Hi,
I'm new on the paizo's messageboards and english isn't my primary language. I'm sorry if I make mistake or if I don't post on the right board.
Soon, I'll be running the Carrion Crown Adventure Path. My (5) players want to play a ''Van Helsing'' like campaign with a slow experience progression.
I know that Carrion Crown already have some classic monster:
- Ghosts and Haunts (The haunting of Harrowstone)
- Frankenstein (The trial of the beast)
- Werewolf (Broken Moon)
- Horrifying Cthulhu Monsters (Wake of Watcher)
- Vampire, Headless Horseman and Witch (Ashes at Dawn)
- Lich, Huecuva, Worm that walk and Ravener (Shadow of Gallowspire)
I want some new classical monsters. Here is a list of what I tought:
- Bogeyman
- Dr Jekyll And Mister Hyde
- The Hunchback
- Invisible Man
- Island of Doctor Moreau
- Jack the Ripper
- Museum of Wax
- Phantom of the Opera
- The Pied Piper
- The Sandman
- The Swamp Thing
Any idea?
(I already adjusted the module's experience progression.)
Some thoughts:
Bogeyman - Hard to do and keep it serious, as this is primarily a children's horror piece. You'd need it to be attacking someone the PCs already care about. Maybe Kendra has a newphew or son or something that lives with her? You could handle this in Ravengro itself.
Dr Jekyll And Mister Hyde - This begs to be an awesome, high-level combat. Therefore I would try and include it late in the adventure path. Caliphas? Someone from the Quarterfaux Archives?
The Hunchback - Inversely, this would be a farily low-level challenge. Therefore perhaps in a town in the road between Ranvengro and Lepidstadt? The xenophobia of Ravengro would lead in to this encounter quite well.
Island of Doctor Moreau - This would be hard to do in D&D. Part of what makes this horrific is that (in the real world) there is such a stark divide between man and beast. Since monsters are already "normal" in D&D, the shock value is gone.
Jack the Ripper - Do you have Rule of Fear? The PCs have to pass through Tamrivena. Check out the section on "K". It seems like this one is already set up for you!
Alternatively, Ashes at Dawn is kindof doing the Jack the Ripper thing already.
Phantom of the Opera - This one will be hard to run since the Phantom is actually just a pathetic man: the only reason he is powerful is because of Christine's weakness. I would play up the "Angel of Music" angle: the idea that there is a great benefactor that someone adores. This basically has to be an NPC, which is hard because you never get attached to any femme fatales in the series.
The Swamp Thing - Vorkstag (from book 2) already is doing this. Maybe when the PCs are investigating Morast, they learn that there have been attacks in the distant past (but stopped when Vorkstag took the skin)?
You should seriously try to get a hold of some of the 2nd edition D&D Ravenloft material. They took on most of the classics, including the Island of Dr. Moreau. I ran most of them, and I highly recommend the following:
The Created (PC's wake up as marionettes)
Hour of the Knife (Jack the ripper or dopplegangers?)
Neither Man nor Beast (The Island of Dr. Moreau)
There is really a lot of great adventure material that can fit really well in the CC adventure Path.
Erik : Thank you for your comment, they gave me some idea. My goal is to create classic horror monster, even if they wouldn't be horrifying in a world like Golarion.
Brodyz: I didn't thought about Ravenloft. Thank you about the GREAT idea. I love The Created adventure.
Einmaliger: I forgot to read Rule of Fear! Good one, thank you.
My group of 5 PC should look like this:
- A fetchling synthesis
- A damphir magus
- A human cleric of Desna
- An inquisitor
- An Alchemist
I'll ask about others next time I check in.
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I'm using the spring heel jack as a way to tie in new players in between the 1st and 2nd book.How?
The city of Lepidstadt is currently the scene of intense local excitement. The dreaded Beast of Lepidstadt—a terrifying abomination that has terrorized the people of Vieland for years—has been captured. Hundreds of people have flocked to the city hoping to catch a glimpse of the horror and watch it burn for its crimes.
The heroes decided that the best method of travelling would be by horseback. They walked a day’s travel from Ravengro to the Hamlet of Ghaervan. Ghaervan specialized in travelers and had a large stable and sold horses regularly.
