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It looks like my group is going to pick Carrion Crown as our next AP.
I am gearing up for the first adventure and I am looking for ways to help introduce the overall plot of the AP (using Loki_Thief's brilliant letters found on this board) and also drive home the history of Harrowstone and its spooky inmates.
One idea I got from the opening vignette of the first book is to start each session after the first with a short cinematic flashback narration that introduces one of the murderers that are now haunting Harrowstone.
These flashbacks are only for the players' enjoyment, the PCs do not experience them, and the idea is just to thicken the atmosphere and give some context, not to give any vital plot information. After the scene is narrated, the game returns to wherever it left off at the end of the last session.
Since the players will not have any agency in them, it is important that they are short and sweet. They should touch on enough details of the murderers' appearance that the players will recognize them later when the PCs face their ghostly presence.
So far I only have a draft of the first vignette, introducing the Lopper. Here it goes:
A courtroom, the gallery filled with curious citizens, rumbling and mumbling, every now and then pointing with fearsome delight to the calm, bald and haggard, almost emaciated man sitting alone beyond the bar. Even the jury cannot hide their disgusted fascination with the accused. The man grins wickedly and stares blankly ahead at the empty bench.
"Rise for Jurisdeclaris Axenris the Third!"
As the crowd stands up, the elderly judge enters through a side entrance and walks straight to his bench, avoiding to make eye contact with the bald, grinning man. He takes his seat and begins rifling through some documents.
"Vance Saetressle, you are..."
The bald man interrupts, his words pressed through his frozen, toothy grin: "Please, call me Lopper."
"Silence!" the judge exlaims forcefully. "Vance Saetressle. You have been found guilty by a jury of your peers of stalking and savagely beheading at least 17 victims with a handaxe."
The crowd erupts in gasps of horror and rage at the reminder of the Lopper's deeds and is only calmed down when Jurisdeclaris Axenris starts banging his gavel.
"Order, order in the courtroom!
Vance Saetressle, you are hereby sentenced to live the remainder of your short life in Harrowstone, which, I hasten to add, is a blessing compared to the extent of your crimes and the suffering of your victims. There you will reside in the misery of your thoughts until such time as you are drawn, hanged, and quartered. May the gods have no mercy on your blighted soul."
As the judge gets up and leaves, the crowd erupts once more, this time in cheer and mockery of the Lopper. The bald man, however, does not even flinch. He just sits. And stares. And grins.
I intend to write one for each murderer, but I would love to have some help, if anyone feels inspired!
Here is another one:
After years of protracted combat, Count Aericneni Neska recalls his troops and cedes Furcina back to Ardeal. His retreating troops are spending a night in the small town.
The sounds of carousing, singing, and laughter can be heard from a tavern that sits at the edge of the town. Warm light spills out through the glass windows facing the dirt road and keeps the dark of the moonless night at bay.
The door opens and a burly barkeep throws a pitifully drunk dwarf out on the street.
"Get your sorry arse outta here! Go home!" he yells as he wipes off his hands and slams the door shut behind him.
The dwarf moans as he rolls on his side and throws up on the road. "Home...," he mumbles and sobs.
A soldier wearing the colors of House Neska happens to walk by, stops next to the dark figure on the ground and pokes him gently with the back of his halberd.
"Get up, dwarf! You can't sleep here."
"It's my fault, they're all dead," he babbles, terribly slurring the words.
"What are you talking about? Get up, go home. Where are you from?"
"Mosswater. They are all dead because of me. If I had never laid with Ispin's wife, they would all still live."
"Get a grip, dwarf! You are not making any sense. Are ye talking about that merrow raid, what, 30 years back? Terrible thing, didn't know anyone survived that. And you say that was your fault?"
"It was punishment!" the dwarf howls. "Punishment for me running off after betraying my best friend! He was such a great man. So good with his craft! 'Onyxcudgel's hammer is like an angel's caress", they used to say. And he loved her so much. I am the worst. I wish he had slain me, too!" He rolls over and into the puddle of his own vomit, totally oblivious of his surroundings.
