My PC group in Savage Tide is far from good-aligned. One of them is even lawful evil. Now a fun incident happened in the latest sessions. We are in Into the maw.
I will put the incident under a spoiler button for those who have not yet played this adventure.
In other words, now the LE PC is going to become a death knight! The character has been played such that it is strangely appropriate, and it is also strangely fitting for the end of the campaign.
I want to make this a transformation akin to a prestige class, so that the PC will be fully changed at the end of the campaign. But I also think this transformation should not be easy. So I want to think up a dark ritual, preferably taking place in several stages. Perhaps an innocent should be sacrificed every time the PC gains new abilities. Perhaps she should drain a bit of her own blood every day.
I know there are some fiendish dungeon masters out there :-), so I am curious to hear about your ideas.
Sacrifice a loved one for each level, as horribly as you are willing to stomach as the GM. Draw and quarter an angel. Collect an alicorn without slaying the beast. Maim a pegasus in similar fashion for its wings. Bring the canopic vital organs of a suitably worthy paladin or cleric of opposite alignment.
I had a similiar situation, but instead of death knight, it was lich. I cant remember everything I made the PC do, but I did use "the feast of flesh" from the Demonicon of Iggwilv: Demogorgon article of Dragon Magazine. In a nutshell, the PC had to call a demon and allow it to crack open the pcs skull and feed the pc bits of his own brain (dealing con and int drain while doing so)
It so happens that some of the PCs have vile damage. Since they have no good cleric, the only one who can heal it is a trumpet archon they have freed from the prison. She can do a consecrate or hallow in order to heal it. Wouldn't it be nice if the PC who wants to become a death knight, has to sacrifice the angel, preferably before it has the chance of healing the vile damage? :-)
I like the idea of the alicorn, too. And of bringing the organs of a cleric of the opposite alignment as well. (The PC was originally from a family of famous LG clerics, descended from a LG saint. However, she rebelled in puberty and sacrificed a girl in the woods near her home. She has already sacrificed her own brother, a paladin.)
I was also thinking of letting the PC slowly drain her own blood (dealing con damage), since an undead has no constitution.
I know it is rather late to chime in on this but worth mentioning anyways:
(1) the pc could have been tasked to commit genocide and wipe out all of the phanatons on the Isle of Dread
(2) Kidnap females, have summoned bar-lguras (or any evil outsiders) impregnate the women, and then sacrifice the unborn fetuses to an evil entity
(3) Butcher the entire clergy of a faith opposed to an evil entity stationed in Sasserine (such as the Church of the Whirling Fury)
(4) Engineer a brutual civil war
(5) Contaminate the drinking water supply of a population centre with a drug or poison that causes madness, personality disorders, or physical deformation
(6) Consume a small portion of one's own brain, typically associated with "good" and "noble" emotions
(7) Convert a small village or town to the worship of an evil entity
(8) Fund/Build a prison in a small city to hold all of society's undesireables; you then proceed to "re-habilitate" the prisoners using the most brutual methods and techniques known to turn them into your own private army of efficient killers who you dispatch to violently eliminate your enemies or the enemies of the state
(9) Bring shame, humiliation, and disgrace to a popular rebellious hero by engineering a campaign to discredit, slander, and ruin the reputation of the hero, frame him/her for a series of horrific crimes, and convince him/her to commit suicide, all to protect the status quo of the ruling government
(10) Assassinate the military leaders of an opposing nation, and sup on their blood from the skulls of chaotic good outsiders
These were some of the gruesome ideas I could come up with on the spot.
CB out.
Thanks for your feedback, Canadian Bakka! Unfortunately we have finished the Savage Tide about a month ago, but perhaps these gruesome ideas will be useful some other time, or they will inspire others.
We will be starting Reign of Winter tonight with the same group, + one extra player. Again they have thought up some pretty weird characters, so who knows I am going to need some other gruesome initiation in the near future :-)