If you play Zanster, Olidon, KoKo, or Racklin, or if you ever have, then you have already read too much. Please turn back now, and forget you ever saw this thread.
For anyone else, OK, here's the deal. HoHR is written in such a way that by the end of the adventure, it comes to light that one of the PC's has been replaced by a doppelganger at some point in the adventure, or at least that there may be an impostor in their midst, and that there really hasn't been much reason for any of the other PC's to suspect which one it might be, since the one who gets replaced continues to act normally, use their regular character sheet, etc. Sure, there's the scene in the Crooked House where one of the doppelgangers tries to frame a PC for attempted murder, and if things go really wrong for the party at that point, the rest of the PC's might think that guy getting framed has something wrong with him. But chances are they'll prove their innocence before it comes to that. But I'm hoping to throw in a few little red herrings so that when it comes to light that one (or more than one, for all they'll know) of them may not be who he seems, they'll start suspecting each other and have at least a few chaotic rounds where they have no idea who to trust. I'll give you a little background on the PC's and the ideas I've come up with so far. I'm hoping for a few good suggestions so that each PC will have at least one reason why the others might doubt them.
The PC's:
- Zanster Tormilko, human fire-worshipping cleric. His player wanted to roll up a priest of Kossuth but since that is a FR deity and we're playing in Greyhawk, he doesn't have access to any official dogma or holy texts or even a name for his religion and just prays at/to the campfire, and sees visions therein when he's not scouring the nearest library for clues to his unusual source of divine power. Died in 3FoE in the Hextorite "kill room" when the rest of the party was just knocked out and imprisoned for later sacrifice. Woke up to find his soul facing Gendinom the Furnace Master (from a Wormfood article) on the plane of fire, acting as his deity's agent. Gendinom, knowing his master had plans for Zanster, offered to restore him to life in exchange for a promise to pay him back later with some unique creature or treasure to burn up in the fires of his forge. The party staged a jail-break with a little help from an assassin working fro the Hextorite secret police who'd been caught trying to infiltrate Theldrick's band of heretics. Zanster paid back Gendinom's favor after receiving a vision asking him to bring the body of the Ebon Aspect to the ring of standing stones at the Bronzewood Lodge, where an elder nature priest who'd also received visions from Gendinom cast the needed spells (requiring components available for the same cost as a raise dead spell, oddly enough, before anyone accuses me of being overly generous to my players) to bring the elder elemental to Oerth so Zanster could walk across a bed of hot coals to deliver the aspect's body personally.
- Olidon Rifter, human rogue. His player, having not previously provided one, agreed to accept the surname Rifter so as to tie-in to a Dungeon adventure I ran before AoW was released, where the party had to fight their way through a troglodyte warren to recover the corpse of his uncle Kai Rifter to bring it back for a decent burial. Wish I could remember the name of the adventure, sorry. Suffice it to say that his player missed almost every session of that adventure due to work pressures. Go figure. Anyhow, Olidon was raised by his Aunt, who believes their family to be cursed because all their men wind up getting killed while off adventuring. She is definitely not pleased that he has taken up with this band of neer-do-wells (who have inadvertently inherited the name of Kai's old band, the Last Men Standing, to her dismay), but he sort of took off on her without leaving any word when the party went to Diamond Lake to meet Allustan, so she's no doubt given him up for dead by now. Incidentally, they came to Diamond Lake to meet Allustan at the suggestion of Iquander, the head librarian of the Greyhawk Library, who thought the mage might be able to shed some light on Zanster's mysterious god and possibly figure out the significance of the missing pages from the evil book stolen by cultists of Vecna and recovered by the PC's in their first adventure, the Mad God's Key. It will eventually turn out to have been some blasphemous chapter about the unthinkable Ebon Triad, no doubt...
Racklin, the Amazing Spider-Monk. Max ranks in jump, climb, sometimes uses a net, took EWP (whip); basically this guy wanted his character to be Spider-Man. 'Nuff said? Has craftily ignored any hooks I've put out there that were geared toward his character. This guy can be counted on to show up most sessions, but not to get really immersed like the rest of the group. Happy enough just to be able to roll a few dice once a week, from what I can tell. That's fine, don't get me wrong; it's just that I don't have much I can say about what makes him tick or what lose ends he's left behind. Was invited for unarmed combat training at a gym in Greyhawk owned by a guy who trained a few champion's belt winners in the past. This was before they ever went to Diamond Lake, but he didn't ever bother to check it out. Too bad, could possibly have tied in nicely with the next adventure... Maybe it's not too late. Since he hasn't really gotten too involved beyond taking part in combat, I'm thinking maybe he'll be the one to get replaced by a doppelganger in this adventure. Possibly on his way to finally go check out that gym if he chooses to do so...
