Hi,
I find the "Adventure Hook" section of There Is No Honor a little lacking in inspiration. I'm wondering if any other DMs have come up with a prelude to get the campaign going, a sort of way for the PCs to meet each other/get the adventurer reputation they are supposed to have? I prefer to roleplay this rather than just invent backstory and then start the PCs off at 0 XP :)
This is very difficult to do in an adventure module. I liked the way Savage Tide started: everyone gets a note from a stranger. They could meet there or know each other beforehand, it's up to them. They can come up with a small backstory to give a reason why Lavinia would notice them, but you don't have to play these backstories. In the end this is really more about the player's character and less about the NPCs, so it's nearly impossible for Paizo (or any publisher) to come up with something that works for everyone.
The Blue Nixie encounter really IS the prelude, as is the Vault. Each of these events don't really need to happen but they help bring the characters together and foster a relationship with a patron.
Really "inspiring" hooks are IMO campaign specific and based on the world the DM is building and the characters the players bring. Paizo is creating adventures for a large number of DMs, and did Mr. Jacobs did a perfect job with this hook as far as utility is concerned. The mysterious note can work in pretty much any campaign.
In our campaign the "greater" hook is built into each character's background. If you could give us more info on your party I'm sure we could help you out.
You can also use the Sasserine article, the Player's Guide and the first Savage Tidings in Dragon to create plenty of character hooks. It really depends on what your players are looking for.
I would have to agree with Qbert - the whole "hired by a [usually wealthy] patron" hook has been done to death, and as a thread for an ongoing campaign it really can leave the players feeling like they are dancing to someone else's tune rather than making a choice about what they want to do at a high level. That's what bugged me when I was playing the original Eberron modules - all we did was do what someone else hired us to do, it stifled our creativity as far as motivations and character development went, we just focused on characters that could beat up the "baddies".
I won't be running Savage Tide for a long time yet, but am also eager to hear how anyone has changed the hook (nothing comes to mind for me).
We haven't started yet, but my thought is to put all of the PCs near the waterfront at dusk for various reasons relating to their character backgrounds. They hear a scream from a dark alley, and upon investigation discover a street urchin girl, standing terrified as she looks up into the dark. A rhagodessa has grabbed her younger brother and skittered up a wall to devour him -- the girl is next on the menu. Hopefully the PCs will intervene and save the girl. (Later, after the "Trouble on the Blue Nixie" encounter, the PCs may learn that the rhagodessa escaped from a waterfront warehouse where Soller Vark was keeping his smuggled exotic animals -- in this scenario, he had a mated pair of rhagodessas, not just one -- the female escaped). The rhagodessa escape necessitated relocation of the remaining animals to the vacant Blue Nixie to avoid scrutiny.
Unfortunately for Vark, the next day Lavinia Vanderboren shows up to make payment for release of the Nixie. Knowing of the death of her parents and her rich inheritance, Vark sees her as a vulnerable mark ripe for the picking. He takes her money, knowing that he cannot allow her access to the ship, but also knowing that by the time anything is done about it, he will have moved his illegal cargo. Meanwhile, tales of the strange monster and the heroes that vanquished it are making the rounds. In the wake of their small celebrity, the PCs find free drinks at every tavern on the waterfront, and later may enjoy the benefit of a favor (information, warning, something of that nature) from someone in the poor community. Kora Whistlegap relates the story to Lavinia, and she directs Kora to find the heroes and deliver her note.
I'm also not comfortable with the notion that the entire AP is driven by a patron calling the shots (my players hate feeling pushed along through the adventure). I would never use this mechanism in my own campaign. However, given that Lavinia and Vanthus are central to the AP, I'm not sure how to avoid it in "There Is No Honor" without having to retool each subsequent adventure accordingly to keep things moving. Any suggestions in this regard would be welcome.
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We haven't started yet, but my thought is to put all of the PCs near the waterfront at dusk for various reasons relating to their character backgrounds. They hear a scream from a dark alley, and upon investigation discover a street urchin girl, standing terrified as she looks up into the dark. A rhagodessa has grabbed her younger brother and skittered up a wall to devour him -- the girl is next on the menu. Hopefully the PCs will intervene and save the girl. (Later, after the "Trouble on the Blue Nixie" encounter, the PCs may learn that the rhagodessa escaped from a waterfront warehouse where Soller Vark was keeping his smuggled exotic animals -- in this scenario, he had a mated pair of rhagodessas, not just one -- the female escaped). The rhagodessa escape necessitated relocation of the remaining animals to the vacant Blue Nixie to avoid scrutiny.
