I'm waiting breathlessly for the next installment.
Same, because judging by the lack of response, I am simultaneously convinced and disappointed that nobody in the party attempted to use the unicorn horn as a shank.
Sorry for the delay... last game called on account of illness.
They did find the Unicorn's Horn, the cleric took it, went off into the forest and buried it. So no shank I'm afraid. They also could have kept it and sold it to a local alchemist - who the poachers were going to sell it to. Of course a Unicorn's horn can be sharpened into an excellent shank-type weapon... I cite Bugs Bunny as precedent:
https://i.ytimg.com/vi/7OpOYGt4Sss/hqdefault.jpg
The Unicorn eating comeuppance has not come up yet. The PCs have finished the Unicorn side adventure and moved on in the campaign with that sword hanging over their heads. But I expect they will find out quite soon
I have questions. Why are you calling the poachers "poachers?" Robin Hood was a poacher; he was chaotic good by most conceptions. How do you or anyone know the poacher are/were evil? Maybe the unicorn attacked them?
Short answer - They were called poachers in the adventure. They were actively hunting the Unicorn to sell it's horn to a local Alchemist (who would have purchased it off the party if they decided to go that way).
My Reasoning - The area that the adventure takes place in is ruled by a Lord (LG). These hunters were in a secluded part of the forest and did not wish their location known - which is why they attacked the party. These hunters were not hunting with permission.
parsimony wrote:
Why would a dragon prefer cooked unicorn over raw unicorn? Cooked unicorn spells TRAP.
My thinking exactly.
parsimony wrote:
Anyway, the primary purpose of the player actions here seems to be to mess with the DM.
If these were any other people I would tend to agree with you. But in my heart of hearts I know that these folks were just enjoying themselves in the game here and didn't have any intention of messing with me :)
parsimony wrote:
Cannibalism is mommas eating babies when they're hungry, eating dead associates in a starvation situation, or ritual cannibalism by eating hearts or livers.
A man cooking a talking dolphin, a dragon eating an uppity maiden, or adventurers checking out unicorn drumstick ain't cannibalism, although it may be bad politics. I don't care what a wiki or a developer says, it's meaningless to extend the word to that extent.
In my mind, I've been equating this Unicorn situation to Harambe or Cecil the Lion. But then we're kind of getting into a slippery slope. This is a role-playing game, how close do we want to get this to real life?
so the party is high enough level to fight off a group of harpies 2-3 in guessing a cr8-12 encounter but all failed their dc 16 will saves to avoid the trance?
cr 6, actually. 2 pcs made their save.
even at a cr 6 encounter(im assuming 2 young templated harpies than?) even if you will save is your weakest save they shoulda made the save on a between a 4 and a 6 on the die with 5%chance to fail on a will is good save character how did all but 2 people fail their saves?
They rolled their saves. 2 made their saves, 3 didn't. This part of the game was based on chance. They rolled their dice and they didn't make it. What more do you want me to say? Sorry they didn't all make their saves, but them's the breaks.
so the party is high enough level to fight off a group of harpies 2-3 in guessing a cr8-12 encounter but all failed their dc 16 will saves to avoid the trance?
You call the Unicorn an animal. If this is your opinion, or is just the way you talk about them, it is no wonder your players see nothing wrong with eating one. I get that a lot of magical beasts are just animals with a couple extra options, but with mental stats (Int 11, Wis 21, Cha 24) probably above most of your PCs as a whole, animal doesn't come close to describe them.
I feel that's a bit of an over-simplification. I've only used the word "animal" to describe the Unicorn once in this thread.
That being said, how I was perceiving the Unicorn was the biggest reason why I started this thread. I was worried that as a DM I was holding the Unicorn in too-high of esteem and wasn't going to be fair. My instant reaction was "If the party eats the Unicorn, they get an alignment change". Fortunately it was the end of the night before it came to that.
