In my campaign I am planning to provide the party plenty of motivation and eventually an oppotunity to attack the Last Laugh Headquarters during Chapter 8.
Has anyone drawn up the plans for the headquarters and/or thought much about its layout, contents, traps, gaurdians and other Jesters?
How many Last Laugh members are there?
What do you think will happen to the Last Laugh and their Headquarters during Chapter 9 (Foundation of Flame)?
Delvesdeep
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Well I'd probably would have the guildleader there, but not allways. I'd say a 50% chance he'd be there. If he's there I would use 2-3 lieutenants and a few serfs, in all not more than 10 last laugh members. Off course a good thieves guild would mean entering 2-3 secret doors to get into the coridors, members that have a room there like the guildleader would require a secret hidden entrance with a trap. In a thieves guild who can you trust after all? Off course the lieutenant's rooms will open directly into the guildleader's rooms and the guildleaders room would have not one but two secret exits in case of emergency. Both of them will have a trap. When the door opens it will start it's armament, when the door is closed then the trap will be armed and ready to go off. If the guildleader escapes he can plan his revenge then.
Now I don't have a plan at this moment but I'm also seriously thinking about making one because it will probably happen that one of my players will try to join the guild.
I believe there are 5 Jesters in charge of the guild. I don't have anything in front of me now, but there is a sidebar either in one of the early issues of the AP or one of the early web enhancements giving some good info about the guild makeup. There's a little info in Lords of Oblivion too, in the section after Finch's stats where it talks about how he spills his guts if he's captured.
You can also try searching the board archives too. Here's a good post:
http://paizo.com/dungeon/messageboards/shackledCity/archives/anIdeaAboutThe LastLaugh
I believe there are 5 Jesters in charge of the guild. I don't have anything in front of me now, but there is a sidebar either in one of the early issues of the AP or one of the early web enhancements giving some good info about the guild makeup. There's a little info in Lords of Oblivion too, in the section after Finch's stats where it talks about how he spills his guts if he's captured.
You can also try searching the board archives too. Here's a good post:
http://paizo.com/dungeon/messageboards/shackledCity/archives/anIdeaAboutThe LastLaugh
PandaGaki, thankyou for you ideas. Its always good to share useful ones like that! Any idea where I can get a typical thieves den/headquarters? I would love a floor plan and contents if anyone knows of one. It would make my life much easier.:)
matt_the_dm,
I tryed to look up the site/thread you mentioned but with little success. Is the thread still active? Thanks for the advice none the less.
My overall thoughts are that the players plus another small thieves guild (The Acquirers if you are familiar with my document I posted up on the SCAPResourse site) will attack the Last Laugh either just before or immediately after their visit to Vhalantru's manor/lair.
The Acquirers comprise only of a wizard, guildmaster, head thief and a handful of low levels thieves by this stage so they are not an army or mjor force by any stretch of the imagination. What they do poise though is significant assistance to the party in this attack.
What I want to achieve is an exciting 'climax' adventure which allows the party to work with their long time allies but at the same time not feel like they are playing second fiddle to them. Perhaps I could have them all make the initial attack and them the two 'teams' seperate as they fight their way through the headquarters.
What 'Jesters' should be home?
What traps should be included?
What surprizes should be discovered?
What villians should they encounter?
Perhaps I could use this as a means of foreshadowing future adventures having the cagewright -' The Fish' make an appearance before escaping?
What are peoples opinions and advice?
Delvesdeep
I tryed to look up the site/thread you mentioned but with little success. Is the thread still active? Thanks for the advice none the less.
A space got inserted into the link, but if you click on the following link you should get to the thread.
I forgot how to post links and also about the spaces being added when you cut and paste. Use the search function on the board and search for Last Laugh and you'll find some good stuff.
I just got Dungeon 128 in the mail and there's a map of a thieves guild on the last page as the Map of Mystery. Check it out.
Thankyou both for all your help. I'll get to work writing out the details. How are you both progressing through the path. Is everything going as planned? Any run ins with the Last Laugh?
delvesdeep
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So far the only run in my players had is in the first adventure with Jill and the three hired thugs. It ended lethal for one of the thugs as the elf ranger and rogue of the group decided to fire two arrows after first hiding in the street. They waited a bit to see how the situation evolved by the time they went into action the thugs had kicked the poor cleric of st cuthbert unconcious. The rogue and elf then opened a barrage of arrows and both aimed for the same one. End of story for one of the hired thug, when the two others realized what happened they ran for their lives.
