Using Aldern Foxglove


Rise of the Runelords


Two members of the party managed to impress Aldern, I can see him doing lust over one and I can see either envy or wrath from the other. I'm considering waiting to see if either of the two manages to trump the other to get his attention for Skinsaw, though it also occurs to me that another party member might get into the mix during that time as well.

I'm considering having him target one member for each sin (Lust, Wrath and Envy). Though I don't want to make it too easy for the party to realize that it must be Aldern that's behind it too soon. Anyone else tried this?


My players are very talkative as far as the npcs go and they innately distrust all the nobles. I'm having difficulty keeping them from visiting Aldern and I'm only on the first adventure.

We aren't through Burnt Offerings and the target of his affection Ferlanria (a fey druid) is already noticing small things missing. He was on her short list of suspects as far as she was checking. I had to insert a small boy into the Rusty Dragon hanging around her door calling her his girlfriend to throw off some suspicion because it was far too early.


Grokken wrote:

Two members of the party managed to impress Aldern, I can see him doing lust over one and I can see either envy or wrath from the other. I'm considering waiting to see if either of the two manages to trump the other to get his attention for Skinsaw, though it also occurs to me that another party member might get into the mix during that time as well.

I'm considering having him target one member for each sin (Lust, Wrath and Envy). Though I don't want to make it too easy for the party to realize that it must be Aldern that's behind it too soon. Anyone else tried this?

I had a feyish druid set up for Lust, but then she died. In fact, all five female PCs died (including some which were new characters made by players with previously dead characters).

I decided a mixed bag like the one you suggest would be in order too (esp. since he had shown no real signs of Envy or Wrath at all in their first encounters with him). I had him dig up the object of his affection's corpse after it was buried at Sandpoint and raise her as his ghoulish bride, and then he began his Envy campaign against the Taldan noble barbarian, who Ven Vinder already disliked anyway thanks to Shayliss. Considering the PCs just learned from Tsuto and Nualia's defense attorney's research that the aforementioned Taldan noble PC is disgraced from his family due to losing control of his Rage, they began to question him somewhat as well. The undead former PC will also help explain why Aldern could take on Iesha's revenant if it comes to that. I've decreased the regular ghouls to compensate.


James B. Cline wrote:

My players are very talkative as far as the npcs go and they innately distrust all the nobles. I'm having difficulty keeping them from visiting Aldern and I'm only on the first adventure.

We aren't through Burnt Offerings and the target of his affection Ferlanria (a fey druid) is already noticing small things missing. He was on her short list of suspects as far as she was checking. I had to insert a small boy into the Rusty Dragon hanging around her door calling her his girlfriend to throw off some suspicion because it was far too early.

You may have emphasized Aldern a little too much then. You generally want to use the Swallowtail Festival to create a lot of potential suspects for the Lust motivation. Jubrayl Vhiski at the very least is a good Red Herring for the theft of small items, and Sandpoint's population is large enough that you can take a little bit of creative license, but you probably want to stick with Sczarni gang members as the most prominent "dickish love interests." Whatever you can do to make Aldern more of a fly on the wall. In these situations especially, less is more. The less the players know about Aldern, the better. He should be curious about them more than they are curious about him, and after he leaves to collect Vorel Fungi from the Manor the rest is history.

I personally had five different suspects for my party to investigate by the time chapter 2 rolled around.

At one point they were absolutely positive Caizarlou Zerren the Necromancer was the murderer. He made some brief appearances ogling my party's cleric in town. (I may or may not have made him a creepy germanized necrophiliac character reminiscent of the doctor from Human Centipede to fuel the ICK factor, but there's no rule in the book saying that was off-limits)

Ven Vinder is built to be a suspect based on his connection to Harker, but I chose to juice the suspicion even more by giving him one of the Sihedron tattoos from Paradise Barge, with the story that he did some nightly gambling while visiting his sister in Turtleback Ferry months ago, and got the tattoo to bypass the cover charge. When Ven has the same seven pointed star on his wrist as the victims have carved into their chests, it sends up red flags, and also helps to foreshadow chapter 3. If the party ever goes to investigate Turtleback Ferry before Rannick is taken by the Kreegs, it is simply at a time after Paradise is destroyed/sunken, but before anything noticeably bad has happened. They will get bored of TF and move on after a few days.

