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I'm running a home game that we started back in 3.5, so we're still using those gods. Our Paladin of Pelor is seeking a minor artifact (really just a Lord's Banner Crusades) that she knows is buried with this ancient, powerful Paladin.
The Paladin has guarded the tomb so that evil beings cannot get in and only those powerful enough to be safe with the loot can get to the loot. Essentially, some level 4 party can't get in, and then a few days later get killed by some orcs and now orcs have really nice stuff that they shouldn't have.
Anyway, the basic format. There are 6 statues in the entryway, of the Patron Saint of Vigilance, Valor, Truth, Sacrifice, Mercy, and Perseverance. Each statue has an outstretched hand. The party will enter a "test chamber," and solve a puzzle with one of those themes. At the end, they get an orb and put it in the appropriate statue's hand. So part of the test is identifying what they are being tested on. I'm looking for ideas for tests.
Here's what I have:
Valor - An orb is on top of a tall stone pillar. Around the pillar are monsters that are way too difficult for the party with Fear auras that will only attack you if attacked or you are climbing the pillar, but will not pursue you past a certain point in the floor. The party needs to get the orb, but if they get close, they fail a will save and become panicked. I can see a creative solution (animate rope, something like that) or, the easy solution, where the party goes to one side of the room and attacks, while the Paladin, immune to fear, runs in and grabs it. Or the party can just win an epic level encounter and be fine.
Truth - A court case illusion, where a Solar and a Marilith are both accused of a crime. It's a standard logic puzzle, with witnesses and stuff, but the Solar is guilty and the Marilith is innocent, because servants of Pelor pursue the truth, not outward appearances. I'd like a combat here too.
Perseverance - Several chambers where the lever or key is inside increasingly powerful fields of Positive Energy. Whomever goes after the key has to survive without exploding. Basically, the party needs to beat up a party member and have them walk in. This test is inspired by the scene with the coolant tanks in Sunshine.
Vigilance - They are walking through a crowd and keep getting attacked by a ghost or some invisible, incorporeal thing. They need to defend themselves without endangering or harming the "innocents" (actually just illusions) in the crowd. Any one they injure becomes a wraith and attacks, because servants of Pelor protect the innocent at the cost of pursuing the guilty. They will not give evil room to grow. As they progress, they start becoming more fatigued and disadvantaged, but must maintain a watchful eye. Things like True Seeing stop working. But despite the handicaps, they must be ever watchful.
Mercy and Sacrifice - I need suggestions here. A friend of mine suggested somebody basically has to willing take an Oracle curse for Sacrifice. I'm not sure about setup or if I'm mean enough to do that to a party member.
I'd also like some non-standard combats to mix in. One example is from a few sessions ago, where the Cleric needed to channel through an amulet for 5 rounds and the concentration check stacked every round if he took damage. So the party had to keep things off of him while he did it. The cleric described it as the most stressful combat he's ever been in, so I think it worked (though I know a lot of players would be bored with that). Things like that, that force a difference tactical situation.
Any suggestions?
Thanks in advance.
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Sacrifice - A yellow glass sphere about the size of a basketball covered with spike-like 'rays' resembling a sun floats above a stone altar. Inside is a dead butterfly (or dove, or whatever). Picking it up with ungloved hands causes the spikes to pierce the skin and blood flows into the spikes and down the insides of the sphere. Each round it is held and draws blood in this fashion, 1 Con pt. of blood is drained, and after 10 pts. of blood are drawn in this fashion, the butterfly returns to life, and the crystal globe shatters, freeing the revived insect, which then flutters to the mosaic on the far wall and lands on the tile that must be pressed to pass beyond this chamber. The blood drawn in this fashion need not come from a single individual, and it would obviously be better for a 5 man party to divide it up and each donate 2 Con pts. worth of blood than for any single member to contribute all 10 pts!
[Within the final chamber, a few potions of lesser restoration might be available, if you don't want to require the party to expend their own resources, or spend a few days, recovering their lost Con.]
I don't have any good idea for Mercy yet...