They then took the st cuthbert priest away and left the corpse there. Jill looked from up on the roofs but decided not to take action now but to alert the guild and keep an eye on both of them. What I've done then was since one of the thugs died and them both being guards and counting in the fact that the last laugh doesn't really want their involvement being known or linked to the kidnappings is the following. They had huge angry arguements with Jill which ended in both of their deads by Jill. Jill then went for aid from the guild and disposed of the bodies by cleaning their faces and dropping them in the neighborhoods of the alleybashers and forging some evidence that tied in the alleybashers.
Now the streets are filled with angry guards that recently just apprehended a couple of alleybashers for "interrogation" to the cause of death of three of their companions. Basically reducing the territory of the alleybashers a little bit in order for the Last Laugh to claim it.
I love thinking these kind of things out. The Last Laugh came out a winner despite the pc's somewhat foiling one of their tasks. I'm also thinking about letting the rogue pc make contact with Jill since the player said he'd like to take a good version of the prc Assassin, I know there is one in Book of Exalted Deeds that's kinda like what he wants to play. Letting Jill get in contact with them seems like fun.
Well my party finally cam together and I was able to run them through this adventure. Fario had been taken by the Last Laugh and the party hunted down Jil to rescue him from their tortue (as per the Hardcover).
At this point the party had had enough and decided to engineer an attack on the guild to wipe them out. They asked for the aid of the Striders, High Handcrafters and the 'good' thieves guild of the city called the Acquirers (on the the.RPGenius.com site if you are interested) and manifactured a plan of attack.
Basically the strategy involved the NPCs working their way into the front of the guild while the party would attempt to sneak in from the back and attack the Jester/s before he/they could escape.
I used the map that matt_the_DM so kindly forwarded to me and it worked nicely.
The party were given the location of a secret door alone the northern sewer but used a wand to detect the location of another which after much detecting and strategising they moved into the guild under the cover of invisibility spells and with the use of Darkvision.
The doors were revolving which automatically locked after someone moved through them which slowed the process considerably but were designed for the Jester to escape through in a hurry slowing his persuers down as they had to find a way through the door behind them.
After moving through the complex as quickly as they could while ever mindful of traps, they found the Jesters study and door to his bedroom. The room was dark and the party spoted about the room before attempting to open the door as quickly and as quietly as they dared.
Unfortunately for them the Jester had been alerted to their presence and croached hidden onto of a bookshelf watching them and preparing to use his unique Mirrored necklace to create his twin and to attempt to assassinate a character.
Jumping from the shelf, laughing hysterically, he took the party by surprize and in the ensueing battle had relieved the party fighter of over half his hit points as the Jester and his duplicate flanked first the fighter then cleric to inflict massive sneak attack damage using Improved Invisibility. The injuried fighter went to save the cleric but the Jesters turned their attention back to him and after a brief flurry of attacks the fighter lay dead.
The mage was able to dispel the Invisibility on one of the 'Jesters' and the party was eventually able to kill the Jester which shattered his magical device and caused the duplicate to 'shatter'. The other, real Jester used Dimension door to immediate flee.
That is where we left the battle but next game I intend to create a 'Chase Scene' where the party will attempt to hunt down the Jester using their superior speed while the Jester using his knowledge of the Guildhouse to unleash traps on them, disappear through secret doors, disguise himself as common thieves involved in the battle and even continue to launch suprize attacks.
The Jester knows he is realively weak without allies to help him flank and use his sneak attack in battle so he will search for this straight away. I would like to see him survive the battle to face the players in the Foundation of Fire adventure but I will not 'cheat'.
I'm looking forward to the next game where they are involved in the chase and head off to the meeting with Thifirane.
We're getting closer to the end now where the party finally get to make some progress so I'm excitied to see them see all the pieces fall into place.
Thanks
Delvesdeep
DD,
Sounds good indeed!
One question: isn't the Jester supposed to be a visitor at Thirifane's manor? Are you planning on him not being a part of that party using your set up?
I know you have changed things so that there is only one Jester (I'm totally stealing your idea here, even your awesome idea of duplictes of the Jester). I'm thinking about a possible attack on the LL guild headquarters in my campaign and so am reading this with interest.
