So I have been running a campaign where my players are recovering shards of a dead gods persona to try to resurrect him.
In my most recent game they had a choice to either stop a plague or investigate missing miners. In the end, both were plots to attack a temple which was holding one of the shards the players had recovered in a previous game.
They stopped the plague and are returning to town. When they get back they will see that the temple has been attacked from the mines.
Here is where I need help. Should the bad guys have stolen the shard that the players had already recovered? The other option that I am toying with is just having the temple take a large number of casualties. It is a young faith that one of the players is trying to help grow so having a lot of the higher rank clerics die would be a big blow. I want to make the players choices meaningful and the enemies an intelligent threat, but I don't want to have the players accomplishments stripped.
This is the first time I am in the GM seat with a long time gaming group they seem to be enjoying the campaign so far so any advice would be appreciated.
