An idea might be that most other NPCs and businesses not realated to the mystery wold be worried or give them the cold shoulder. If you are concerned with XP perhaps giving them experience from finding clues is an idea. And when they do find the cult have them able to bust the doors down on a safe house for it and kill a number (or arrest) members. This could serve to make them feel cool, give XP, and ramp up tensions.
One suggestion that came to mind that you could add to:
Party investigates church one, one of the followers there states that the person the PCs need to talk to is not at the church, he's at home because he's come down with an illness. PCs go to that home, and after entering are ambushed by members of the evil cult.
Evil cult hopes to eliminate the PCs, or at least cause more suspicion on church one that sent them there (they've hidden the body of the actual church member that lives there, and the person that answered the door is wearing a disguise to appear like him.)
If the battle goes poorly for the enemies, one of them will knock a lantern or candle into a pile of sheets, which will eventually burn the entire house down.
After setting fire to the place, one or two of them will break through windows/shutters/back door and the PCs can engage in a race to bring them to justice. The enemies will split up, so the PCs will have to as well if they want to catch all enemies.
One of the enemies (preferably one that is killed) has a forged letter on him that seems to be written by a high-ranking member of the church two. The letter states that an evil cult has infiltrated church one. The forgery is not particularly good, so the PCs will likely be able to determine it is a forgery.
The forgery is essentially the truth, but because it is a forgery, the evil cult hopes it will throw any investigators off the trail (because once the PCs discover it is a forgery, they will likely immediately assume it is a lie.)
The bodies of anyone killed in the house will likely be burned too badly to recognize faces.
Mysteries are some of the toughest adventures to write/run. You have to have enough clues so the PCs can solve it, but it has to be tough enough to be memorable and a challenge. And Players NEVER EVER do what you expect them to do.
In general, you probably want at least 3 ways for them to find out who is behind it (this can be multiple levels of mystery if you want, with three ways to find a lead that leads to another lead etc etc.) and you want a red herring or two (like the CG temple being behind it, although I'd probably have another one as well since that isn't too likely to be seriously considered by the players.) Lastly, think about a back up-plan for if they totally miss all your clues, go off in the wrong direction etc.
Another common trope of the genre is when the PCs start getting to close, or maybe just making enough noise about investigating, someone shows up to bump them off. Inevitably this fails, and often provides important clues. Like the mud on the thugs shoes being from the river banks, or a tattoo related to the the bad group (or holy symbol). Once again, probably have 3 things that point in the direction you and the PCs to go (whether it is a real clue or a red herring.)
I think mysteries are hard to do well but before level 3 is the perfect time to do them. The PCs have no 2nd level spells, little money, and no followers to fill party gaps. Basically all the things that wreck mystery plots are just out of reach. Skills are really important still at level 2 as magic isn't throwing around those +20 skill bonuses that make everyone seem competent at everything. Good luck and have fun.
Okay, to work <cracks fingers>. Mystery adventures are someting of a specialty of mine, which is to say, i suck less at them than a lot of other GM/writers. They're probably the hardest genre of RPG (IMHO) to write and play, because they take a degree of implicit cooperation from your players that is not always there.
A few basic guidelines:
1) The Rule of Three. Always have three clues that point at anything you want the party to pick up. They will miss the first, misinterpret the second, and finally interpret the third correctly. If you want them to realize that Lord Edgeware is lying, make sure he makes at least three mistakes of fact (or that at least three other witnesses contradict him, whatever).
2) Action movies are a better basis than cozy mysteries; if the villain does not go quietly, you can close out on a great set-piece fight rather than a staged reveal in the drawing room.
3) Envision an onion. Mysteries go better when they are layers within layers, rather than when it all comes together in the final chapter. You need to be able to provide partial feedback -- yes, Lord Edgeware is lying about where he was, but where was he? -- Okay, Lord Edgeware was actually in the chapel, but the body was found in the stables, so what's the connection -- All right, you've found the secret passage between the stables and the chapel, but why Lord Edgeware?
4) Either roleplay the social scenes or roll them out, but don't do both. If your players like talking to the NPCs, you can drop hints and keep the conversation going until the hints are picked up. If you roll them out, then you can just spoonfeed what you need them to know. But if you make them roll and then roleplay, they will miss stuff in the conversation because they didn't think they rolled high enough.