One of my PCs is actually a member (junior) of the LL. he's slowly but surely got more and more sucked in to the guild and is now wishing he wasn't a member but of course this is not something you can easily leave. Last session the LL staged a raid on the Bluewater Academy where they stole a scroll which allowed them to summon in the fire elementals which attacked Minuta's Board. During this raid the Jester killed the chief librarian (Who was called Google of course!) and the party rogue - who was simply on look out duty - heard his maniacal laugh. The look on his face when he found out he'd been party to the death of one of his favourite NPCs was priceless. He is beginning to really hate being part of the guild now.
He's never been to the LL guild house and is now off in the Demonskar so won't get a chance to get introduced there much before Chapter * anyway. And seeing as he's not liking his involvement I dont think he'll be trying to get there either.
But I can see him wanting to take out the Jester for definite and possibly then will see an chance to wipe out or take over the guild. Interesting times are ahead.
Blakey
Like you know, DD pared it down to one Jester, Blakey. He also changed who that Jester was, so no I don't believe he would be at the party.
That's correct. I suggested that Velior should be downgraded as one of the leaders of the guild while Nulin 'the fish' (Cagewright Master found in the Foundations of Fire Adventure) should become the LL's only 'Jester'.
When I was reducing the Cagewright numbers, to try and make them more meaningful and a greater climax when the players finally encounter the evil NPCs, I got rid of the villian who shares the room in the FoF adventure with Nulin. Nulin's powers are weakened considerably when he does not have another ally around to assist him to flank and therefore sneak attack so I arrived at the idea of enabling him to create a duplicate of himself.
I came up with the idea that Nulin would simply be known as THE Jester, would wear the full outfit constantly and have a manic laugh that echoed and made it difficult to pinpoint his location. I also thought that his 'mirroring' ability could be because he had assassinated a powerful enemy of the Nerra (Mirror People) years earlier who had awarded him the necklace which has allowed him to become so powerful.
The Last Laugh all wear make-up and garments to suit their station with the common thieves known as the Comedians or Cackles(if you can come up with a better name here it would be much appreciated), the next tier - the Clowns, the leaders - the Harlequins and the guildmaster - the Jester.
Anyway, just my take on things
Delvesdeep
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So this is partially a continuation of events that I mentioned in this thread.
Right after the party at Lady Rhiavadi’s, Harlequin Velior Thazo was quite angry at the party for disrupting his life. The same night (when most of the party’s resources were spent) he decided to enact his revenge. This is the story of that epic night.
Knowing that the PCs protected themselves in powerful wards and thick armor, Velior decided to attack the PCs where they were weakest, their friends and family. The party had long ago moved into the Kopru Ruins and had hired TONS of NPCs to work there. I ruled long ago that at least a few of these people were Last Laugh plants and that very evening Velior used them to his fullest. He quickly sent Jil into the ruins to kidnap the warlock’s cohort (an artificer named Plutarch). I had a PC play as Plutarch, but the poor man was no match for Jil’s death attack. With Plutarch captured, the Last Laugh agents started to sow chaos within the PC’s stronghold while other agents began to cause chaos in the city above. As the PCs chased their tales a number of things happened. The head of the Shrine of Pelor was beat up (but saved by a party member). The warlock’s mother (a Taskerhill) was kidnapped. Many houses across town were set ablaze, etc. When the dust settled a little after midnight, the party was pissed, but also tired. They had to save the warlock’s mother/cohort immediately, but they were somewhat afraid of their chances.
Interrogating captured Last Laugh members, the party was lead to The Brass Trumpet (actually a trap) where several powerful people awaited them. I ran this MOSTLY like the hardcover describes it except for a few changes. In the “curtain maze” I placed curtains in every 5-foot square, essentially making the room impossible to navigate or see more than 5-feet ahead of you. Instead of Jil waiting in the secret room, I had my upgraded Velior from this thread. Waiting for my PCs in the curtain maze…and best of all I had the Jester himself (Nulin Wiejeron) waiting on a rooftop across the street from the inn. I had changed Nulin Wiejeron from a rapier assassin to a sniper assassin. He has several new spells from Complete Scoundrel and Spell Compendium that allow him to sneak attack and death attack from long distances. He also is level 20 with full assassin levels, a little more intelligence and more sneak attack dice (+9d6). He was lined up with the windows of the Brass Trumpet so that he could fire at PCs in the curtain maze if they sat in front of the windows.