"I wish he had slain me instead of her. And all those other people. All just because he thought he could fix her if he would only find the missing piece of the puzzle that he made from her skull."
The soldier starts to poke the dwarf more forcefully, trying to get him to pick himself up from the road. "Come on, you're drunk, you are lying in your own filth, and you need to sleep it off somewhere. And stop crying, man! I know the story of the Mosswater Marauder, but he got send to Harrowstone decades ago and died in the fire along with all the other scum!"
"He's still out there!" the dwarves eyes widen in fear as he stares into the night sky above. "He'll get me! He'll find a way!"
"Shut up, you drunk. Get up and off the road, or I'll make you! You are in the heartland now, the war is over. What could possible happen to you here?"
As the dwarf's drunken sobs echo from the alley walls, a blood-red dawn begins to light up the waking town.
Parts of it are a bit heavy-handed, but I still kinda like it. In case the reference is too obscure, Feldgrau is the town that shows up in book 3 whose population was massacred in 4693 AR.
And another one:
A fireplace warmly illuminates an old woman's humble cabin. The wind whipping the waters of Avalon Bay can be faintly heard in the background.
Two little children, a boy and a girl, are sitting around the fireplace with their grandmother. "Please, granny, tell us the tale of the Piper again! Please!"
The old woman chuckles as she rocks back and forth in her rocking chair. "Alright, alright, my little sticklebacks."
She leans forward and turns away from the fire, eerily casting her face in shadow.
"You better be good, because the Piper is going around Illmarsh! If you have been naughty, you may hear his flute at night, playing a sad melody just for you. And then, one night, you fall asleep after dinner, and when you wake up..." She pauses for dramatic effect and then suddenly slams her hand on the armrest of her rocking chair and yells:
"...you look down and you see his pet stirges drinking your blood!"
The children wince at the sudden outburst and then laugh nervously. They jump up and run up to their grandmother. As they hug her, still laughing at the story, they reveal webbed hands.
In the distance, the howling of the wind almost sounds like a sad song.
I am not sure if the webbed hands are a little too much.
And something slightly Sherlock meets CSI:
The door to the cramped office in the Quartrefaux Archives, Caliphas famous academy for young nobles and home to the royal collection of artifacts and documents, says 'Professor Hean Feramin, Head of Anthroponomastics'.
Inside, only a narrow path from the door to the desk is not covered in books, scrolls, parchment, and various types of writing equipment. Motes of dust dance in the sallow light falling in through the shuttered window. It smells of strong tea, paper, ink, and iron.
The professor, an elderly and polite gentleman, sits at his desk in a high-backed chair worn down by countless hours of study. Across from him, an elven man wearing a black deerstalker hat and a gray casual suit listens intently to the professor's elaborations, a very faint smile on his face.
"Forgive me, Prof. Feramin, if I have to interrupt you," the elf says politely. "I know you are truly a luminary in the field of the origins and study of names. But why, in your expert opinion, would a serial killer go through the troubles of spelling their victims' names out in letters to them? Each letter written in blood or entrails, no less." He gets up from the visitor's chair and walks over to bookshelf bursting with tomes and scrolls. "And all that work, just to kill the victim afterwards in a trap as gruesome as it is ingenious." He casually scans the books as the professor replies:
"Hm. Interersting question. There could be many reasons. Maybe the killer enjoys the victim's agony. Maybe he wants them to live in constant dread of finding a letter, ticking down the countdown to the inevitable one letter at a time. Maybe the blood has some occult importance. You know, one of my graduate students, has posited a fascinating theory on a new type magic powered by emotional components. I think, I have his paper somewhere around here... Lorrimor, Lorrimor..."
He starts rifling through the myriad of papers on his desk.
"You have helped the Sleepless Agency a great deal in this investigation, Professor Feramin." The detective says, gently tapping the backs of the books one by one. "I wonder, was it all part of your game?"