I like Perseverance (particularly the visual of someone having to cut themselves repeatedly to cross the hallway without exploding), but perhaps a different version would require someone to re-arrange locking golden gears on a wall to try and 'disarm' a constantly resetting lock to open the door. The 'gears' are hot, and each time someone touches one, they take 1 hp. of heat damage, and anyone who is resistant to this damage finds that they will not budge. Only someone suffering the fire damage can move them, and, presumably after much fussing about with them, it will be discovered that only someone who has been reduced to a single hit point will be able to move the final piece, an action that will *not* damage them. Once the door opens, those passing through it will be healed of a certain amount of fire damage (not all, like the old heal spell, they will always be a few hit points down, even after the healing).
[One reason I'd suggest this over the positive energy option you mention is that, barring meta-game knowledge, it's really, really unlikely that a 4th-ish level party would have any idea that excess positive energy causes meat-'splosions. That would be an unpleasant thing to learn only after someone goes ker-blooey, or, worse, and entirely possible, to not figure out until *multiple* PCs have exploded from 'too many hit points'...]
For Truth, a solar and a marilith might be a bit large in scope for a lower level adventure (particularly since you were looking to add a fight), so perhaps a sinister looking black scaled naga with red patterns could be spewing venom at a floating globe of light that is suggestive of a lantern archon. The naga is a LG guardian naga, and the 'lantern archon' is a will o' the wisp (both tweaked to appear more like an evil naga or good archon, with the wisps electrical attacks looking more like light rays, for instance). If they pick wrong, the wisp will happily help them kill the naga, and then turn on them. If they pick right, the naga will cough up the key to open the door out of this chamber. (If they killed the naga, they can get the key by cutting it out of the naga...)
Hey, I think I was unclear, they aren't 4th level, they are 12th level. I meant that some random 4th level party is supposed to see the first door to the tomb and know it's over their heads. The Paladin doesn't want a low level party to get through. My point is that since a Paladin made the tomb, it's not meant to sucker people in, but it looks rough from the outside. Also, the party is made up of a few very experienced gamers, so I feel little guilt about throwing around positive energy and the like.
As to your suggestions, I really like the idea for sacrifice and Perseverance. I might have to do 2 chambers for that test, or something because I like it so much.
Also, I like how you added combat to the Truth puzzle. Definitely working that in. Awesome suggestions.
Mercy is giving me a lot of trouble too. I'm not even sure whether to approach it from the point of view of showing mercy to the guilty by not punishing them or by showing mercy as in putting people out of their misery. Probably the former.
I'd probably suggest an outer 'safe' area, where LG first-level commoners can come to light a candle or pay their respects in perfect safety. The simplest way to exclude low-level tomb robbers would be to provide no entrance at all - or, slightly less extremely, a wall that only sprouts a door for characters of good intent.
Naturally a paladin wouldn't want or use undead as tomb-guards: I've had good luck with celestials (in some case bound immaterially, so they seem more like haunts than creatures) and with elementals. Since the paladin's liable to want to distinguish between the merely greedy and the outright wicked, you might want to arrange things so that there are two levels of failure - one that simply turns the selfish away, and another, more brutal one to punish active evil.
Lastly, a forbiddance around the innermost sanctum would make sense thematically, but might frustrate parties that didn't bring a LG party member with them.
Traps that do holy dmg, puzzles that can only be solved by good aligned spells (the higher the better), and so on.
Lincoln Hills wrote: I'd probably suggest an outer 'safe' area, where LG first-level commoners can come to light a candle or pay their respects in perfect safety. The simplest way to exclude low-level tomb robbers would be to provide no entrance at all - or, slightly less extremely, a wall that only sprouts a door for characters of good intent.
I like this idea. How about the outer wall only reveals its door if a certain amount of positive energy is channeled into it at once? So a cleric channeling positive energy, casting a cure spell, or paladin laying on hands could do it, but they have to generate enough positive energy in one shot to activate the door, which keeps lower levels out. Or maybe just enough energy in one round, rather than a single source all at once. But definitely enough that only a higher level group could do it, not just a bunch of level 1 clerics channeling in the same round.