The PCs easily dispatched the thugs and traps, but had a bit of trouble with Velior. Eventually the warlock acid coned the curtain maze, melting all the curtains, and Velior leapt out a window. After taking considerable damage, Velior surrendered on the streets below the window. As the party “gish” started questioning him, he asked “Where is your master?”.
Velior winked and said, “Closer than you think” as an arrow slammed through the wizard/crusader’s neck. One fortitude save later, the PC was badly wounded and the party started trying to find an invisible assassin with a +43 to his hide skill (that’s still a +23 when hiding after attacking). With limited spells left, the party could not just fire bomb the roofs and hope to hit the Jester and it took many rounds of him nearly killing party members in one-hit before they narrowed down where he MIGHT be and the cleric dropped a spell which obstructed his line of sight. Next he went mobile and cast assassin’s darkness which would allow him to sneak attack while just walking around the party. But the cleric is a Radiant Servant of Pelor and was able to dispel the globe of darkness with his last daylight spell. Thwarted, and somewhat winded himself, the Jester fled and Velior was finally killed.
So now the party has used scrying to teleport to the warlock’s mother. I am using the Dungeon map mentioned in this thread, but am at a bit of a loss for what encounters to put in there. The party is basically at empty, but the night is not over. I plan for this to be the end of the Last Laugh (and perhaps the Jester himself) and I want it to be suitably memorable.
Oh well. If anyone has any last minute suggestions for running this let me know. I'll do a write-up after the session Friday evening so that other people can draw ideas from the thread.
I'm so sorry Sean. I haven't visited this site for a fair while now so I missed your request for help.
I ran through the conclusion of Last Laugh Guildhouse last session. The party were incredibly nervous and cautious in their search which in the end lost them any chance of attacking the Jester before he left the headquarters. I will have him ready to attack the party in the modified Thirteen Cages adventure they will play through.
I had every door trapped heavily, particularly the door to the Jesters room with Death Spell wards, alarms etc. The party were able to eventually find his tracks but they lead them to one of the one way doors leading out into the sewers he had obviously dimensioned doored too after the battle.
They found a flying carpet and some other goodies in his dwelling which appeased them somewhat in loosing him and then made their way through the complex following the sounds of battle. They encountered a few last laugh and eventually cam to the treasure rooms that was well guarded by an advanced Iron Golem.
The attack on their headquarters saw the end of the guild but the Cagewright Master still remains.
The party has now figured out who almost all the Apprentices and Masters are but I am getting very excited about the great unveiling regarding their old friend Valantru.
They have just entered the 'Party' at house Rhaladi (sp?) which should be interesting before they head off to Sasserine to learn what happened to the Lord Mayor and Orbius...looking forward to it! :)
Delvesdeep
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I have only a few minutes right now, so this post will be short. I actually made the hallway up to the Jester's room a hall of strange magical mirrors. The mirrors all had a variation of minor image that made it look like the Jester was reflected in all of them. This made all the mirrors appear magical, which hid the fact that one of the mirrors was a mirror of confusion. One of the mirrors was also one-way and the Jester used it to observe the party and prepare his death attack. Needless to say, the party was so busy calming their confused companion, that he was able to get the drop on them and almost smushed the party wizard.
I have only a few minutes right now, so this post will be short. I actually made the hallway up to the Jester's room a hall of strange magical mirrors. The mirrors all had a variation of minor image that made it look like the Jester was reflected in all of them. This made all the mirrors appear magical, which hid the fact that one of the mirrors was a mirror of confusion. One of the mirrors was also one-way and the Jester used it to observe the party and prepare his death attack. Needless to say, the party was so busy calming their confused companion, that he was able to get the drop on them and almost smushed the party wizard.
Nice addition.
Of the thread a little, two of the party disguised themselves as halfling waiters and entered the 'party' to overhear the speech but Mhlad became suspicious of them so they exited the party and teleported away. This is where we left it.
I am going to have the villains try hunt the party down and attck them on mass one that night unless the party quickly return and attck them why they prepare. I'll have to figure out the plan of attack once I read the NPCs over once again.
Could be devestating for the party...
Delvesdeep