He pulls on one of the books and all of a sudden, the entire bookshelf moves back and slides to the side, revealing a secret room filled with elaborate contraptions, traps, surgical tools, and a list of 27 bloody names hanging on the wall in the back.
The professor starts to panic as the secret door opens. His face, just moments ago a friendly mask of academic professionalism, turns into the grimace of a mad man.
As he jumps up from his chair, suddenly holding a serrated knife he pulled out from under the papers, the door bursts open and a squad of guardsmen storms the office, overpowering the professor within moments.
"Take him away, boys," the detective states as he adjusts his hat. "Looks like the Splatter Man just got tenure at Harrowstone."
I am still looking for some inspiration for Father Charlatan. I thought about showing him in the middle of a street sermon that turns violent when someone from the crowd calls him out on a bogus miracle.
But I also want to connect him to one of the localities in the adventure path.
Does anyone have a good idea which one to go with?
I ended up using Tamrivena because my players characters just met someone from there in our current campaign and I think they might get a kick out of recognizing the name.
Here is the vignette:
The wind of change is blowing through the county of Canterwall. People talk about independence from their hereditary noble family more and more openly. While the revolutionary spirit has not yet reached critical mass and probably will not for a couple of years more, the people of Tamrivena have started to realize that there may be alternatives to their current rulers.
The cobbled stones of the large town's market square are hardly visible because of the crowd. A hunchbacked man, dressed in blue and white clerical vestments embroidered with Desna's butterfly symbol, swings his shepherd's staff for emphasis as he preaches to the gathered townsfolk:
"And see, as it is written in the Eight Scrolls, man was created to be free, but man has to create his own freedom. And as you strive to throw off your worldy shackles, you need to break the chains of your soul. For only a free spirit can soar like a butterfly!"
The sermon is well-received as it touches some of the current sentiments with skillfull precision.
The travelling preacher goes on for a little longer and then states: "...and thus you shall maketh your own destiny. For only 15 gold pieces the smile of Lady Luck can be bestowed upon you in the form of this divinely blessed ointment. 'tis but a small price to pay for your soul's salvation in these trying times!"
The preacher has captured some of his listeners with his sing-song sermon and several of the townspeople start pushing towards the group of cowled men that have set up a folding table with their relics for sale near the preacher's portable pulpit.
Suddenly a farmer yells from among the crowd: "Oh give us a break, 'Father Charlatan'. I just saw you a couple of days ago in Lepidstadt, except you were a Pharasmin then and sold that damn grease as a divine wrinkle cream to my wife! She's been smelling like cabbage ever since." Several people in the crowd chuckle at the thought.
The hunchbacked preacher's face freezes and he gestures to one of his acolytes. "Oh, no, no, you must be mistaken. I am Sefick Corvin, you must have met my brother Levin. He has truly fallen from grace. I am so sorry for your loss, please let my acolyte reimburse you for my brother's false cure."
The acolyte makes his way over to the man and smiles at him, revealing a golden tooth. "Please, take me to your home and give me the salve and I will reimburse you right away." The man grumbles, then shrugs and leaves with the acolytes.
As the crowd starts to disperse, only very few people buy the priest's miracle cure. Moments later, the acolyte returns, alone. As he makes eye contact with the now sour-looking preacher, he nods almost imperceptibly. The preacher smiles fiendishly.
No one notices the fresh blood on the acolyte's shirt underneath his robes.
You're very welcome! Let me know how they worked out in your game. I'm looking forward to use them myself, but we are still a few months away from starting Carrion Crown.
You're very welcome! Let me know how they worked out in your game. I'm looking forward to use them myself, but we are still a few months away from starting Carrion Crown.
Hi Nullpunkt
I love these flashbacks. I will be using them for sure in my upcoming Carrion Crown campaign.My only thing is the year you set for each vignette.
Didnt' the prison of Harrowstone burndown in 4661 ? and the flashback story for the Mosswater Maruder you state is in 4693 AR.:
shouldnt he already be in prison ?
I am abit confused - maybe I am missing something :-)
Anyways great stuff I love the content. Thanks.