Put a clue like "Only those with the power of righteousness may enter" or something written on the wall as a clue.
Cool, thanks guys, I really like that idea for an entrance barrier.
Any ideas for a test of Mercy?
Running across an illusion of a family member corrupted and having the chance to slay or forgive them is always fun. Especially if its someone who means something or has a special bearing on the player. I like mercy in forgiveness more than any idea of mercy killing...
Non leathal dmg barrier? An unlock able, un breakable, impassable door of mercy, can be opened by non leathal dmg or LoH.
I attack the wall non lethally! I don't want to hurt it or anything...
MrSin wrote: I attack the wall non lethally! I don't want to hurt it or anything... Good thing the rogue has an adamantine sap!
Fromper wrote: MrSin wrote: I attack the wall non lethally! I don't want to hurt it or anything... Good thing the rogue has an adamantine sap! "You all laughed at me for spending 100000 gp on a +3 Merciful Warhammer. Well, I'm not helping till you apologize."
This would also be an interesting dungeon in which to include a mirror of opposition, although hopefully a non-portable version so the PCs don't carry it off and begin using it as a villain-buster.
To better suit the theme, use the 'Restricted' rules in the cursed items so that the mirror of opposition is alignment-restricted: Good and Neutral characters "can't use" the mirror, while Evil characters set it off. The irony there, of course, is that should they realize it's magical, it's likely that somebody will try to Use Magic Device on it - now that's comedy.
Pathfinder Adventure Path Subscriber
Mercy is tricky.
Since you mentioned it is a particular paladin attempting these trials, you could have the paladin to find themselves alone, and encountering various enemies (again, ideally long-time enemies, alive or deceased). Any damage inflicted on the "enemies" are inflicted on their allies as well (or each "enemy" is one of the paladin's allies under illusion/compulsion). So each failure to show mercy to his enemies will result in him directly injuring his friends. The paladin is unaware of this until after he has passed through the trial and finds the rest of the party in various stages of health based on his decisions.
This puts a lot of spotlight on the paladin, which may be a poor plan. You can somewhat mirror the effects by having the party encounter enemies that test the limits of mercy (e.g. a puppy-kicking anti-paladin that they have encountered before), and have any lethal damage dealt be suffered by the damage dealer as well. Thus the more merciful the party is to their hated foe, the better they will weather the trial.
Hmmm, yeah, these ideas for Mercy kind of work, but they don't thrill me and I don't think the players would enjoy them.
I don't mind putting the spotlight on one or the other players, but I feel like this adventure is already pretty Paladin centric, so if other players get a chance to shine, that'd be great.
We have a Cleric of Pelor, a combat oriented rogue, a druid, and a sorcerer, if that helps anyone.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IMxWLuOFyZM
You can find an (always evil) dying foe and try to bring him back. That's part of the code for mercy. I completely forgot Pelor's gig with his worshippers however, so I don't know if he's the destroy on sight type.
When your in a place about trials related to morality, run by a paladin, its very likely that the good aligned peeps are going to take the show.
The whole party is good aligned, but Lawful to Chaotic. The actually end up in a lot of philosophical arguments on that front, which is cool. Especially because our chaotic good rogue is played a guy who is definitely quite lawful, but our Paladin is played by a woman who is much more of a free spirit but they still have these arguments in character.
Pelor is most certainly not a destroy on sight type, unless it's undead. The core tenant of Pelor's philosophy is that by doing good works, evil will have no room to grow. So one should always take an opportunity to promote good and righteousness over an opportunity to destroy evil.
Pathfinder Adventure Path Subscriber
For the Mercy test, is there any way you could create something like the Sorrow battle from Metal Gear Solid 3?
Mechanically, you could have a Paladin make a will save or take non-lethal damage for every living foe (that is to say non-undead or demonic) they've killed in battle. If a Paladin has been insufficiently merciful throughout his career it should add up quickly.
While I do like the concept, I have no idea how many things they have killed throughout the campaign.