At the time this scenario was playing out, the characters saw what was described as a horse with a pure, snow white coat - with blood stains of course. When the PCs went in for a closer inspection, they found a wound where the horn should be. At the very same time they made a successful knowledge nature check was made dc 19 (DC 15 for rarely encountered creature + 4 from the challenge rating) and quickly identified it as an ex-Unicorn.
From that point, I let the players work it out on their own.
Daw wrote:
Also, not everyone is OK with parting out Dragons. I read a book years ago that had dragons themselves keeping and using relics of their ancestors, but that was well before Pathfinder was a gleam in Paizo's eye. I am trying to remember the author or title.
I agree. Parting out of Unicorns, Dragons, etc. is not necessarily ok. I mean, the poachers were fine with it, but the campaign setting is a LG society and this wouldn't be seen as a good thing by the population as a whole. Heaven help them if this got out on Youtube.
Daw wrote:
We can justify it either way, we are more rationalizing than rational, mostly.
I feel this whole Unicorn situation kind of went down like this:
Dead unicorn + fire burning nearby = let's eat. Now, how do we make sense of this?
Daw wrote:
As a GM I would have made it clear that eating a Unicorn would be considered evil by nearly every goodish culture in my game, that, using ritual cannibalism, Unicorn flesh could be a significant source of power, and finally, it would be a difficult thing to hide from some beings. It could be worse, Mielikki isn't part of the local divine community.
I appreciate that... however, in this campaign I'm choosing not to lead the players too much when it comes to letting them make their own decisions for their characters (give them enough rope...)
Every one of those players in that group has considerably more experience at roleplaying than I do, we all know the basics about Unicorns as players. The players had every opportunity to inquire about rules, what the community would think if they found out, what their characters would "know", and they all did that to a certain extent.
They had an opportunity to stop what they were doing, but one character persisted. Locksley's player honoured his call to have his character eat the Unicorn, even after reading this thread before the game and understanding that his character would have known about Unicorns and that this was not a good thing to be doing and that there would be consequences. I respect that, so I want to make sure what I do next is even-handed, and above all else, fun for everyone in the game.
Which is why I appreciate everyone's contribution to this thread - it's really helping me out.
As I mentioned before, we've played out the whole Unicorn on a fire scene with the PCs last Saturday, and I've gotten permission from one of the PCs (Roxy - many thanks) who keeps the Campaign Log to post the Unicorn bit of it (see spoiler below). Unfortunately, it doesn't say anything about the consequences of their actions, and I'm not going to post those just yet as the PCs do read this thread (they're all a little "left-eyebrow-raised" at the rainbow diarrhea suggestion). It's great having them see all of your ideas because now they have no clue which direction I'm going to take this in >:)
When, or *IF*, those consequences do come about, I promise to post the results :)
Campaign Log::
As Locksley begins his roasting of the unicorn leg for eating, Xaris, Aedan and Archer are coming up with a plan to roast the rest of the unicorn to attract the dragon. They decide to dig a huge pit and use some of the poachers’ cabin as a giant pyre that they can roll the unicorn on. After tasting what was declared the “magical ham” of the unicorn, Locksley moves over to help. The four watch the unicorn begin to roast when they hear a strange singing. Locksley unaffected watches the other three walk off into the woods in a daze. He eventually decides to follow Aedan thinking if he can help the spell caster, then maybe Aedan will figure out what is going on.
Meanwhile off some 100ft away, Roxy who took the unicorn horn away from the barbarians roasting and eating the majestic guardian of the forest, ignores the strange singing believing the justice of the forest is being doled out and that her companions deserve the punishment. She begins to say some prayers to Desna for the unicorn and finds a beautiful tree to bury the horn under.
