| Lee Hanna |
I'm preparing for the next game session, which for me involves both rolling random events in advance and deciding what various NPCs and their realms might be doing. I try to stay about a year in advance of the characters, so I don't have to make up stuff on the fly.
I have inserted another noble family on the north edge of the map, the Marstenkos. They claim some of the hexes on the border of maps 1 and 4, including Wyvernstone Bridge. The Stag is part of their house crest.
1. A few months ago IMC, there was a "Land Rush" RE, which I randomly decided was in a hex adjacent to Oleg's (recently claimed, not very developed yet). Ah, I say, "Lady Marstenka's founded some farms there, and they are doing very well. Settlers are passing through Levetgrad to move in there." The group immediately Farmed Levetgrad, to counter the Stability loss.
2. We ended the last game session with the arrest and trial of Grigori. They now know someone put him up to it, their first suspect was Varn, actually.
3. Next game will begin with a "Monster Attack" RE, and the dice again point to the hex of Levetgrad. Unrest is currently high enough that if the PCs don't deal with this, his hex will secede! I'll present this as, "Mayor Oleg's store was cleaned out, and if you all cannot protect him, he will find someone who will!"
4. The party has pretty much ignored Jhod Kavken and Kesten Garess, we last saw them still at Levetgrad. I think Jhod will have moved in to the Erastil temple, and has collected secret BP from Lady Marstenka to re-open the temple. Garess may have moved over to her service, too?
5. Lady Maray (from BfB) is definitely a spy for Pitax, and has been working to upset things around here. That includes sending Grigori. I'd like to move her about a bit, perhaps they should find out that it's a woman pulling these strings, and get them to suspect her before they attack Drelev's castle.
I think the dice are setting me up to trigger a little fight between Marstenka and the players, don't you? Perhaps I'll use the Battle for Tatzylford a bit early, but leave an obvious clue that the attack came from her, not Drelev.
| pennywit |
This sound like good plans. I actually haven't played too much with the dice when it comes to kingdom events; I find I like my own custom-built events ... and that my Players create some really nice little opportunities.
For example, the Sootscale kobolds are their own little kingdom. They claimed their own hex and the sycamore. But my players, while allied with the kobolds, are worried that wily King Sootscale is going to start claiming hexes. I wasn't planning to make the kobolds expansionist ... but I've decided to validate my players' fears.
They also haven't made any move toward the temple ... so, shortly, an order of Erastilian paladins and inquisitors will move to take it over. And did I mention that one of them is still on the lookout for an ex-paladin who murdered two people some time ago?
| Lee Hanna |
So far, they haven't nibbled at potential rivalry with Lady Marstenka; oh, well.
However, another juicy (future) plot thread has dropped into my lap.
- The group's barbarian was killed in Hargulka's lair. The party almost immediately detached the Baroness' new husband (cohort) to ride to Restov to get her Raised. Normally, I didn't think the culture around here really supports returning slain warriors to life. But the player, my newest and youngest to the table, was really enjoying her, and wanted to keep the same character, so I can bend.
- The barbarian's player has hinted at having a powerful ancestor, but we've never developed this.
- Another thing to link: the group's cavalier is about to take Leadership, and wanted a warpriest as his cohort.
I propose that the temple in Restov (or a faction, or just one priest) is either a pro-Drelev secret supporter, or has his own goals regarding the legend of Ovinrbaane and Armag. If the Black Sisters can have their candidate for the Twice-Born, why can't he? AND if she had been nudged into going on this expedition because Armag is claimed as an ancestor of hers, so much the better!
SO, the high priest in Restov (Gorum-equivalent for my world) raises the barbarian, gets her promise of lasting gratitude and a promise to pay back the favor at some future date, and attaches one of his priests to the group to assist them in their quest for glory (read: keep an eye on them). If they happen to come across any tombs, he will encourage them to go delving into them.
When it will come time for them to find Armag's tomb and dive into it, he will be strongly encouraging them to get in there and get that (greataxe) away from the imposter, er, bad guy! And, since the barbarian has been killed and raised, why can't she claim the title of Twice-Born!?
| Lee Hanna |
I may be back to my earlier conflict: in planning for kingdom expansion, the Warden and Enforcer PCs, allied to the General (Warden's brother), another PC, and a representative from the Gorum-like church, are urging an "anti-bandit" sweep of their borders, right where the Marstenkos have been quietly expanding.
Mostly, this is just the more-violent players looking for something to slay, but I am going to seize upon it.
| pennywit |
I had a couple interesting experiences with the way chance, rules, and plots interact recently.