Unfortunately for Vark, the next day Lavinia Vanderboren shows up to make payment for release of the Nixie. Knowing of the death of her parents and her rich inheritance, Vark sees her as a vulnerable mark ripe for the picking. He takes her money, knowing that he cannot allow her access to the ship, but also knowing that by the time anything is done about it, he will have moved his illegal cargo. Meanwhile, tales of the strange monster and the heroes that vanquished it are making the rounds. In the wake of their small celebrity, the PCs find free drinks at every tavern on the waterfront, and later may enjoy the benefit of a favor (information, warning, something of that nature) from someone in the poor community. Kora Whistlegap relates the story to Lavinia, and she directs Kora to find the heroes and deliver her note.
I'm also not comfortable with the notion that the entire AP is driven by a patron calling the shots (my players hate feeling pushed along through the adventure). I would never use this mechanism in my own campaign. However, given that Lavinia and Vanthus are central to the AP, I'm not sure how to avoid it in "There Is No Honor" without having to...
I think the easiest way to keep things moving in that direction without just having Livinia just order them around is to make Vanthus someone the PC's really want to get. Play up him taunting them in Parrot Island. Have villains like Soller Vark drop Vanthus's name well before the characters have heard about him from Livinia. Have Vanthus send some thugs to take care of the PC's after they escape Parrot Island. By the time they get to the guildhouse, they are going to want to clear it out just to get even with Vanthus. Then when they find the letters at the end in Rowyn's room, they will have all the motivation they need to chase him down and get you into the second adventure. The key with Vanthus is to play him up as someone the characters get to despise more and more so that they are motivated to go after him on their own. Then Livinia's request won't seem like you are railroading them because they are going to want to do it anyway.
Good thoughts, Brent. I certainly intend to play up the enmity with Vanthus, the recurring villain concept being one of my favorite aspects of the AP outline.
Here's another thought: using my initial rhagodessa encounter scenario outlined above, I could sprinkle clues that would allow the PCs to track the origin of the rhagodessa to the (now abandoned) waterfront warehouse, and eventually to the Blue Nixie. Thus, it is possible for the PCs to arrive at the Nixie sans direction from Lavinia. They could unwittingly assist her by independently defeating Vark's smugglers, and come to her attention that way. In fact, if they find the signet ring and scrolled note, they may seek to return it to its rightful owner. Thus, instead of the patron seeking them out, the PCs either seek her out, or at least play a very active role in coming to her attention. That feels a lot more organic than Lavinia randomly calling upon the PCs.
I dropped the hook entirely. As all of the characters are from out of town (actually 1600+ miles away) they sailed for over a month on the same ship as Lavinia when she returned from her studies. In that time, they told their own stories (getting to know the public background on each character) and also heard stories from Lavinia about Sasserine's history, district "personality," and so forth. On arriving at Sasserine, Lavinia invites them all to her estate but is then met at the dock by her halfling servant and given the bad news about her family--parents dead for a month, brother missing, and estate finances in shambles. She rushes off distraught, leaving the party to explore the city for a bit (a few days). Eventually, they will either look Lavinia up or she will find them and invite them to her estate. Knowing my players, they'll want to help Lavinia because it's the right and heroic thing to do, and she's now their friend.
So, no "hired hands" syndrome for the characters, they get some time to check out the city before the "adventure" really starts, and possibly even make some connections that may later lead to Affiliations. One character is also connected to the Knowlern nobles and so will have a chance to check that connection out and build on it for future adventures.
Great intro, Erian. Although I plan to stick with the initial rhagodessa encounter (I like a cinematic opening with some combat over exposition), I may also try to work in a prior connection with Lavinia. This is turning out to be a very useful thread.
The best thing about this hook is it allowed me to provide the Sasserine info to the players earlier (in an email) and address questions as a sort of pre-game conversations. When the game actually kicks off (this Saturday) they'll be getting pretty quickly into the Blue Nixie encounter.
As a cinematic opener, I'll actually be providing a brief glimpse of things (posibly) to come. I'll describe a view rising up through jungle foliage to look into a clearing, where several savages fight a t-rex. The view will then go higher, showing ancients Mayan-like ruins from which glowing black aura is starting to emanate. This could be a look at the past, a look at the future, or something that will never occur--but it should peek the player's interests about the longer plot goals. I use "opening shots" like this for most of my games, often showing what is happening in other areas of the world, providing glimpses/hints of the BBEGs' actions, or how certain people reacted to the characters' last adventure.