Scaevola77 wrote: You can somewhat mirror the effects by having the party encounter enemies that test the limits of mercy (e.g. a puppy-kicking anti-paladin that they have encountered before), and have any lethal damage dealt be suffered by the damage dealer as well. Thus the more merciful the party is to their hated foe, the better they will weather the trial. I like this. A 12th-level party should have at least one personal enemy they hate enough to make this work. And I do think that for this one to work best you have to present them all with a target that they really hate, someone they don't want to be merciful to.
If you go with the courtroom illusion, the Marilith's lawyer should be a phoenix.
Weirdo wrote: Scaevola77 wrote: You can somewhat mirror the effects by having the party encounter enemies that test the limits of mercy (e.g. a puppy-kicking anti-paladin that they have encountered before), and have any lethal damage dealt be suffered by the damage dealer as well. Thus the more merciful the party is to their hated foe, the better they will weather the trial. I like this. A 12th-level party should have at least one personal enemy they hate enough to make this work. And I do think that for this one to work best you have to present them all with a target that they really hate, someone they don't want to be merciful to. I certainly have a few characters in mind, I just don't get how to set it up, really. Does the bad guy get teleported in or is he an illusion? It will take this party all of 5 seconds to conclude that this is a setup. They won't let him just kill off the party, but on the other hand, they'll be on their guard because it's a test and try to follow all of the established Pelor rules possible.
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Pathfinder Adventure Path Subscriber
bojac6 wrote: Weirdo wrote: Scaevola77 wrote: You can somewhat mirror the effects by having the party encounter enemies that test the limits of mercy (e.g. a puppy-kicking anti-paladin that they have encountered before), and have any lethal damage dealt be suffered by the damage dealer as well. Thus the more merciful the party is to their hated foe, the better they will weather the trial. I like this. A 12th-level party should have at least one personal enemy they hate enough to make this work. And I do think that for this one to work best you have to present them all with a target that they really hate, someone they don't want to be merciful to. I certainly have a few characters in mind, I just don't get how to set it up, really. Does the bad guy get teleported in or is he an illusion? It will take this party all of 5 seconds to conclude that this is a setup. They won't let him just kill off the party, but on the other hand, they'll be on their guard because it's a test and try to follow all of the established Pelor rules possible. If you really want to keep some suspension, surely the bad guys would be interested in the ancient paladin treasure too. Have them show up a couple of times before, appearing just out of reach as the party completes the other trials. Give a sense that there is a race for the relic, that it is possible the bad guys will beat them to it, or that there will be a climactic battle with them after the trials are done.
Have the party finally run into them in the Mercy trial room. The bodies of several monsters lie at their feet, the original subjects that were supposed to be a test of mercy. Dramatic lines are said. The first blows are struck, only to find that there is an enchantment on the room, where lethal damage is shared between victim and attacker. Furthermore, as this damage was dealt in breaking Pelor's rule of Mercy, it can't be healed through his divine gifts. The Orb of Mercy lies beyond their enemy, and beyond the corpses of those he has slain. To get the orb, they must defeat their enemies without killing them.
After they pass the trial and show Mercy upon their hated enemies, you can reveal their enemies were illusions all along. Pelor cares about Mercy above all, so the trial of Mercy was the most intricately crafted trial of them all. What the party thought was a "race for the relic" culminating in a showdown in the trial of Mercy chamber was the trial of Mercy all along.
Scaevola wins the thread.
Thanks all, your ideas have been a big help.
So is it just me, or is anyone else thinking that running an adventure like this for a group of neutral PCs would be even funnier?
Fromper wrote: So is it just me, or is anyone else thinking that running an adventure like this for a group of neutral PCs would be even funnier? Or evil ones, for whom these sorts of trials would be counter-intuitive.
"It said sacrifice! I've sacrificed three henchmen already, and it still won't open!"
"Mercy? What do you mean I wasn't supposed to coup de grace the fallen? We're being punished for being *effective* and using common sense?"
Alternate Mercy test-
The party is transported to a demi plane. They are in a town gripped in mourning as it has obviously been devastated by horrific, murderous monster attacks. Investigation will reveal a lycanthrope has been the cause.