Locksley catching up to Aedan finds him out of his trance but a little confused as to what happened. They spot Xaris and Archer some 60ft away recovered from the trance and heading back to the roasting pyre. When the four of them arrive back they find the unicorn is gone! A few feathers lay around the fire and Locksley and Aedan begin to suspect that they belong to Harpies. Soon their suspicions are confirmed as the singing starts again enchanting everyone but Aedan, who plays along to look like he was enchanted. When the Harpies arrive down to attack the group Archer is pulled into the fire pit catching on fire. Everyone breaks free of the enchantment and defends themselves. Xaris tosses Archer who is on fire at one of the harpies but in the end their valiant efforts are for naught as Archer and Xaris are knocked unconscious by the harpies. Luckily Aedan and Locksley were not badly injured from the fight against the poachers and had some vitality left to take on the harpies. They dispatch the fowl creatures to save the day. Still without Roxy, the only hope for Archer and Xaris is to have them drink their own potions, but that only helps so much.
So Archer and Xaris go off to find Roxy, which is not that hard as she basically stayed to the trail that lead them to the poachers. Roxy refused to return to the group because of their actions with the unicorn, and again Archer in his asking of her to return was a bit of a jerk in Roxy’ mind. She told them she was out of spells for the day and would have to pray to regain them so she would be of no help.
They return to Aedan and Locksley to try and figure out how to continue. Without healing Xaris and Archer would be no good against a dragon and they were sure Roxy would come around once she prayed to Desna. Locksley wanted to forge on since this was the last chance they had to get the bonus for killing the dragon. But Aedan successfully argued that they stay the night here by the fire and rest.
Meanwhile off some 100ft away, Roxy who set up her own campfire spends the rest of the evening praying and sleeps through the night alone down the trail. Until raccoons attack her in the night! "I did the right thing, why is the forest attacking me?" Roxy fends off the three raccoons by squishing two with her mace and sending the last one scurrying. Sad that she has now killed innocent little raccoons, she digs a grave for the two corpses and buries them.
When the sun rises Roxy walks back towards the group with caution and after looking them over thanks to a spell from Desna, rejoins the group and administers healing to Xaris and Archer. At this point Aedan and Locksley still try to figure out what to do next. They have lost the bonus and the events have left the group fractured. Roxy chimes in that they should just return to the caravan while Locksley hates to leave a job unfinished. So they decide to vote and head after the dragon some more.
Essentially, the PC's plan to lure the Dragon in with the BBQ Unicorn didn't work out like as they hoped - they attracted some Harpies who lured them away with their song and stole the Unicorn Carcass for themselves, then - feeling overconfident - came back for the rest of the party.
So they would need Resurrection, a 7th level spell that costs 10k gold and requires a large city (i.e. >10.000 people) to hire a spellcaster for it. But, for Resurrection, a small part would have been enough, and time absolutely no issue.
1) the body has to be reasonably intact: I was under the impression that it was not (though this could be a mistake on my part)
2) the non-insignificant cost may be more than they have, or could reasonably get access to within the short window of time available on that spell.
In this context:
1) The Unicorn was killed, racked and dressed for butchering by NPC Poachers (Neutral Evil). The party wandered into the camp before they could fully butcher the Unicorn's carcass.
2) The party did have the means financially to bring the animal back to life. Also, the Unicorn was recently dead, I would say no more than 3 days tops, so raising it would have been possible.
However, the PC's didn't have the magical means to do that on the spot, they would have to go back to the village and see if that could be done there... In all likelihood, they would have had to cast Gentle Repose and transport the creature to someone who could raise dead. Which would have been an absolute pain in the behind, even in it's dressed state - which would apparently be a touch lighter what with all the internal organs being removed and whatnot.
Giving it a decent burial would have been a simpler solution to them - given that the poacher's huts had tools suitable to dig a grave. (What a pity the PCs didn't search them!)
One of them does... I'm afraid there is the very real possibility that this Unicorn will turn out to be as tasty a bbq as anything.
bitter lily wrote:
Personally, I don't think "You missed out on a restoration" is enough of a slap. You could go with the "Eating the Unicorn will curse you in some way" theory. Or truly bless the one who walked off -- but how???
Well, the restoration thing was done in private - as the recipient walked off from the group and was meditating in the forest nearby while the rest of the group determined how and why they should go about cooking the unicorn corpse. So the group doesn't know about the restoration, just that one character, and that was written in as part of the adventure. Fortunately, that was the end of the night, so I have until the next game to figure out what to do.