Creative Director
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This is a cool thread!
Indeed, one of the main difficulties about writing adventrues for publication is the simple fact that you can't tailor it to a specific group of player charcters; that task is squarely on the DM's shoulders, and the adjustments to "There Is No Honor" mentioned here are great examples of how a DM should adjust and personalized a published adventure. So rather than come up with some "less cliched" openings to the adventure, I decided to embrace the cliche of being hired by a patron so that I could spend as little time as possible on the section of the adventure that would most likely be adjusted or expanded upon by the DM. The Sasserine backdrop and the Savage Tide Player's Guide exist solely to give the DM info so he CAN adjust this opening, to be honest.
As for worries that the PCs are going to be sent on missions... don't worry too much. Having a central NPC in the role of "mission giver" at the start of a campaign is a great way to keep things focused early on, to get the PCs on the track of the campaign and thinking along its lines. As each adventure in Savage Tide comes along, Lavinia's role as "boss" is going to decrease fairly quickly. If things go right, she'll quite quickly move from the "patron" role into "valued NPC ally" role, someone trustworthy the PCs can go to between adventures to hang out with or resupply or just to give them a safe place to rest. By the time the PCs reach the Isle of Dread at the end of Adventure 3... they'll be increasingly on their own on how to handle the perils of the Savage Tide.
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When I started our Shackled City campaign, I did two things when I kicked off my game:
1) I gave a two-page handout giving a "television season trailer" description of certain scenes I knew would happen (Cauldron Burning, fighting a dragon, travelling to other planes, arguing with townsfolk in meetings, etc) and I laid out the overall theme of the campaign. I also included house rules and recommendations.
2) I ran a specific adventure I built as a "prologue" chapter to bring the characters together - in their case, a boat wreck in the swamp 10 miles west of my version of Cauldron, with a mini-dungeon and some moral quandries, to force the players together and give them a common reason for continuing to work with each other when the prologue was over. If you write an adventure for that purpose, it would work well.
Maybe you could have the PCs sailing in on a ship to Sasserine as passengers, when the ship is attacked by pirates. Not real competent pirates, the kind that live in fear of the Crimson Fleet. In fact, you could have some forshadowing, like a map that doesn't have the Isle of Dread ('here be monsters'), and a sign that the Crimson Fleet is big and scary (ransom notes, a journal, etc).
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Also, ideally, in the real world, pirates LIKED taking a ship without a shot being fired. So a ship could get boarded and raided, the pc's might not even get touched since it's NOT their ship, and the pirates might even ask if the pc's wanted to join them.
It's in the pirates' interest to show mercy to those who yield; saves them a lot of heartache. If you're going to kill everyone on the ship anyway, they have nothing to lose by fighting you.
There were some real cutthroat types too, but a lot of times that type of thing was reserved for the Captain and his men.
As my last two campaigns began with the characters having ties prior to the first adventure, I'm actually looking forward to the hook for There is No Honor. Through the use of their ties to some of Sasserine's affiliations, I plan on giving them their own reasons for investigating the adventure above and beyond what Lavinia offers. Some of those goals may be at odds with one another, which should add some nice rivalry and uncertainty between the characters.
I dropped the hook entirely. As all of the characters are from out of town (actually 1600+ miles away) they sailed for over a month on the same ship as Lavinia when she returned from her studies. In that time, they told their own stories (getting to know the public background on each character) and also heard stories from Lavinia about Sasserine's history, district "personality," and so forth. On arriving at Sasserine, Lavinia invites them all to her estate but is then met at the dock by her halfling servant and given the bad news about her family--parents dead for a month, brother missing, and estate finances in shambles. She rushes off distraught, leaving the party to explore the city for a bit (a few days). Eventually, they will either look Lavinia up or she will find them and invite them to her estate. Knowing my players, they'll want to help Lavinia because it's the right and heroic thing to do, and she's now their friend.
This is a very cool intro. One of the PCs might also become romantically involved with Lavinia during the long voyage, which would give the group even more reason to help her out since she's now a love interest.
Half of the players in my group are women and I was toying with the idea of replacing Lavinia with one of the female PCs. She meets the other characters during her voyage back to Sasserine from the Thenalar Academy after the death of her parents to claim her inheritance. This should make the players feel more closely invested with the story line than simply being hirelings.
I'm not sure how this might affect things later in the campaign though. It may cause plot complications that I'm not aware of. At the very least I'll make sure that there isn't 8,600 gp of the family treasure left at the end of the adventure, since it would all go to one PC. We'll just say that Vanthus and Rowyn spent most of it already.