Jubrayl Vhiski was my MAJOR ace in the hole though. My group's cleric had a momentary one night fling with Aldern, but was a little more involved with the scoundrel Vhiski who was buying gifts for her almost every day in an effort to get in her pants. When he finally worked his way to the bedroom though, the bell had long since tolled for Aldern Foxglove, who at this point was spying on the cleric. After seeing Vhiski, the selfish scoundrel of a man abuse her in the bedroom, Aldern stalked him on the way back to his home and beat him nearly to a bloody pulp in a dark alley. Vhiski survived but bore terrible, disfiguring wounds, and whole sections of his scalp that had been torn away inhibiting his hair growth. (This likened his appearance more to the dread ghast Aldern whose face and hair were already deteriorating) Vhiski accused the cleric of having him followed and beaten because she resented him. (Jubrayl was a true gentleman) When the cleric finally began to notice a grotesque figure spying on her and Orik Vancaskerkin through the window of her room, and noticed her holy symbol and some of her intimate clothing had gone missing, she immediately suspected Jubrayl.

The other two red herrings were people of my own invention added to the story, and they never rose to the level of prominence these three did, but they do serve as a momentary distraction.

Keep that in mind during future campaigns involving murder mysteries. Always remember to include that heinous human element. Murder is a heinous act after all, so if you can't mire it in sex, jealousy, scandal, and spite then you are probably playing with children under age 13 and I would have to suggest playing a campaign set in Equestria (The world from My Little Pony) and I mean that. My Little Pony: Friendship is Adventure can make really kickass pathfinder games.


Pathfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

Grokken, I'd be really interested to see how that works. I am still in book 1, but I kind of am in the enviable position where each of the party can serve as a target. 2 for lust (lost noble sorcerer, and exotic-looking, if not attractive, fighter), 1 for envy (honorable cavalier), and 1 for wrath (overzealous inquisitor of Pharasma).

I also have a party that seems to really like Aldern (I think one of his potential objects of lust is actually starting to fall for him, and his target of envy in some ways envies him!). As a result, I am actually toying of the idea of trying to make him a much more sympathetic villain. Rather than going for pure shock value at who the murderer is, adding a twist of sadness as the last bit of the "real" Aldern that they know/like is responsible for the notes that lead them to figure it all out. The letters would be more of a plea for help, or lamentation of what he used to be, rather than psychotic ravings. The problem this would present is the linking to the Skinsaw cult, and how the death of Ilesha fits in (though Vorel's corrupting influence can be used there).

For the actual suspect pool, I have a kind of interesting situation. I have been playing up Ven Vinder as a very overprotective father, but also have had Shayliss be very tenacious in her pursuit of her object of interest. If I go for the lust-letters, I think it is very possible that the party will suspect Shayliss first and foremost (especially since due to some lucky rolls, she actually overpowered the cavalier in the basement encounter). Also, my party has presented another wrinkle in the one of them accidentally started a rumor that Das Korvut was a devout follower of Zon-Kuthon, thus making him a prime suspect for the town, and for the rest of the party who are unaware of the rumor's origin.


Not a good idea, since the haunts in the manor are keyed to certain characters, one keyed to the one he is obsessed with


Mavrickindigo wrote:
Not a good idea, since the haunts in the manor are keyed to certain characters, one keyed to the one he is obsessed with

I disagree. GREAT ideas, and the more I read of the Skinsaw murders (The haunts, especially), the more I feel like the adventure needs to be specifically tailored to the PCs. The letters, the red herrings, the haunt assignment (and reflavouring here and there), the obsession itself... they should all evolve naturally from the party's relation to Aldern. Myself, I tried (unsucesfully) to frame a recently escaped Nualia for the murders, after one of my PCs roleplayed a dramatic confrontation with her and was nearly flung from the cliffs atop the town. A clawed hand tore apart the victims, the symbol around her neck is carved into her victims (unfortunately they'd made the rolls to identify the sihedron and thus it was "that star thing" rather than "nualia's symbol") and I left some white hairs at the crime scene and bleached Aldern's hair as part of the ghastification.

Scaevola77 wrote:

(especially since due to some lucky rolls, she actually overpowered the cavalier in the basement encounter).

This is fantastic.


For some reason, the image of a cavalier tied up and begging the father to pull his daughter off of him amuses me to no end. =^-^= Sadly, the half-orc barbarian scholar in my group was *ahem* clueless about the lady's intentions and brushed her off. So now she's trying a smear campaign claiming he's gay. No one really cares. (Though once her sister dies... heh heh heh)

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