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So I was inspired to add in a little side mission through Thelanis in my Eberron campaign that was based around a few Fairy Tales.
The first is Snow White: Snow White is a vampire justly imprisoned, and worshipped by evil dwarves (maybe redcaps). The heroes must either stop her from awakening or force her back into captivity.
And then I run dry I had an idea about them trying to rescue Rapunzel and being attacked during the upward climb.
So any ideas?
That vampire rising storyline would work also for Sleeping Beauty...or actually, since it's Eberron, something involved with Xoriat being trapped eons ago by those orc druids (bramble hedge and all that).
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A tooth fairy serial killer (takes teeth as trophies).
Have you read "Snow, Apple, Blood" or whatever it's called by Neil Gaiman? It's one of the last stories in "Smoke & Mirrors" and it's the tail of Snow White from the "evil" step-mother's point of view.
A hag could be living in a house of gingerbread and practicing cannibalism on the local children.
A pied-piper just stole all the children from a village and the village needs the PCs to investigate.
The prince is having a ball to find a wife, and it gets attacked and firebombed by the warmage "Cinder" Ella.
A beanstalk appears in the middle of town square, with cloud giants, a goose that lays golden eggs, and an intelligent magical harp involved.
A local bridge is haunted by a troll that wields a unique magical weapon. After the PCs take out the troll and begin using the weapon, the brothers Gruff keep attacking the PCs, each one more powerful than the last, because the wielder of that weapon killed one of their brothers. The brother Gruffs could be goat-folk, or re-imagined minotaurs with goat-like features instead of bull-like features.
Anything involving the Seelie and Unseelie Courts.
And remember, when climbing a beanstalk or a long, long, long jacket, I mean ponytail, the climber loses their Dex bonuses to AC. SNEAK ATTACK!!!
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To build upon the Pied Piper idea, it is a master bard leading away the infernal children from the village of Hamelin, preventing their transformation into devils.
Or how about the Bluebeard tale made stranger? In truth it is a doppelganger wizard slaying young maidens. He uses magic to hide the truth in the room, but something is still awry.
Have you read "Snow, Apple, Blood" or whatever it's called by Neil Gaiman? It's one of the last stories in "Smoke & Mirrors" and it's the tail of Snow White from the "evil" step-mother's point of view.
Yeah that's actually the basis of my Snow White idea, the prince is a necrophile, it's a great story
Yeah, maybe one of the side quests can be to track down The Huntsman and retrieve the heart from him.
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Since you seem keen on reversing the roles in the Fairy Tales:
1) Three Little Pigs: Three wealthy landowners long ago murdered a farmer to acquire his land and the rich minerals beneath. Unbenownst to them, after dumping the body in the woods, a lycanthrope fed on the not-quite-dead-farmer. Now, every full moon the werewolf returns to his land to torment his "killers". The PCs are hired to rid the land of the wolf preying on the land-workers, eventually discovering the truth.
2) Goldilocks: An assassin sent to rid the land of a circle of three druids, she stole into their abode and poisoned their gruel. The PCs are contracted by the Assassin's Guild to find the fate of their "missing daughter", eventually finding three "bears" holding her hostage.
The RPG, 'Grimm', would have some excellent ideas.
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And then I run dry I had an idea about them trying to rescue Rapunzel and being attacked during the upward climb.
'Rapunzel' is a siren, who lures young men up into her tower, from which they do not return. She can't leave, but the magic that imprisons her there is weak enough that she can appear in the dreams of those who rest too close to her forest prison, tempting them to go into the forest and 'rescue her.'
Her hair isn't just long enough to serve as a rope, it's also animate and attacks as a giant constrictor, wrapping around her would-be rescuer and crushing the life from him, while she inhales his dying breath and so adds his strength, and his voice, to her own, growing ever stronger. Her hair is a lustrous shade of red, and as she hangs her head out of the tower, a too-quick glance could have someone believing that it is a wash of blood, coming down from the high window...
For a less traditional 'faery tale,' you could gussy up the plot to a movie like Labyrinth. The party has to go into the lands of the fey to rescue the children of a village, who were all stolen in the night after one of their parents offended some fey entity. If they don't get to the children within 24 hours, the magic of the fey-lands will turn them into Goblins, forever!
Other movies, like Legend or Ladyhawke or (heaven forbid) Krull could be similarly tweaked.
Okay, so here's what I have in short:
The party will encounter a group of Bacheea (sp?) then upon waking find themselves in Thelanis.
After a bit of wandering the find a path, and are beset by bandits, led by weretiger(yes I know the real story of Puss in Boots he's not a bandit)in magic boots :P
Following the path, they notice of large flock of birds, upon investigation they find a trail of bread that the birds were eating, find a house, free the slave girl, probably don't save Hansel (poor Hansel) and slay the hag
that's it for now, I want to do two more, I need a way to work in the Snow White vamp part and one other
Make it a weretiger halfling or gnome or some other small humanoid.
Maybe they run into the Huntsman with the magically locked iron box that holds her heart, and they have to find the key so they can stake her.
Also, the dwarves should definitely be redcaps....they even gather in odd-numbered groups! And it's fun advancing them. You can also mix them up a bit and give some of them picks, axes, hammers, and other tool-like weapons besides scythes.