KoKo, lizardfolk wilder/barbarian. An escaped slave who found himself in the overwhelming metropolis of Greyhawk across a tavern table from a group of hairy mercenary humanoids sharing a pitcher of ale at the Couatl's Quill a few months ago, the same night a certain key was stolen from Theldrat's locksmithy. Spent the whole campaign (without much success) so far trying to take slaves of his own from among the party's defeated victims, since the only real role model he ever had was his old master (before he presumably ate him and escaped, that is). He was, therefore, happy to stay behind in the swamp to be the new king of the Twisted Branch Tribe at the end of Encounter at Blackwall Keep. Gave him Leadership as a bonus feat and Hishka as a sort of cohort, provided he stays on as king (ie. he's out of the game for now, so it really makes no difference, but he will hopefully reappear someday). His player will be bringing a new character to the table when we begin playing HoHR in a few weeks, but I'm not sure what sort of PC he has in mind yet. He mentioned he was thinking of creating some sort of unarmed combat specialist fighter, which sounds almost impossible to play effectively, so is therefore almost certainly what he'll go with (don't ask, you'd have to know the guy to understand. Penchant for playing unplayable PC's and whining about their ineffectiveness)
So, for some of these guys it shouldn't be too hard to make the other PC's wonder about them when they realize one of them might be a phony:
Olidon will probably want to visit his aunt when they get back to Greyhawk. If I can nudge another PC or 2 to accompany him to her house, they can witness her pull the old, "I have no nephew. I used to have one, but he left me here to fend for myself after I gave up my youth trying to raise him right. Probably lying dead in a dungeon somewhere by now, no thanks to you ruffians. This fellow certainly may look a bit like Olidon, but he is no nephew of mine (slams door)". A natural enough reaction for someone who's been treated the way she has, but then later on they'll be like, "wait a minute, didn't Olidon's Aunt Fanny say something about him not really being her nephew? Maybe he's the doppelganger!" At least I hope they'll remember she said that...
KoKo's player's new PC will be the new guy, so he's a prime suspect just waiting to happen.
But what about Zanster and Racklin? Can anyone think of a few little hints I can strategically drop during the course of adventure that will seem like nothing at the time, but will make everyone else paranoid about them once they find out they have a doppelganger in their midst?
I just think if everyone sort of suspects everyone else, it'll make the adventure that much more memorable. So let's get those suggestions rolling, folks! Any ideas you guys post will be much appreciated.
Thanks!
Kang
I did this before with a drow rogue. I wasn't eager to do it again, but I tried.
I managed to separate the party, one half scouting the evening streets, the other half remaining at the inn. When Elaxin came calling, assuming the guise of the captain of the guard, he managed to lure the remaining three PCs into the castle. Just as they neared the castle, Elaxin struck the wizard in a surprise round. She dropped into negatives, and the guards, themselves dopplegangers, attacked. It was the middle of the night just outside the castle, far from residences.
In the next round, the party cleric cast daylight, which sprang up like a small sun in the middle of the night. People all through the town looked out to see the light. The PCs, themselves jumping across rooftops scouting out the Sodden Hold, saw the light spring up, and wondered what it was. By the time they made it to the site, the castle gates were closed. The ranger used track and determined that a fight had happened here less than an hour before. After returning to the inn, the group knew three of their number had left with the captain (the innkeeper told them), and they had a hunch that the cleric might have been the one who used the daylight spell as a beacon (she's done it before).
Long story short, the remaining PCs called for the captain of the guard, a fight broke out, dopplegangers died, sadly some humans died as well, but the whole switch-um-up thing was upset. I could have had the dopplegangers just do the ole' quick switch, but that wouldn't have had the full effect (not to mention the party could detect evil, and would have spotted the dupe immediately).
