Shag Solomon

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Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path Subscriber. 29 posts. No reviews. No lists. No wishlists.




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Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path Subscriber

About halfway through book two, I had this idea I really dug about how to run the AP with characters who were genuine heroic types, and not villainous henchmen, before they lost their memories. By that point in my game, I'd already solidly established that my PCs were monsters* before they became amnesiac, so I couldn't use it myself, but I wanted to share it, particularly because I've seen some GMs hesitate at making their players run (formerly) evil characters.

The lore on Xhamen-Dor stipulates that he doesn't really have organized cults, with one exception - the Sentinels, a group that "worships" Xhmanen-Dor with the goal of preventing him from waking up. They're dedicated to wiping out any evidence of his existence, and to prevent being corrupted through their knowledge of the Great Old One, must periodically wipe their memories.

You see where I'm going with this, right?

Before they lost their memories, the PCs were members of a Sentinel cult. They still have an unsavory reputation, because they often had to kill some apparent "innocent" who had been seeded by XD, and of course, they could never defend their actions, because explaining why they killed the seeded exposes anyone hearing the explanation to Xhamen-Dor's corruption. Lowls was still their leader, but instead of betraying them in a power grab, he was saving them from being taken over by Xhamen-Dor, but was tragically unable to prevent his own corruption in time, and now his former companions have to hunt him down before he awakens the very creature he had dedicated his life to keeping asleep.

This change requires virtually no change in the actual campaign - pretty much everything plays out exactly as written, including everyone in Thrushmoor acting like the party is evil, but PCs can still have been genuine good guys all along. (Well, no major changes through book 3, which we just finished, and I don't think this breaks anything in the next three books, but I haven't actually run them yet.)

*in one case, literally - the party wizard was a Leng ghoul, polymorphed to pass as human before she had her memory wiped.