5) Keep it to one session. Nobody will be able to remember exactly what was written on the card on Lord Edgeware's desk next Thursday, and no one will really care. As a matter of fact, keep small details like this to a minimum unless you have a totally OCD party that will write down everything that happens. You lose too many clues otherwise.
6) When all else fails, Chandler's Law. When in doubt, have a man come through a door with a gun in his hand. A new plot twist, preferably with the threat of violence, will probably shake something loose, and this is an excuse to plant new clues that the party can follow up.
It's a long read, but well worth it. Justin Alexander writes a great gaming blog, and has a complete essay on mysteries in rpgs called: The Three Clue Rule. If you are seriously thinking about making this part of your players' adventure a mystery, this essay will be invaluable.
Also, +1 to everything Orfamay Quest said.
The town the players are in (about 5k residents) have two temples, one to a LG god and another to a CG goddess. The two temples despise each other. An event happens (one of the leaders of the LG church is killed?) and the other church is blamed. The PCs as members of the guard need to investigate the event to determine who is to blame. The result is that it was actually an evil cult responsible trying to both silence someone with knowledge about them, at the same time trying to cause a battle between the two churches.
Okay. Rule of 3 in action.
1) There is a third church in play.
* There are a number of religious symbols scattered around (scribbled on buildings?) that do not belong to either church.
* Suitable perception checks will lead to various sites that have been used as cult meeting places, not affiliated with either church.
* A local historian can tell you about the old NE cult that used to be worshiped in this area
2) The effect is a battle between churches
* A joint ecumenical festival is going to be cancelled
* The LG priest hasn't been seen publically with the CG priestess in a month.
* Fundraising efforts for both churches have become much more intense and competitive
3) The CG church is innocent of the murder
* The most reasonable suspect has an ironclad alibi.
* The murder was performed with an unusual weapon associated with the NE god
* Footsteps at the murder scene indicate boots, not the sandals associated with the CG church
4) The NE church was behind the murder
* The murder weapon, as above
* The night of the murder was the first night of Unholy Week
* A witness thinks the murderer may have been wearing a symbol associated with the NE church
5) The specific murderer
* ... had the murder weapon custom-made at the blacksmith
* ... has an unholy symbol of the NE church in his house, if searched
* ... can be tracked to a ritual of the NE church, where he can be apprehended in a grand and glorious firefight.
(By the way, neko-te are awesome murder weapons for an evil cult.)
In general, [...] you want a red herring or two
I generally disagree with this. In my experience, parties are fully capable of renting a trawler and a paint shop and will provide an entire fishmonger's worth of red herrings without any work by the GM. The problem is to keep them from doing this.
Mysteries are hard enough if the GM plays it straight.
|
With a 9th level cleric, you'd best be ready to explain why they don't use Commune to figure out whodunnit. I'd drop the cleric to 8th. Beyond that, augury and divination really aren't useful in a murder mystery to identify a wrongdoer. Plus, if the murder were uniquely arranged (a newly built holy statute of CG deity falls on LG victim, killing him), there may not be an obvious suspect other than examination reveals the statute was tampered with so that someone could easily push it. Other questions might be why the LG priest was in front of the statue in the first place.
Players could be commissioned as an independent investigative group, especially if they've achieved some degree of fame locally. In medieval settings the community usually decides who's guilty right away; you may want a suspect picked out as the "obvious choice." As a twist, players are used to this device (the first guy is always innocent), and you may shake things up by having him be guilty, just not how everything thinks. (e.g. He had an alibi but summoned something to do the dirty work for him using the cult's book that lies belowground in a set of tunnels that run below the town's river).
Consider also a short side adventure built in where a lead takes them to something unrelated to the murder, such as the strange tree that gives the town its namesake and a dryad that needs a favor, repayable with a spell or small gift, or a secret cache left over by the famed bandit king a century ago that was rumored buried in these parts. This keeps things realistic (not every action they take someone connects back to the murder).
I am having writers block. I have a campaign going on that has a gap I am trying to fill in between level 2 and 3. This adventure has a couple of requirements, but I’m not sure what exactly I’m going to have the players accomplish.
When in doubt: Kobolds...lots and LOTS and then lots more, for good measure, kobolds.
They could be using Hats of Disguise to look like halflings, or gnomes, or children--that would be creepy, the murderers are children--or any number of cool plot twist.*Imagines PCs notice a young boy run out of a priest's chambers after a lot of grunting, the PCs investigate to find the priest stabbed to death. The PCs come to their own conclusions about what happened.*