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Creative Director
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Making Lavinia into a PC is actually a pretty cool idea. There'll be a few changes that you'll need to make to the adventure (mostly having to do with "The Bullywug Gambit" and "Into the Maw", both of which involve plots to save Lavinia and therefore place her outside of the immediate action of the adventure) but otherwise you should be good to go.
Making Lavinia into a PC is actually a pretty cool idea. There'll be a few changes that you'll need to make to the adventure (mostly having to do with "The Bullywug Gambit" and "Into the Maw", both of which involve plots to save Lavinia and therefore place her outside of the immediate action of the adventure) but otherwise you should be good to go.
Excellent. Thanks very much for the input. I am so looking forward to starting this campaign.
erian, I think I will be stealing your hook. It assumes the PCs are from out of town, which mine are not, but I think I can massage it into working. Just wanted to say thanks for the inspiration.
You're welcome! I'll let you know how things proceed. So far, I've found the "just come into all this mess" perspective to work very well for Lavinia. It went really well withher not knowing about the family affairs, and my plans for the next session (when she starts tracking down her bro) are working out well as she's truly in the dark on where he might be.
It's also let me build up Kora as sort of the backbone that's kept the house going. I'm probably going to build on that even more, with her pretty much running the estate during the elder Vanderboren's long soujourns as Seekers.
Erian, that's a great way to begin. I will be stealing that, as all my PC's will be from out of town.
One question for Mr. Jacobs or any other writers: will having Lavinia just getting home at the beginning of There is No Honor pose any problems later on? Specifically, the leader of the Jade Ravens who is falling in with her? If he hasn't met her yet, will that be a problem?
Heh, I cut the Jade Ravens from TiNH entirely--helped me avoid a potential future problem and also didn't flow with my presentation of the Vanderboren estate being on the verge of bankruptcy. I did introduce a foreshadowing event, however. During the sea voyage to Sasserine, the ship passed through the Thanegioth Archipelago, where the Isle of Dread is located. As they passed by, the captain mentioned that few ships ever stopped on the islands due to cannibals and worse. To emphasize the point, the party caught site of huge dragon-birds (pterodactyls) circling one mountain, which was smoking (only one knew what a volcano was). They then saw the hundre foot trees of the jungle shaking around as something unseen but massive moved along the coast. Later, at the vault, the players (not characters) put together the fact that the notes Lavinia found would lead them back to that island, and they looked (for me) pleasantly terrified!
I set the money situation up such that the funds from the Blue Nixie and the Vault were absolutely critical in keeping Lavinia out of debtor's court or worse...gave the PCs a much stronger pull to "get the job done" so to speak.
I dropped the hook entirely. As all of the characters are from out of town (actually 1600+ miles away) they sailed for over a month on the same ship as Lavinia when she returned from her studies. In that time, they told their own stories (getting to know the public background on each character) and also heard stories from Lavinia about Sasserine's history, district "personality," and so forth. On arriving at Sasserine, Lavinia invites them all to her estate but is then met at the dock by her halfling servant and given the bad news about her family--parents dead for a month, brother missing, and estate finances in shambles. She rushes off distraught, leaving the party to explore the city for a bit (a few days). Eventually, they will either look Lavinia up or she will find them and invite them to her estate. ...
I took this hook for my group, slightly modified: I decided that if Lavinia had been gone when Vanthus made his move, he'd've just taken over the estate, and I didn't want to sit down and figure out the consequences of that. So, Lavinia and the PCs arrived a couple of weeks before the death of the elder Vanderborens. (I suppose I could've used your above hook, but with the ship arriving on the day of the deaths. Hm, in retrospect, that probably would have been better yet.)
I took this hook for my group, slightly modified: I decided that if Lavinia had been gone when Vanthus made his move, he'd've just taken over the estate, and I didn't want to sit down and figure out the consequences of that. So, Lavinia and the PCs arrived a couple of weeks before the death of the elder Vanderborens. (I suppose I could've used your above hook, but with the ship arriving on the day of the deaths. Hm, in retrospect, that probably would have been better yet.)