Of course the party has to figure out who it is, but when they find the culprit, a witch, is the parent of several young children who are not old enough to fend for themselves, and will not be taken in by the townsfolk - either because of fear of the curse, or because they are outcasts / a differnt race/ from a differnet country.
The local temple to Pelor has an alter which can cure the lycanthrope, but only at great personal sacrifice from another creature. That can be anything from gold, to a magic item, to uncurable ability damge, to death (a life for a life.) When the alter cures the lycanthrope, the restored witch holds the orb in its hands.
Once the party leaves the demi plane they find that time has flown faster there so no time has passed on the material plane Optionally the sacrifice is restored or even rewarded. Perhaps the fighter who sacrificed 4 con actually gained 2.
Mercy and/or Sacrifice: the ghost of a dryad appears, guided by a solar. The poor woman needs the party to enter a portion of the dungeon to rescue her daughter. Said dungeon is an abattoir of horror; bodies of the fallen lay everywhere and not only are they hacked but charred and seared as if by intense heat. Up ahead the sounds of battle spark, then suddenly stop, followed by intense weeping.
The party arrives to find an infernal-looking female, caked in blood and sobbing uncontrollably. These fresh kills reveal that this wretch is slaughtering the faithful, and that many of them were unarmed. "They just keep coming at me with hatred in their eyes!" she pleads, "then the song begins; the infernal song inside my head. The rage comes then, and when it subsides...look what I've done..." the girl whimpers.
Interacting with the girl sends her into another frenzy. She battles intensely trying to murder every last member of the party. When the fight is over the PCs have the dead dryad's daughter. Returning to her and the solar, the angelic being pronounces judgment and demands the party execute the Forlarren for her sins. Not only did the creature slaughter the faithful but she murdered her own mother and destroyed the dryad's tree before fleeing into the lightless depths.
Now, finally, the test of mercy. The dryad's ghost begs (really play it up) for her daughter's life, pledging her own spirit in return. The solar argues she's tainted by the infernal but over and over the dryad cries, "she's still my little girl, just my sweet little baby..." The party is given a choice: execute the girl and the solar will grant their desire of the next key, otherwise commute her sentence and give their wish to the dryad instead.
Of course, either way they get the key. But should they show mercy and give the dryad her wish, she begs for her daughter to be cured of her "affliction". The cure transforms the dryad into a tree and the forlarren into a dryad who then inhabits the tree and finds the party's key in it's depths. The party is reminded, there are few greater powers in the heavens or on earth than a mother's love.
Here's one: the Chamber of Petition. Certain prayers to the dead paladin's deity are forwarded, through divine agency, to a chamber within the tomb. The person delivering the prayer appears with an effect similar to major image, with the words of the prayer echoing through the Chamber. There's a wide circle of flagstones in the floor of the Chamber that looks like it could unfold downward, forming a spiral staircase to some lower level: however, the stair works through a series of stone shape effects, and the only way to get the stair to unfold is to go out and answer one of those prayers. Naturally, these prayers are only from people within eight or nine days' travel, and fulfilling them will meet LG aims such as peace between two villages, reversing the judgement of a corrupt magistrate, preventing a flood, and so forth.
Anyone who returns to the Chamber after participating in the answering of a petition automatically causes the stairs in the floor to sink downward, creating an access to the next level (and the next challenge).
This feature has a side benefit: if the PCs are ever bored later in the campaign and looking for deeds of valor to perform, they can return to the Chamber of Petition and listen for interesting plot hooks.
Set wrote: Fromper wrote: So is it just me, or is anyone else thinking that running an adventure like this for a group of neutral PCs would be even funnier? Or evil ones, for whom these sorts of trials would be counter-intuitive.
"It said sacrifice! I've sacrificed three henchmen already, and it still won't open!"
"Mercy? What do you mean I wasn't supposed to coup de grace the fallen? We're being punished for being *effective* and using common sense?"
"It said it was a test of Justice. How much more do I need to bribe the magistrate?"