Night at Ghaervan Inn
The heroes paid for their rooms and meals, and settled in for the evening to enjoy the troubadours, their drinks, and good company. Most of the heroes decided to turn in for an early evening to get an early start the next day, but Janos was hitting it off nicely with a pretty brunette stable maid. As the evening winded down, she urged him to go pay for their drinks, and gave him a key to her room in the inn, telling him she’d like to continue where they left off.
Paying for their drinks, he drunkenly stumbled up the stairs and to her room, slipped the key in, and opened the door. The room was dark, and the only light was coming from the turned down lamp on the nightstand. Janos kicked off his boots and he began to stumble over to the bed. He had just reached the edge of the bed when the hairs on the back of his neck rose up in alarm. There was movement next to the bed on the other side, and he had just stepped barefoot in something wet and warm.
Janos cautiously reached over and turned the lamp up, and was immediately startled by small black demonic looking creature sporting a black cape. It hissed angrily at him from the far side of the bed, and jumped onto the window sill, and then from there, clear up two stories to the roof of the inn. Janos running to see its path ran to the window, and then seeing he’d lost it, went to check on his date.
He ripped back the blanket covering her, and was shocked at the brutality and sheer amount of blood that splattered over him from the blanket. His date looked as if she’d been given an autopsy while still alive. Janos shocked himself into action realizing that he was the only person seen entering this room, and knew few would believe him that a small demonic creature had done this.
He rushed from the room to get help from his friend Gedron, Cleric of Pharasma across the hall. His pounding and yelling alerted the other guests, and it wasn’t long before someone called for the guards, and he sat accused of murder in the downstairs commons by the Hamlet’s constable and Deputy.
Giving Chase
The Constable interrogated Janos about his intentions, who he was, and anything that the Constable could find out about his involvement with the stable maid. Due to some quick thinking by Gedron, and to Kendra volunteering to take his place if he skipped town, the Constable agreed to set Janos free if he could bring the real killer to justice.
They began their search on the roof of the inn, and not finding anything there in the pouring rain, began to spread out from the inn and started searching the surrounding grounds for any sign of the murderer. Finally after searching through the mud, rain, and filth they found a single track. It was a cloven hoofed track, and not from any natural animal that the heroes could identify. They assumed this was their killer.
Spreading out again they managed to find tracks heading towards the Maidensnarl Forest, spread out 10 ft or more, as if someone was bounding; trading feet on each landing. Finally, the came to the forest’s edge, and the heroes balked at entering the forest at midnight, and began to debate on what they should do. Gedron then perceived that a set of bright red glowing eyes were watching them. Sergei spotted it and threw an alchemical bomb at the eyes, and then all hell broke loose. The eyes caused the fear they held to manifest to a burning panic in Gedron who dropped his mace and ran for town. Then before they could further react, the creature sent Janos and Sergei scattering as it breathed fire from the trees on them, and then disappeared into the forest night.
Regrouping
Recovering their gear, and heading back to the Ghaervan Inn, the heroes recounted their story. Sergei stated the creature was probably the illusive Spring Heeled Jack, a mythical fey creature with a penchant for brutal murder and sowing terror. The Constable obviously terrified by what he was faced against, conferred with the owner of the inn, and they together offered the heroes, and anyone willing 250gp to kill the creature or at least drive it from Ghaervan permanently.
Two travelers of skill offered to join the heroes in bringing the murderous creature to justice, Prospero the Oracle and Alatier, the Cavalier. The two new heroes had decided to leave their respective families at the inn to wait for them while they brought the Spring Heeled Jack to justice. As they were getting ready to leave, a rain drenched man burst through the door, yelling that there’d been another murder.
The man was the brother of the latest murder victim, and he heard about the latest murder and went to check on his sister to make sure she was alright when he found her dead, and chopped up. He implored the constable and the heroes to come investigate this latest murder, and avenge his late sister.
Additional Murder
The heroes trekked to the edge of the hamlet; they noted that this home was probably the closest of the cottages to the Forest. Janos, having been a detective in Caliphas set to work investigating the scene of the crime.
The first thing he noted was that the body was not butchered in the same fashion as the girl in the inn, and not with a small weapon such as the dagger he saw the creature wield. Alatier utilizing his time as a professional soldier noted that the wounds reminded him of an axe wound. Further, they noted instead of being split open like the girl in the inn, she’d only had her legs and arms removed. The last detail was there were no cloven hoof prints, but prints resembling a large 6 ft plus man whose prints headed towards the Maidensnarl. The heroes made the deduction that based on their evidence there was likely another killer.
