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So my players killed the stag lord tonight. It was a great fight all around, had a lot of fun.
My "problem" if you will, is that the players were rather "good" about avoiding a lot of exploration. They managed to hit the major events (Mites, kobolds, temple)and were high enough level to take him out, but they avoided a lot of quests. They didn't even go talk to the hermit potion guy, even though I told him about him multiple times, they just were not interested in meeting too many people with the Stag Lord threat looming over the land, I guess I can't blame them too much.
They skipped going to Nettles crossing(I even moved it's location so they would see him at a different river area, but they still avoided him, grr). So they never got the quest to hand over the stag lords body. The body is now buried in an unmarked grave, minus one head for identification to the swordlords.
My question then, is what to do with Nettle now? I don't want to turn it into just a quick stop of "oh, you want his body, ok we go dig it up for ya, thanks for your stuff..."
Couple options I could go with.
1. He just is gone, effectively turning the hex into an unexplained burned up toll bridge.
2. Turn Nettle into a bit more aggressive enemy. Perhaps nettles is mad that his revenge is no longer possible and he haunts the PCs for taking the chance away. Make the party actually discover the back story another way, while being haunted. Not sure how to release Nettle yet though through this.
Any thoughts?
Maybe tie it into the Kingdom building: He only goes away when the PCs settle the hex and reopen the crossing (ie build roads there), thus proving the bandit threat is over. That will leave them trying to convince people to settle in a place which is quite obviously haunted :)
It will mean he's still there well into book 2, but since he can't be defeated normally it doesn't really matter that the PCs will be a bit higher level.
Interesting dilemma!
You could loosen the requirements of Nettles' revenge - perhaps it's enough to show him the helm or Staggy's bow (they kept his stuff, right?) to convince the revenant that the man is dead. Although if someone is actually wearing the helm, Nettles will probably go after that person with a singular obsession...
Or perhaps Nettles' spirit can never be placated now, and that crossing will remain haunted forever... or until the players do something to fix it (consecrate or whatnot). Although the crossing is so out of the way that they might not even bother.
I think the important thing is to go with something that will be interesting for the players, rather than a "Oh, you want his body? Let's go dig it up and we'll be right back," type thing.
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Great ideas all.
I will definitely incorporate some of this.
I am now thinking perhaps there was a son/daughter that escaped the fire, who is living out in the wild, lost and gone somewhat feral. Perhaps returning this family member to society will help with that. Maybe this becomes the lost boy down in book 2's lizard men camp.