Spoilers for Runelords in text and others behind tags

[Athos710]

If you can brave spoilers for Revenge of the Kobold King and Shattered Star Book 2, I'm hoping to get some advice. One of my player's threw me for a loop and I'm trying to resolve it.

The party was in Magnimar to testify before Ironbriar against Lyrie and Orik and I needed to keep the Paladin (whose player was absent and Foxglove's target) away from the Foxglove Townhouse and the Ranger's player really wanted some combat. So, I had Ironbriar ask them to go on a errand for them after the trial. He had just gotten word of some trouble that morning outside the city. He figured this group would either kill themselves off or handle a potential issue for him. Enter the RoKK module.

RoKK:

I transplanted the lumber camp to a few days East of Magnimar. I ran the lumber camp portion pretty much as written, without Payday(?) the thug that would betray the party. In order to make the second part of the RoKK fit better into the environment, I made it a Thassilonian Ruin, not an Azlanti one.

SS 2:

Since Shattered Star 2 happens near Magnimar, I took that as inspiration and made it a ruin of Sorshen. In re-skinning the RoKK dungeon, I borrowed heavily from descriptions and enemies in Shattered Star.

RoKK:

I left the boss fight as is, but since my players were so focused on "there's a dragon behind this, I know it" I put in a large room where the King sics a Wyvern on them. (tangent: of course, the Wyvern rolls a 1 on Initiative, so it goes last and they surround it before it gets a chance to take off. They ruined the tactics I had for it).

Playing through the boss fight, my players are really digging the modified adventure and I'm pretty happy with how things are going.

SS 2:

Then came my favorite room in my modified dungeon. I had Cataryd Columns, a Marble Sentinel, and normal statues all looking like Sorshen in a side room. They found it early in the dungeon, took a step in, realized the room was bad juju, and saw no other exits so they left to clear out the dungeon. After they finished the rest, they came back and killed the constructs. Behind a DC 30 Perception hidden door, I had Lust Sinspawn and a Rune Ward of Lust protecting a clone body of Sorshen. I nixed the Phantasmal Killer trap and left the permanent Gentle Repose intact. They killed the guardians and thought they had found a real Runelord preserved over the eons. I was clear to them that the body was dead, but that didn't stop them. The clone's body is hereafter referred to as "the object".

That's when the Rogue threw it all off the rails. They had found a Bag of Holding in the loot and he decides he has to take "the object" back to Brodert Quint because he would love to study it. The rest of the party thinks this is INSANE. However, he argues long enough that they finally cave in and into the Bag the object goes. They load the rest of the loot they got into the bag too and make their way back to the city flush with the success of their favor for an important Magnimarian Justice.

We had to stop our game session before they cleared the dungeon and the Paladin's player was back for the next one, so I ran them through what I had planned in Magnimar and they were there for another week before heading back to Sandpoint to start Book 2.

SS 2:

Thinking on my feet, I decide the Gentle Repose was sourced from the sarcophagus that they didn't bring with them. A couple days after they leave the dungeon, they realize the body is now decaying. I figured this would cause them to find the most expedient way to get rid of the body. Almost all of the party came to this conclusion on their own..... except the dang Rogue. He whips off the Sihedron Medallion he's wearing, puts it on the body, and says, "We're fine now. That'll take care of it."

Once again, there is a big disagreement in the party whether it's safe to take the object back to Sandpoint. Once again, everyone else things the Rogue is COMPLETELY INSANE. This time, the Rogue doesn't feel like arguing them over to his side, so he jumps out the window with the Bag of Holding (obect inside)and hides from the rest of them until it's time to go back to Sandpoint. (This player can be both awesome and insanely difficult for the DM.) So he's bested me and the other party members; the object is going back to Brodert.

I just didn't have it in me for Brodert to dismiss the object as not something he'd be interested in. Let's face it, Brodert would LOVE the chance to study that object. The other player's warn both Brodert and Father Zantus that attempting to active the object

SS 2:

raise the body from the dead somehow

could have disasterous consequences for the town. Brodert promises to be good and Zantus vows not to help him do anything.

So here I am, stuck with how to deal with the significance of this object in my campaign. Any advice?

[Bellona]

So there is no risk of body-switching at this point?

[Athos710]

Bellona wrote:

So there is no risk of body-switching at this point?

Nope, no risk.