ATTENTION: My players, GTFO!
Playing Rise of the Runelords, and my players have quite a bit of downtime before Sins of the Saviours. I have been playing on personal stories of the characters, as well as the plot of the adventure path, and now it's time for the bard.
Over the past many sessions, the bard, with regular intervals, have been making astronomical perform checks, exceeding DC 50 at some point. So I decided, many sessions ago, to start dropping hints, that someone had noticed. I wanted some outsiders to want him to perform for them, but I didn't know which outsiders to pick, so I made a list and rolled a die.
It came up Efreeti. Wonderful, right? :)
So now a Malik is holding a banquet to celebrate his daughter's birthday, and the bard has been contacted, with an offer to perform at the party. The group did not want to earn the ire of a lord from the plane of fire, while simultaneously juggling the runelord issue, so they accepted the invitation, provided they'd not be harmed, and they be allowed to return after the banquet.
So now they're at an immensely opulent, beautiful, and gargantuan, almost paradisiacal palace, and they've been left to do whatever they please. They may enjoy the slaves, eat the food, drink, bathe, read, explore, or do whatever they may please in the palace, and its gardens. So now they're looking around, waiting for the banquet and running into certain servants and the other guests of the Malik. I want to create conflict, ALOT of conflict, without the palace breaking into chaos.
So far the following has happened:
They've observed quite a number of slaves, and an assortment of outsiders, who, like them, seem to be able to exist quite comfortably inside the palace.
They've met a Shaitan who insulted them and mocked them for being material plane mortals, before stating that he hoped to kill them for sport during the banquet.
They've seen the Quasit servants of, and met, a succubus, who, like aforementioned shaitan was invited to the festivities.
I have planned to do the following:
I'll have someone attemtpt to assassinate the bard, before the banquet, an attempt to prevent him performing there, as a political action against the Malik.
I'll have the succubus approach the party, in an attempt to torment the paladin, who ventured with the group to protect them, and present him with two slaves (mother and son), she herself had been gifted upon arrival. She will offer the paladin to release the son, if the paladin will order the boy to kill his mother. If not, she will drag them both, kicking and screaming into the abyss when she leaves. ANTI-FLAME-DISCLAIMER: I WILL NOT HAVE THE PALADIN FALL, DONT START! XD
I plan to have Khalib, the failed apprentice of Karzoug, attend the banquet in the runelord's place, playing up on niceties between them from thassilonian times, and have the party meet and talk to him. He will lie and tell the party that he is a diviner, given his oracular powers through a wish the Malik granted many years ago, and since then he has been offering his services to the Malik regularly, earning him an invitation. He will offer to see the future of the party, and will say that he sees many paths. He also sees that if they travel to the place they seek, this so-called Xin-Shalast, then they will die. I will then have him reiterate this warning if they ever face him, saying that he warned them they would die, and now he would make certain of it.
These are my ideas for now, but I need more, I want to make them feel like they're in an otherworldly, beautiful minefield of potential danger, as well as play on the fact that they are among the invited guests of a powerful outsider, with an interesting assortment of guests :)
Your help and suggestions for conflicts, as well as interesting NPC's will be very much appreciated. I have 2 weeks to ponder exactly what to do, before next session.
Thank you very much in advance :)
-Nearyn
TL;DR: I want to make a NPC gallery and a series of conflicts and challenges for PC's attending a banquet at a Malik's palace, on the plane of fire.
This to me sounds like something straight out of the Harry Dresden series where the reporter lady gets turned into a vampire! All your ideas seem interesting, but I'd make sure that there's a chance of finding evidence that someone is attempting to kill the party bard, so that IF the bard is killed by someone in the party, the party could potentially show evidence pointing to the truly guilty party for the bards inability to perform.
As to the succubus taunting the Pally, I think your current idea is a fun idea to prompt him/her into action or inaction against the succubus, provided you create a way for the Paladin to stay alive (I.E. evidence that said succubus was over-extending her welcome by taunting an invitee beyond the bounds of the hospitality set down by the host of the party.
Other than that, have fun cuz I think these are great ideas, and if they survive, there might be some extra-planar denizens that they might gain the appreciation/irritation of for future campaign plots.
thanks for the feedback. I will make sure that the players have a chance to detect and foil people scheming against them, before it comes to swords :)
-Nearyn
The players had worries before going, so they had the following to say to the messenger:
Their safety had to be secured, to which the messenger replied that noone in the service of the Malik would raise weapons against them.
They had to be guaranteed that they be allowed to return to the material plane after the banquet. The messenger assured them, they would be allowed to return, or even be provided transport, should they desire it, after the banquet.
They wanted to make sure they would not just burn up on arrival, to which the messenger assured them that they would quite comfortable as guests of the Malik.
*As long as they remain within the outer walls of the castle, they are effectively in a localized demiplane, -inside- the plane of fire, built specifically for this event. If they cross the walls, they'll get hit with the full effect of being on a dangerous plane.
-Nearyn
Hello everyone. I am back, after having played through the banquet, and I wanted to tell you how it went.
The players pissed off a Rakshasa vizier, by refusing to deal with him, which led to the assassination attempt on the bard.
The players got themselves in a scuffle with some planar travellers from Vudra, resulting in a duel between the paladin and one of the travellers, which the paladin won.
The Rakshasa, having spied on them the entire time, through the use of prying eyes, sent them a few gifts, poisonous to the touch, carried in boxes by slaves, who thought they were delivering gifts from the vudrani travellers.
The bard was the first to touch the items, and failed her fort save, resulting in dex damage, and she started calcifying, and would have turned to dust, had she reached 0. Instead the party started force feeding her restoration potions and antitoxin formulas, until, finally, he powered through the consecutive saves, and barely survived.
At the banquet. I presented the group with an opportunity to fight against the other guests, waging whatever they pleased, while the match was overseen by a devil, ensuring that everyone delivered what they promised. The players did not go, after having witnessed a contender losing about 50 years of his life, as part of such a bet.
An oni played them in a game of twentybone(gamemastery guide) and the succubus attempted played her game with the paladin, who was torn up at first, and then decided to beat the snot out of the succubus, sending her back into the abyss, with the help of the party.
They met Khalib, who did his things, convincing them of his oracular powers, and trying to dissuade them from going to Xin-Shalast, which he failed (predictably).
And finally Alkis, the bard, performed, rolling 5 Performance checks in the mid 50's, earning explosive cheering from the crowd, and the satisfaction of the Malik and his daughter. As a way to reward him for his brilliant performances, the Malik offered the bard one wish.
It took awhile, but the bard wound up wishing for a weapon, a sword, a that could aid them in defeating Karzoug the Runelord, and restore peace to Varisia. I thought about giving him one of the seven swords of sin, but decided against it, opting to instead give him an intelligent sword of my own design. This sword will be double edged (pun intended), and I plan on making it a great gift, that the players will want to use, while simultaneously prodding them with the risk of something horrible happening. As for now, they cannot even draw it, the sword refusing to be drawn before the bard has proven himself worthy (not too big an endeavor), whereupon the bard wants to give it to the paladin, as his champion.
All in all, a success. Thanks for your suggestions, it helped quite alot :)
-Nearyn
Groovy, and the bard wins on a five again! *shudders* God I dislike how powerful bards can be at the hands of a PC... Nothing wrong with the bard BEING that powerful, just how a player takes that power and makes it better than anything but a wizard 20+ levels higher than the Bard.