fellow DM wants help with revenge

[Fraisala]

Alright, here's the situation:
My party just finished Whispering Carin. They snuck in at night, caught Filge in his sleep, and captured him. Filge escaped. He then captured the druid/love interest, and sent his familiar with a message to the party. They go the the abandoned mine and rescue the pc's boyfriend.

Now what I've got on my hands is very VERY ticked off necromancer still alive with no spellbook, no zombies, and close ties with Smenk. What I need here is a brilliantly evil plot for revenge to hopefully make a short adventure out of.

Any mean and nasty ideas you can come up with would be most appreciated. While I intentionaly made things lighthearted before, the time is now right to take off the kid gloves and lay on some pain.

[Pariah]

Fraisala wrote:

Now what I've got on my hands is very VERY ticked off necromancer still alive with no spellbook, no zombies, and close ties with Smenk. What I need here is a brilliantly evil plot for revenge to hopefully make a short adventure out of.

I'm all for having Filge hire a random rogue to steal the spell book and bring it back to him at a specific location at a specific time. The rouge is of course bound to fail, and Filge knows this and expects the rogue to give him up to the party... it's merely bait to lure them either into an ambush, or away from their loved ones, or both.

So they catch said incompetant rogue, he spills the beans as to where he was supposed to take the spell book. The party goes there and is ambushed by mercenaries hired to capture or kill the party and get the book from them. Mean while, Filge expects them to have left their loved ones unprotected. He captures them. If he can manage it, turn one into a zombie from a scroll as a warning to the party and trade back teh rest of thier loved ones for his spell book. If for some chance his mercenaries actually do the job and take the party, well, then he has his spell book and can do them all in.

Might even be more fun if he escapes and ends up working for one of the Dragons in the series. You could throw in random loved ones as undead throughout the entire campaign and make them REALLY want to kill him.

[koramado]

GREAT suggestion! I think I'll have to try and manipulate the situation now, just so I can use this sidequest and create some real PC tension.

[Bill Lumberg]

Have Filge encounter the PCs in the Midnight Emporium or the dragonchess parlor. This allows an encounter where not combat is likely to take place.

Filge can verbally spar with the PCs over a game. He should be backed up by a thief in the service of Balabar Smenk. The thief can attempt to pick pockets or place an item belonging to Smenk on one of the PCs. The town watch can then conveniently come along to arrest the PC with the stolen item.

Filge can tell the PCs that this will all blow over if his spellbook is returned to him. A similar exchange can be made if the thief steals from a PC. This works well if it is an item that is needed for the adventure to continue. It could also be done behind the scenes with the PC's base camp being burgled and a note left with the details of the swap for Filge's spellbook.

Another suggestion is to have Filge put contact poison on the pieces of an opposing Dragonchess player. It should have a delayed effect and put the PC in a comatose or extremely sickened state. This gives Filge time to leave before it's effects are known.

When the players seek help have Filge's tomb mote leave a message that he has the cure. The price for the cure is his spellbook.

To make it more insulting force the PCs to make a formal appointment to see Filge because he is a "very busy man". Nothing infuriates PCs like arrogance. Make them a very long time with a lackey just to make the appointment. make the lackey a non-combatant innocent so they cannot take out their frustration on him or her.

If the PCs go to Allustan for help tell them that he has been called away on urgent town business. This could be arranged by false messages delivered to him by Smenk's men.

[Achilles]

Framing the party so they are caught by the militia in hard to explain circumstances is also fun..."They found the dead St. Cuthbert cleric's bloody scalp in YOUR backpack, stranger!"