"Well, the solution to sacrifice is obvious. One of us must die. Grab the bard"
Anyways, there were distractions in the game and they didn't get into the tomb over the weekend. It happens, but they still seem intent on going there. For some reason, the Paladin insisted on helping troubled villagers before fulfilling her own quest. It's like she puts the needs of others before her own.
It's always rather startling when somebody writes Lawful Good on their character sheet and then actually starts doing Lawful Good things. Whereas it is never even slightly surprising when somebody writes Chaotic Neutral on their character sheet and then starts doing Neutral Evil things.
A good initial test would be held in the first chamber, where people come to pray or offer respects. It activates when the petitioner kneels before a shrine and recites a Pelor-specific prayer for the fallen, one that takes 1 minute or so to complete. This activates the first test.
While the prayer is recited, the shrine activates the detect good, detect evil, and magic circle against evil spells in the foyer (Caster level 10 or higher). After concluding the prayer, the way into the tomb opens if the requirements to pass below are still met.
During the 3 rounds it takes to determine aura strength, the detect good ensures that the petitioner has a good aura of Strong strength at least. This means it requires a paladin or good cleric of 10th level minimum to enter the tomb (any other good character must be 26th.) This both ensures the goodness of the petitioner and prevents low level people from entering.
The detect evil scans the room and prevents the test from passing if it detects either more evil auras than good or even one evil aura equal to or greater in power than the strongest good aura in the area. This makes it unlikely that a group of bad guys can get in by intimidating or overwhelming a lone good person, but does allow leeway in case an evil person had reason to be brought into the tomb by a group of good guys.
The magic circle against evil effect is to prevent good characters from being charmed or dominated into passing the test by giving them a chance to break such effects.
The basic points are that this plays to the strengths of clerics and paladins with their Aura of Good feature and means a typical person can come and pay respects without even being aware they are being tested (though they would activate and benefit from the MCaE effect in the foyer.) Evil creatures can still try and coerce, blackmail, or trick a suitably powerful good person into starting the prayer, but if they outnumber or overpower aura-wise the good characters nothing will happen (and they may not know why.) Spells that conceal aura readings, like nondetection won't help, other than to fool the detect evil failsafe. Misdirection could work, but you'd need a good creature of suitable power anyway to use as a target.
It's not foolproof, but it shouldn't be. For instance, a suitably powerful charm or dominate could still work despite the MCaE, though the caster would have to wait outside (and this requirement should never be known). The best way to get around this particular test without being worthy would be to summon a good-aligned outsider (since their aura is Strong at 5HD or more) and have it perform the ritual while concealing evil auras or staying out of the area. The MCaE won't prevent non-evil summoned creatures from entering, since the builder may not have considered them. Remember though that some evil casters can't summon good creatures.
Another test should definitely utilize the ability to Channel Good Energy. A test that required Lay On Hands would be better and more restrictive, being much harder to fake, but unless the builder only wanted a paladin to enter his tomb, you should stick with a test that any suitably strong cleric of Pelor could pass. It can be an orb that requires a certain amount of good energy to be channeled into it at once. Let's say 6d6 energy in one round since 6d6 is what a cleric or paladin at 11th level could do. It takes one additional channeling per d6 below 6d6 (for instance, three 4d6 channels over up to 3 rounds, or 6 1d6 channels over up to 6 rounds.) While this means several low level clerics or paladins could pass this test, the previous test should ensure that they're accompanied or 'supervised' by a suitably powerful mentor.
Another test could require casting one of the domain spells available to clerics of Pelor but that would leave paladins unlikely to be able to pass. Forbiddance is great, but that leaves either lawful good or neutral good people taking damage, though I don't see why you couldn't say that this one is a special case and allow both in. Or maybe only specifically clerics or paladins of Pelor can enter without damage (unless the person is Neutral Good). Neutral Good being selected over Lawful Good since the priests maintaining the tomb are probably that alignment and the paladin occupant, being dead, probably doesn't worry about being effected.
Another challenge could be one requiring Smite Evil or Dispel Evil to be used.
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