Through the Maidensnarl
The heroes followed the new set of foot prints from the hut, and they led them to the edge of the Maidensnarl Forest as well. Janos & Prospero continued to track the murderer’s tracks deeper and deeper into the forest. After a couple hours of tracking, Janos discovered that another pair of tracks stood beside the Murderer’s tracks. These tracks were cloven hoofed, and appeared as if they were looking at the other set of tracks as well.
Another hour deeper into the forest, and the heroes stopped as they heard something running up ahead which appeared to be veering off drastically from their course. The heroes decided not to give chase, but to stick to the set of tracks they were following, assuming it may be some form of red herring. When they came up to where the sound originated, they saw more cloven hoof prints.
Still, another hour into the forest, Janos and Prospero heard the snap of twine, and the lightening fast approach of a spiked branch. Prospero’s instincts allowed him to hit the ground and avoid the trap, but Janos was not quite so quick, finding himself impaled on one of the branches, not that Prospero didn’t fix him up with a few quick prayers.
Forest Cabin
The heroes following the tracks, finally broke into a forest clearing, in the center of the clearing sat a small one room cottage. They were immediately suspicious, and slowly entered the clearing. That’s when Gedron noticed on top of the cabin that same set of eyes from earlier in the night was watching them. Gedron shouted the alarm as Spring Heeled Jack breathed fire on top of the cabin, setting it ablaze, and then jumped away fleeing the scene.
From inside the cabin they heard a roar of rage, and sending the front door flying from its hinges a giant of a man burst from the cottage, his eyes bloodshot with rage, his hands holding a gigantic axe. The heroes could see his outrage, and that he was ready to spill blood. The man took one look at Prospero, and charged across the gap between them, and cleaved Prospero from shoulder to hip, the shock of it not even giving him a chance to cry out in pain.
The rest of the party, working fast, managed to bring down the enraged and crazy woodsman a moment later. As they finished, cleaning their blades, another man broke into the clearing, looking very similar to the now dead Prospero. This man was as it turned out Prospero’s brother Franco. He’d been left behind at the inn, and decided to track down and catch up to his older brother to help him.
While Franco mourned his brother’s death, Sergei began to stitch him back together, Alatier began to dig a grave, and Janos investigated the still burning hut. Inside he found it lined with the bones of dozens of bodies, and in the stew pot in the hearth, he could see human arms & legs. Nothing of value or anything of importance found, he left the hut to burn.
The Nest
The heroes then discussed what their next course of action should be. They all acknowledged that they’d brought at least one killer to justice, but they weren’t sure how he even fit into the picture. They also realized while they did stop this killer, they’d not stopped Spring Heeled Jack, and should track him down and stop him for good.
Janos decided to begin searching the lower branches of trees to see if he could pick up the trail, and through careful examination he was able to find the trail, and carefully went about tracing where Jack went. The going was slow though, and it took him 3 hours to track Jack 2-3 miles deeper into the forest.
It led them to a small waterfall, and on the edge of the brook, at the top of the waterfall, on the far side, they found a dug out 3-4 ft high mud wall. It was seemingly built halfway around a nest of sorts. It had furs of small animals, fingers, bones, and what appeared to be a mad creature’s perception of knick knacks.
The heroes figured this must be Spring Heeled Jack’s nest. They guessed that Jack was likely a nocturnal creature and if he wasn’t already nearby watching them, he was likely to return and they would lay in hiding in the nearby trees to ambush him upon his return, after hiding to the best of their ability, they waited to spring their trap.
Unfortunately, what they suspected was entirely true. Jack had been watching them pick through his nest, and listened closely as they planned to ambush him. Unfortunately for them, as he sprung his ambush, Alatier was too alert for him, and managed to dodge Jack’s dagger. Then shouting the alarm, the rest of the heroes were quick to assist. Too quick for Jack, and they had killed him moments later, having done no more damaged than a grazing slash to Alatier.
Sergei intent on dissecting Jack took slung him over his back and they all headed home, feeling mostly good about the nights work. Aside from the loss of Prospero, it was a largely a huge success. As they neared the town, the body of Jack burst into flames. Sergei tried everything he could do to stop the body from burning, but to no avail. Soon, the body was nothing more than ashes. He stoppered up a sample of the ashes, and they continued on.