate quietly, as they must not raise the attention of Grogen or the thieves’ guild. They sneak into the house of Grogen and find some links to a bartender. The bartender gives them a hint about the thief and his hideout. They climb into the sewers just to find that the hideout now belongs to an otyugh. They defeat the otyugh and claim the loot. If they operated in silence and they did not raise the suspicion of the other parties, they simply walk away, otherwise they are attacked as they try to leave the hideout.
Act 1: After talking to Tork, the characters sneak into the home of Grogen. They must find a way to get past the guards.
Act 2: Once inside, the characters locate his study and try to find some clue. They are attacked by guards if they are not careful enough. Then they must leave without leaving a trace.
Act 3: A note in the diary of Grogen leads the characters to an inn where they can get some information from the bartender. They can get this info using skills or weapons.
Act 4: The characters are on their way to the hideout, but they must be careful not to run into any of the searching parties in the severs. This means that they cannot take the direct route.
Act 5: The characters find the hideout, fight the otyugh and collect the papers.
Act 6 (optional): If the characters were not careful enough, they are attacked by the thieves or Grogen’s men as they leave. It is possible that they have raised the attention of both parties. In this case the characters may find themselves in a fight where each party has two enemies.
Conclusion: If the characters deliver the papers to Tork, he takes them to Grogen, who is quite thankful. He may become an ally for some time; however, he is not the most reliable man on Golarion. If Grogen finds the papers, the whole affair is quickly forgotten. If the thieves get the papers, they make it sure that Pelaton removes Grogen and places a member of the guild in the position of the tax collector.
Thomas Higgins |
So I made my first submission to PFS and it was rejected, which is OK, but I would like to ask you folks, what do you think about it? Also, please do not post your own submission to this thread, it is much better to have only one submission per thread. So, here it goes...
I can't say specifically why it was rejected other than the others were better, which is okay as you said. However, several little things that I noticed:
1) If you are trying to follow the synopsis format of the current pathfinder modules, you will want to completely remove the second half of the second paragraph. The top part is a full description from the player's point of view (more or less) as though they knew about it from either the pathfinders or another interested inside party (or parties). However, no one knows about the second paragraph but the DM. That goes in the synopsis section below as you did.
2) You bring in the Thieves guild, however, any decent party that would be looking at going through this would likely be a member of the same-said guild or be hunted for an being an unsanctioned thief. The only way I can see this being preserved is if the city was big enough for multiple thieves guilds, and only one learned of the situation (not the one the party thief is a member of, obviously). That provides another starting point possibility as the party member is sent to see what the other guild is up to that has them so busy lately.
3) I know this was meant to work towards a pathfinder AP specifically, but if you generalize the setting (for example instead of a pathfinder, you can say the local adventuring historian), it would be very portable to any campaign setting, which is always desireable. Then once the concept is completed, it can be localized.
4) Instead of starting them as a third party from Tork, leave the story line a bit open where the party could start from any of the 3 or 4 groups getting formed. Let the group/DM and party dynamics decide which party the party is and how they get assigned to the mission. If the concept is good enough, they will be following more or less the same path anyway, they just may have certain obstacles removed or placed in their way due to their affiliation. As the path gets more detailed you can ensure each group has approximately the same number and difficulty of obstacles such that the other groups don't have.
I don't know if any of this would help or hurt your writing for the PFS, but it may help for writing general setting/adventure ideas. Either way, these are just my observations and initial thoughts. Take them as such. :)