Oh, and as for your group, Kang, I say make the new guy the doppleganger. Though I must say, I can't believe you're posting this information when there's even a chance your players might read it. ;)
Oh, and as for your group, Kang, I say make the new guy the doppleganger. Though I must say, I can't believe you're posting this information when there's even a chance your players might read it. ;)
Well, there's only one guy who's even remotely likely to visit the Paizo site, and even then I doubt he'd check the boards at all, much less this one since he'll know he ought not to (They've been warned about that before - they opted to RP the interaction with that Diamond Lake trapper guy to haggle over selling the owlbear chick when I had given them the option to just skim over it between sessions, then one of them complained that from what he'd seen here, the guy had low-balled them... Duh, what, like he's going to offer them full price when they clearly have no idea what the little guy's worth? Not likely, nor is it my fault if they've neglected Appraise and Diplomacy... IIRC I gave them a minor XP story award for taking that option and to make up for getting shafted a bit on the owlish loot they should have had coming to them, but for some reason they didn't complain about that not being specified in the module). And even if he does, he'll probably recognize my screen name, since it's my PC in our other campaign, who looks just about exactly as 'Krusk'y as my avatar, and know he should stay away from this thread. And do so. If that fails, IIRC I put a warning at the top of my OP to chase them off before they ruin any surprises for themselves. So they're not any more likely to stumble across spoilers for my campaign than they are to find spoilers for the AoW in general by coming here. Really, I wouldn't want them reading this forum at all, regardless of whether I post or not. Since I can't pre-emptively delete the entire AoW forum, what the heck - might as well let 'er rip, eh?
Anyhow, as for making the new guy the impostor, it's a possibility, but he'll probably be the first one they suspect anyhow, since they barely know him. That, and the fact that his semi-retired lizardfolk PC was so central to the last adventure lead me to believe someone else would be a better choice. For one thing, there's more shock value in having a long-trusted companion turn on you than a near-total stranger. For another, Racklin (the spider-monk dude) really hasn't had much of a chance to bask in the spotlight (other than in combats where he doesn't roll 6 or more consecutive natural 1's, which happens - just for him, mind you - at least once monthly in our weekly sessions, as do multiple consecutive natural 20's) so far in the campaign.
But I do want them all to be suspects - really just looking for some subtle false clues I can quietly drop now and again along the way, seemingly implicating them. Maybe I'll have Rain Barrel man snap out of his trance long enough to point at one of them and go into a rant about how he is not who he seems to be. Completely untrue, but the PC's won't know that. Besides, the guy's clearly at least half-crazy already, so just because his prophecy has a certain amount of truth in it doesn't mean everything he says should be 100% accurate... That's half the point of even having crazed street prophets, am I right? Maybe I'll use that one on Zanster, since he's had that weird near death experience I mentioned above, which could be what RB man is actually referring to. Somehow. Maybe... Then if I can get Racklin to split away from the part for a few hours at some point (hearing about the Champ's Belt tournament coming up will hopefully remind him of that guy who offered to train him a few adventures back, before we ran the Whispering Cairn; maybe he'll decide to finally drop in on the guy, leaving him having been out of the others' sight for long enough to be replaced. I suspect I'm going to have to improvise these false clues, but I'd still greatly appreciate any suggestions.
Tyrecian: In retrospect, what did your DM do to try and get your party to notice what was going on, and why do you think it didn't work? Maybe I can learn from his failed attempts. Not that the adventure won't work fine even if they don't already suspect each other or anything; I just think it'll be a little more fun during that one scene where they walk into a room and find all of... themselves... tied to chairs if they do, is all. Oh and by the way, does your DM know you're reading this? ;o)
Thanks for the replies; hopefully they won't be the last...
I'm really looking forward to running this one. I've got all kinds of ideas for bringing in NPC's they met when they were in Greyhawk early in the campaign in ways that tie into the AoW AP. I'd offer more details about that, but it's off-topic plus now I'm all paranoid my players will read this...
Kang
PS. Sorry; and yes, I do realize I can be a bit longwinded. For me, this is actually keeping things short. This is just what is left of what I had origianlly drafted after 4 or more 'preview' clicks, each followed by much self-derisive tongue-clicking and text removal...
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When I played Dragon Mountain (2nd Edition box set), my psionicist PC got captured by the dragon, pumped for info, and replaced (grabbed by a kobold wizard...2Ed teleport could drag unwilling victims...).
For several months of real time, I accompanied the PCs as the dragon, learning all their secrets, item command words, etc, and nudged them into battles with my rebellious kobold minions (and away from the faithful). It was fun, but I had to be careful. It helped that the dragon's abilities, plus some items could replicate some of my sciences and devotions, but not all, so I had to BS my way through it all with guff about 'PSP thresholds' and 'limits on multiple concentration slots'. I also had a few abilities my PC didn't, which I had to pretend had been recently learnt ("Well of course I've learnt Fire Resistance! We're exploring Dragon ****ing Mountain! I've just not needed it before..."). Since no-one else had played a psionicist, I got away with it, until I left after hearing the original PC had escaped...
Surely the choice of which PC to replace should be based on whose abilities can be easily replicated?