In our last session, we focused heavily on kingdom-building. In the interregnum between RRR and VV, my players are rather concerned about the troll/goblin settlement on their borders. They killed Hargulka at parlay two sessions ago, but the trolls are still hostile.
At our last session, I experimented a little bit with plot twist cards. To make things interesting, at key junctures, I put several plot twist cards in front of my players, face down, and told them to choose one of the cards.
So, here's how chance played out:
My players wanted to get some intelligence on the trolls, so they sent Dovan to scout the settlement. To help him, they sent along a potion of invisibility that had been rolled for a settlement magic item slot.
I had them make Stealth rolls for Dovan. He came back and reported the trolls were considering an attack on the lizardfolk. (I made ethis up on the spur of the moment). So ... my players decided to send an army to take up a position around the lizardfolk village.
To add some spice to this, I laid out four Plot Twist cards, face down, in front of one player and asked him to choose one. After dithering, he flipped one over. "Hidden Secret." I grinned at my players ... and told them a troll army was attacking their army at the lizardfolk settlement.
After two mass-combat turns in which the players' army (led by Akiros while the players were running their kingdom) made a decent accounting, I said, "By the way, remember the hidden secret?" The lizardfolk backstabbed my players, causing a complete defeat of the players' army.
I think my players enjoyed it ... and they have now added lizardfolk to the kingdom's enemies list. (Said list includes trolls, owlbears, evil fairies (particularly tooth fairies) and "f***in' wisps.")
| Lee Hanna |
In addition to the above anti-bandit sweep (there was going to be a Bandit random event next month anyway, so I just moved it up), which sorta implicates the neighboring Marstenkos, the more violent PCs sneaked off to go slay the kobolds. Without telling the rest of the players.
I ruled that 1 8th level PC, a 6th level PC and a 6th level NPC should stomp the little critters out, without breaking much of a sweat. It's when the other players find out what's going on, that's going to be the fun part.
| Lee Hanna |
After about a year of kingdom building and random events, things are bubbling to the north.
First, the Councilor PC, whose player is single-handedly running all of the realm-level things, began claiming hexes into the forest, hoping to head off any new encroachment by the Marstenkas. This was new, since she had been expanding very slowly before, but was possible, since they had just crossed the Size-11 threshold. Since they were up against Tatzylford, I allowed them to swallow his lands as well by tightening the vassalage agreement.
Second, the Bandits event was followed 2 months later by a Slavers event, then a Matter of Justice. All of these I ruled affected the unstable forest border, except that the first two were the boggards (bugbears IMC) and the last was the discovery by the NPC Spymaster of some humans who were aiding the slavers (secret: who were taking their prey to the naga).
Third, the Matter of Justice was followed by a Feud. I ruled this to be between the General (Akiros) and the Spymaster, whose recent success had given him the courage to start wooing Lily Teskertin, in essence cutting in on Akiros' moves.
Menawhile, the Warden PC is chomping at the bit to lead an expedition to chase down the bog-goblins-- I have my next session partly planned now. That the group is all 8th level, heading into Book 4 territory, should be interesting. I may move the naga, or some other nasty boss fey, into the Forgotten Keep.
| Nique29 |
I'm still on Stolen Lands IMC, but my players and the random dice rolls are making things quite interesting.
They fey are a more prevalent thing in my world, so they have actually started making more of an effort to be friendly with Perl and Tyg. At this point, they are the ONLY two characters who have made ANY mention of the Stag Lord. And, because they are fey and they refer to all people as Biggins, they call him the "Big Stag Biggins". My players haven't yet picked up on the fact that only humanoids are called "Biggins". And they've seen glimpses of the "Giant White Stag" in the woods and at the horizon line. And with Jhod talking about a temple to Erastil, and the necklaces they've found on the bandits, they think "Big Stag Biggins" is a reference to Erastil. :')
Also, through random encounters, they are convinced that a Hunter is stalking them or is a personification of Erastil, that some of the other fey are enchanting small animals (rabbits, squirells, and the like) and awakening them to cause an animal uprising...
And the best was today, rolled random encounters of Hunter, Wolves, Worg. I rolled with it, and had them see the "stalker hunter" go traipsing off through the woods. He was followed a little later by the sounds of padded feet passing, and then a bunch of high pitched howls, accompanied by a lower pitched growl. They rolled a knowledge nature and realized it was wolves and a worg. One of the players said to the other "We have to kill it! Its evil, and intelligent! If we let it go, it might go tell the bandits that we're here!!!" But it managed to get away.
And because I liked that idea, it led the pc that was chasing it to the outskirts of the bandit camp.