I have figured out a few responses, depending on how the characters go forward. I'm hoping that they don't back down from what they were thinking of doing... it should be pretty fun. I'm sure one or two of them have tripped over this thread (hi guys!), so I don't want to reveal anything before the game. But i do have the reward/penalty thing figured out to my satisfaction now.
I would like say thanks to everyone in this thread for their thoughts, it all helped me get to this point, and it should be great fun for the next game :)
You're into homebrew territory with a "Unicorn blessing," aren't you? What was the blessing, that the rest of the party didn't get?
Oh yeah, I have to go off the reservation on these adventures as everyone has the same access to the materials as I do. And meta-gaming is a huge issue with my group - in that everyone meta-games the crap out of everything. This situation is one of the rare role playing points we get into during the game, so I want to keep people guessing to make it fun.
The "blessing" was a restoration.
The Steel Refrain wrote:
...they presumably killed the poachers for killing the unicorn in the first place, but now they're going to hunker down and gnaw on the poor creature's leg?
The poachers actually started the battle... but the rest of that statement captures how the scene played out :)
The more this thread goes on, the less inclined I am to give some kind of Alignment penalty. However, if these characters do go through with this, I'm certain that there will be some form of reckoning.
I noticed that the entry for Unicorn indicates that they mate for life. I for one would love it if the mate showed up at the most compromising moment.
That actually happened in the game... the dead Unicorn in question had a mate who was watching nearby unnoticed. That much was written in the adventure, anything after that up to the DM.
One of the spell casters was vehemently against anything but giving the Unicorn a proper burial. When she was overridden, she went off on her own to rest and pray for her spells - shunning the party and their actions. So I had the Unicorn mate approach her (and only her) to bless her.
Murdock Mudeater wrote:
Eating dead things isn't exactly opposed to good alignments, provided you are eating for nourishment.
Good point... although the party is by no means starving, they have plenty of food. The village they are working from is also not in desperate need of food. The originally wanted to BBQ the unicorn to attract the dragon they are after, and that somehow morphed into a conversation about eating the unicorn.
I was worried that I was imposing some notion that I hold out-of-game that what they were doing was some kind of sacrilege. I see now that it's not necessarily so, but what they are doing can be misconstrued... especially if a gang of
RealAlchemy wrote:
Ekujae elves
just showed up out of the blue. Oh if only this were in the Mwangi Expanse (Que the Benny Hill Theme).
Thanks all for the responses so far :) It's given me quite a bit of insight.
I think the closest, real-life example for this situation would be that Dentist who killed Cecil the Lion back in 2015. Although this party didn't kill the Unicorn, they were looking for ways to consume the unicorn after the fact and rationalized it with "we're trying to attract the dragon" (because Dragons dig BBQ apparently) and settling on not consuming the unicorn, but trying to lure the dragon and if that didn't work, cremating the Unicorn.
The question I'm wrestling with is this:
Given the above circumstances, is cooking a Unicorn's carcass an act that any reasonable Chaotic Good character would do? I could imagine that there are circumstances that it might be OK, but given the above situation?
The answer I'm coming up with so far is that what they are undertaking is more of a Neutral Evil act given that they are acting without feelings or scruples.
I've got an AL5 party all with CG alignment on an adventure to find and kill a dragon. During the adventure they ran into a camp of evil poachers in the middle of dressing a Unicorn carcass.
After the party dispatch the poachers, they decide that they want to cook the Unicorn carcass. They reason that it should attract the dragon. Of course there's a bit of a debate, and the party decides that they're just going to cook a part of the carcass... and if it doesn't work, they'll cremate the unicorn. Although one or two want to try eating it first.
The party didn't kill the creature, they didn't gut and dress it... but they did carve off a leg and are now roasting it.
The question is, did the party commit an act that would result in some kind of alignment adjustment/penalty?
