Hope this is the right forum, since I'm still working on figuring the boards out...
I need a little help brainstorming my next (possible) adventure. My PCs (10th-level inquisitor, 10th-level rogue-ish type) went to a noble's house while he was a red herring in the current adventure. After being forced to cool their heels, one snuck out to do some investigation, which is of course exactly when the servant came in to summon them (not intentionally ... I went "you wait one hour, two hours" and was about to tell them the servant showed up when they decided to spring into action).
At any rate, the angry servants escorted the remaining PC from the house and the rogue-y type decided to leave shortly thereafter (after knocking a servant unconscious and then rifling through some papers to determine he was not in fact in any way connected with their current crisis).
They've not apparently decided to focus on said red herring even as they deal with the crisis. Forced to wait a few hours for some information, they decided to go out and gather some info on the red herring noble.
I suspect they'll continue to do so in the next session (when they'll likely quickly wrap up their current adventure) and I'd like to have something prepared if they do (I have what I'd intended for them already set, but I don't feel any need to railroad them if they want to go off on a tangent). Just looking for some ideas.
The character is basically a merchant, sending goods to the north (they're in a home brew medium trade port, set north of the Lake of Steam in the Forgotten Realms). Some quick decisions during their investigation at our session today resulted in the merchant being somewhat shady (he sometimes prefers to leave goods outside the walls, to avoid taxes/inspections, despite the greater risk to the items), connected to the local group trying to organize adventurers/caravan guards into a guild, and has at least a couple mistresses (one, a singer, they managed to get a name for). Really, though, he can be/do just about anything that makes for a good story.
Thanks in advance for any thoughts.
The characters will need to track some of the black market items back to the source (use a plot hook to align to the mission of your inquisitor). Turns out tracing the source takes them into interaction with a series of thieves guilds where your rogue can shine. They'll find shipments of alchemical items, very rare woods, huge heating vats and blank parchments for scrolls. Ultimately they get to a key thief boss, who lets them know that there is some big money floating around for some unusual items. Plus...there is a big shipment coming in. As the characters intercept the shipment they get their first insight into the mystery: a book titled A Treatise on Jellies, Puddings and Other Dangerous Oozes.
In order to get to the Sorcerer Ooze running the whole show (who somehow broke free of the gelatinous prison in which he was enslaved), they'll need to get through:
Ooze cultists
Gelatinous Cubes
Ebony Cubes
Electric Jellies
Frost Cubes
Stunjellies
On occasion, they run across abyssal and aberrant sorcerers and their respective gangs. The ultimate goal of the sorcerer ooze is to become a fiendish ooze.
Turns out there are other inquisitors who are dedicated to containing oozes. The sorcerer ooze escaped from them and perhaps they can team up with the PCs for a big final battle.
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It might be fun to make your red herring merchant into a nice guy.
Your PCs could begin tracking his 'misdemeanours' only to find that he is trapped in an arranged loveless marriage and his one true love is his mistress.
His wife belongs to the ruling noble family and they would destroy him and blacken his name if he brought shame upon his wife. He also has children with both women and he sincerely loves all of his children.
He is being blackmailed by unscrupulous sorts and leaves his goods outside so that they can take x% of his goods in exchange for keeping quiet.
Eventually your PCs can choose to help/hinder him in various different ways. If they want to protect him then they have to silence the top few people in a powerful smuggling gang and/or separate him from his wife in a way that does not damage his relationship with the ruling family.
You could complicate things when his wife falls in love with one of your players (perhaps a female PC, helping to explain why the merchant's marriage was never quite right).
The loyal butler, incidentally, knows exactly what is going on and it was his wife who sold the information to the smugglers to stop them from selling her alcoholic brother into slavery after he crossed them (trying to stop the gang leader from carving up the face of an actress who had snubbed him). This means the butler can give some info on the smugglers but doesn't want to say where it came from...
I'm getting carried away now, but you get the idea...
Oooh, I like the idea of him actually being a good guy, possibly over his head in some type of trouble (I like the unhappy marriage thing, but I think I told the players he was unmarried when they were throwing questions at me and I didn't have his full back story).
I'm thinking that he perhaps left them cooling his heels because he was dealing with whatever the trouble was -- perhaps even thinking to protect them (since he certainly doesn't know the two people waiting for him are 10th-level PCs)...
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Oooh, I like the idea of him actually being a good guy, possibly over his head in some type of trouble (I like the unhappy marriage thing, but I think I told the players he was unmarried when they were throwing questions at me and I didn't have his full back story).
I'm thinking that he perhaps left them cooling his heels because he was dealing with whatever the trouble was -- perhaps even thinking to protect them (since he certainly doesn't know the two people waiting for him are 10th-level PCs)...
That's a really neat twist, they don't understand each other...
Merchants can get into trouble really easily (a shipment sank and then the next one was delayed for two weeks: he doesn't know, but that was corrupt dock inspectors) and so to keep the business ticking over he had to borrow money from some other gentlemen who had an overabundance of cash: next thing you know he's in debt and he has helped to launder stolen cash/goods so he can't go to the authorities.