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DCC 38: Escape from the Forest of Lanterns
"The characters come into possession of a book called the Tome of Tales when they find it among treasure collected in their latest adventure or by other means. The book makes its presence known to them, offering a story or two for their entertainment. After reading one of its
stories to them, the Tome of Tales uses its powers to transport the player characters to a small demiplane called the Forest of Lanterns. The PCs find that they have been transformed into small children and have somehow been transported to a strange unknown forest. The forest is actually a small demiplane with the unique side effect of altering visitors to a child-like state.
Exploring the primordial woodland, the PCs may meet some of the strange, comical, and deadly denizens living there at the numerous keyed encounter areas. By exploration, encountering her henchmen, or talking with some of the less hostile creatures they meet, the PCs eventually
learn of the Warty Witch who lives in a cottage made of candy at the heart of the forest."
If you don't like the demi-plane idea, it's certainly got some yoinkable encounters.
I like it!
What are the crunchy bits for being "child-like?"
Size reduced by 1 category?
Penalties to any or all Mental Stats? Penalties to Will Saves? Negative levels?
Inability to order ale or wine at the inn?
Just be careful it doesn't become the Kenderization of the PCs....that might be TOO annoying! ;-)
Size reduction and RPing mostly. There's also a feature that you get younger the longer you stay on the plane.
Has anyone ever run a Nymph vampire before (I know techinically not allowable, but anyway) the CR comes to 9, but it looks like it should be higher, does anyone have previous experience here?
That sounds about right. She'd be kind of fragile (6d12 hps, averaging 39), but hard to hit (Dex + Cha + 6 Natural Armor).
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That sounds about right. She'd be kind of fragile (6d12 hps, averaging 39), but hard to hit (Dex + Cha + 6 Natural Armor).
Oh, damn! That'd be hard. I have a tough time believing that a 6th level party would find this to be an appropriate EL+3 challenge.
Possible tactics:
Stunning Glance a scout, then drain blood for 2d4 rounds. Or Stunning Glance plus Dominate, if you don't want to just kill the player's character. Or Poison to ruin a Fort save, then Stunning glance.
Call lightning but be out of sight of where you know the party is, striking somewhere a ways away. Gaseous form. Hide +22+whatever circumstance bonus. Move to within sight of party. Use the pre-existing spell while in gaseous form to blast the party with 3d6 damage for 6 more rounds.
Entangle plus bat swarms. Or Soften Earth and Stone. Heat metal on four front liners, a Will save.
Children of the night plus summoning dire wolves and constrictor snakes plus vampire spawn... means you face an army before you get to find the patch of mist that watches all of this in gaseous form. Vampire spawn may be its sick parody of planting season.
Rusting grasp plus energy drain leads to 2 negative levels and -1d6 AC.
The coffin is one tree amongst many, making finding the coffin a hugely difficult task. Plus dimension door and gaseous form for escapes.
Gets 4 extra feats, +8 to several skills, and ability bumps translate to +4 AC, +3 melee/damage, Fort +1/Ref +6/Will +3. +3 natural armor for barkskin. +6 increased natural armor bonus means... AC 30, F +8, R +18 W +15. +23 for spot and listen. +22 for hide and move silently. +10 Initiative. The scout might never see the vampire nymph coming.
DR 10/cold iron, silver AND magic. (If you have a silver magic weapon, then the 10/cold iron kicks in; if you have a cold iron weapon, then the 10/silver and magic kicks in.) With fast healing on top of that. And negative levels heal it on top of that.
Spells give access to scrying and information from plant life making it very prepared.
Weaknesses:
Lots of stakes in a forest.
Best 1 on 1, not so good with 1 vs. many. It has little blaster capacity. If the spawn and swarm get blasted with fireballs quickly and the entangle spell doesn't work... fleeing is its best option.
That sounds about right. She'd be kind of fragile (6d12 hps, averaging 39), but hard to hit (Dex + Cha + 6 Natural Armor).
She could keep animals around caged to energy drain before battles, yes? Wouldn't even have to kill them. At 10 HP (temporary) per touch, one bear means that she enters combat with 20-30 extra HP.
That sounds about right. She'd be kind of fragile (6d12 hps, averaging 39), but hard to hit (Dex + Cha + 6 Natural Armor).She could keep animals around caged to energy drain before battles, yes? Wouldn't even have to kill them. At 10 HP (temporary) per touch, one bear means that she enters combat with 20-30 extra HP.
Diabolical!!!
And is she the Elite array?
Straight out of the book.
Right, that's not really helpful I thought of all that, my question is whether or not it's CR9 equivalent, or should I bump it up to 10?
Another valuable resource for fairy tale hooks is "Instructions," a poem in Neil Gaiman's Fragile Things. Basically, it is a set of instructions in case you're ever in a fairy tale.
O
Right, that's not really helpful I thought of all that, my question is whether or not it's CR9 equivalent, or should I bump it up to 10?
Oh, damn! That'd be hard. I have a tough time believing that a 6th level party would find this to be an appropriate EL+3 challenge.
All signs indicate "yes."