Definitely a good consideration. My players haven't dug into the situation with Vanthus yet, but when/if they do, they'll learn he did indeed try to take over. Kora relates to Lavinia (and the party) how Vanthus initially tried to say he was in charge until his sister returned. However, he refused to pay any debts or meet with those wanting to resolve Vanderboren issues. He instead lay about all day with "hooligans" (as Kora calls them) and the halfling could tell he was wasting even more of the family's scarce money. Eventually, Kora threatened to bring him before the Dawn Council if he didn't take some better charge of the estate, at which point Vanthus disappeared (and soon thereafter raided the Vaults for the bulk of the Vanderboren treasure). This is part of what leads Lavinia to believe her brother must have fallen in with a bad crowd and spurs her to seek him out.
(Vanthus) did indeed try to take over. Kora relates to Lavinia (and the party) how Vanthus initially tried to say he was in charge until his sister returned. However, he refused to pay any debts or meet with those wanting to resolve Vanderboren issues. He instead lay about all day with "hooligans" (as Kora calls them) and the halfling could tell he was wasting even more of the family's scarce money. Eventually, Kora threatened to bring him before the Dawn Council if he didn't take some better charge of the estate, at which point Vanthus disappeared (and soon thereafter raided the Vaults for the bulk of the Vanderboren treasure). This is part of what leads Lavinia to believe her brother must have fallen in with a bad crowd and spurs her to seek him out.
Nice!
Well Im not sure how well this would fit with other players but Steve Greer had all of us fall out of the sky on top of each other. He said it was magic.
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Well Im not sure how well this would fit with other players but Steve Greer had all of us fall out of the sky on top of each other. He said it was magic.
:]
Pfft. Everyone knows magic isn't real! That has to ruin the game!
Sean Mahoney
Now that's just silly...if you're going to fall out of the sky, it has to be in a roller-coaster cart! Everybody knows that... ;)
In a city Seven hundred years old, there is indeed a thieves guild bigger than the Lotus Dragons right?
All such guilds were wiped out when the Sea Princes took over. As such, thieves' guilds have only started rising back to power in the last ten years. And so, the Lotus Dragons are one of the most powerful (possibly the most powerful) of the guilds in Sasserine.
I'm using the rhagodessa introduction I referenced above, combined with "Urban Decay" from Dungeon #138, to introduce my players to The Savage Tide. It's working out nicely with their backgrounds. You can monitor the progress via a Story Hour on the ENWorld messageboards here: http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=176530.
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Well Im not sure how well this would fit with other players but Steve Greer had all of us fall out of the sky on top of each other. He said it was magic.
:]
I am SO stealing that plothook! Except instead of magic it was the divine will of the Gods!
FH (joking)
Dude. That makes life soooooooo easy. *yoink*
All such guilds were wiped out when the Sea Princes took over. As such, thieves' guilds have only started rising back to power in the last ten years. And so, the Lotus Dragons are one of the most powerful (possibly the most powerful) of the guilds in Sasserine.
Yeah ok then ;)
A thieves guild is a operation built on stealing, bribes blackmail,information gathering, murdering etc..I believe they would have garnered such information before being attack, knowing full well whom was coming and when, and thus took the steps to either hide or leave or wear disguises and different hats. A city that old would indeed have a very old Thieves guild a very powerful thieves guild.Even in todays world with cities with low crime rate it's not law enforcement stopping it- It's smarter crimnals not getting caught!
Yeah ok then ;)
A thieves guild is a operation built on stealing, bribes blackmail,information gathering, murdering etc..I believe they would have garnered such information before being attack, knowing full well whom was coming and when, and thus took the steps to either hide or leave or wear disguises and different hats. A city that old would indeed have a very old Thieves guild a very powerful thieves guild.Even in todays world with cities with low crime rate it's not law enforcement stopping it- It's smarter crimnals not getting caught!
You could definitely rewrite it that way, but everything I've seen is pretty explicit that (1) the Sea Princes (who, keep in mind, are indeed the "smarter criminals"...indeed an entire nation built on stealing, bribes, blackmail, information gathering, and murder...) destroyed the traditional thieves' guilds and (2) the Lotus Dragons have risen over the last 10 years to be one of the most powerful thieves' guilds in the city.
Sea Prince "law enforcement" was likley vastly different from what we might expect in a civilized city--perhaps hunting down and killing anyone even hinted at being in a guild (and thus undercutting their profits), destroying any economy to support more than vagrant petty thieves, etc. This wouldn't be like a standard nation taking control of a city--more like the mafia taking control, and holding it for over 100 years.
oji, it is likely that, while many of the overt operations of the pre-Sea Princes guilds were destroyed, many of the remnants survived. In particular, the Shrine of St Worgul likely sheltered many of these activities. It's highly likely that the old guilds ceased to be, with their scattered members reforming under more clandestine organizations.