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So my Campaign is off to a good start, the PCs are on a long journey, from Tamran to the Embeth Forest and have chosen the overland round, North of Lake Encarthan and going right through the Southern tip of Caliphas.
I don't want to drag them into anything really major, as the focus of the game is what awaits them in Embeth, but I can't see them just wandering through Ustalav with nothing bad happening to them. So I want sort of a mini-adventure to give them a taste of the place, and make them a bit nervous going back there when they have to later on in the Campaign.
Any good suggestions? Resources for horror themed adventure hooks? I hate to even ask, but I am hitting brain block, so any and all help appreciated.
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What level range?
Some hooks:
A woman is to be burned for practicing witch craft in order to commit murder. Unfortunately she was possessed by a demon at the time, and now it's found a new host.
Creatures from the black lagoon raid a fishing village at Lake Encarthian's edge, they seek vengeance because a boating accident killed their queen. Can the PCs stop the raiding monsters through violence or appeasement.
Traveling through the forest PCs are assaulted by spiders. A woman has been captured by the area's spider-monsters and is being transformed into an incubator. The side-effect of which grants her control of mindless vermin. The PCs can either face spiders by ignoring the woman's plight or horrid spider-people by trying to help. Can they escape the silkwood horror?
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For places like Ustalav, I like morality plays and monster-mashes. Good horror themes require the PCs to have to make some choices. Just don't make it all no-win scenarios unless your game is Warhammer Fantasy inspired. A bit of investigation also helps. But that's just my experience.
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The party comes across an orc thief/an orc thief's body in their travels and realize that he has a holy relic from a temple of Pharasma. Something akin to the Hand of Jude but valuable looking enough to steal. If they don't realize the implication immediately with a knowledge check, they'll learn soon enough what it means: the inhabitants of the graveyard surrounding the temple rise, and the village is now under siege. Restore the relic and read from the book before the bodies of the powerful witches and necromancers tried and buried in that graveyard can break free of their mausoleums.
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Here's a favorite that builds setting but isn't a 'true' hook. One of the PCs is waylaid and attacked by a vampire in the night. That's it. Screw over a random player, let them eat a negative level, and then let the PCs tromp all over the landscape trying to find the bastard. The vampire is canny and will not be easily found. The PCs will stumble into other evil to solve, but never find that vampire. It gives a real sense of how vulnerable people in Ustalav are.
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The PCs meet a traveling merchant and his wife on the road. He keeps her in the wagon, and Sense motive reveals he's extraordinarily nervous. The road ahead is plagued by a pack of ghouls, and his wife was bitten. He doesn't want anyone to know she has ghoul fever for fear they'll kill her. Of course, without coming clean he places the whole party in danger along the road ahead. Start a timer when you kick this off: if the party has not puzzled things out before time is up, the merchant's wife goes full ghoul and tries to lure the rest of the ghouls to them. (I actually like a physical ticking egg-timer for this ... don't tell the PCs why you have set it up. It makes them anxious that something is going to happen and gives some palpable relief when/if they they cure her of ghoul fever).
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A sideshow is presenting a terrifying Orisini mummy for spectators to enjoy. People are also dying. The twist is that the mummy is just a corpse. It is the sideshow operator who is an Orisini alchemist and immortal, and he has a formulation that kills in the style of mummy rot. Perhaps his immortality requires souls or vital humors from his victims, or perhaps he's out here because he is just an evil, selfish alchemist. Either way, vivisectionist all the way.
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A group of five bards cross the party's path in a small town. A Knowledge check reveals these bards have a reputation of which the small town seems unaware: performances by these 'Clockmen' bring out the very worst in people, driving them to horrible brutality and violence upon each other, as well as slavish loyalty to the bards' dark master (possibly your campaign's antagonist, if not than uncaring Azathoth or a potent demon). The Clockmen loot the dead and the devoted, then move onto the next town, a wake of chaos behind them. The PCs must decide whether to take action before the Clockmen perform -- they have not yet committed a crime, so this means 1) drumming up a mob, 2) tracking down evidence of the Clockmen's evil, or 3) taking the law into their own hands -- or else wait until the Clockmen perform.
Okay, yes, that is a Dethklok reference. But you don't have to play it as one. It could just as easily be a Paganini sort of story.
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A Hellknight and his local followers confront the player characters, putting them on trial for their past actions. In one version of the scenario, the Hellknight keeps the paladin code as I do and only smites them if they are deserving. He may become an ally of sorts, as he too is alone in a grim land.
In another version, the Hellknight is a corrupt pretender that does not understand the Chain and does not read from the Measure. Unless the PCs have been tyrants themselves, he will no doubt seek to part them from their weapons and then kill them. No doubt such a vile pretender to the Hellknight Orders would enjoy the aid of devils and the fruits of reputation.
Scourge this Hellknight from the face of Golarion.