Been starting to wonder how well a former long-con artist would work as a character idea for a Rogue, maybe re-flavour the Rich Parents trait to be what's left of his takings from various former marks.
Thing is; I don't recall the subject ever coming up in Golarion fluff. At most; there might be mention of long cons happening, but that's about it.
So can anyone think of long cons that could be pulled off in Golarion? I can see the Spanish Prisoner being easy-enough to adapt, as the thread title suggests, but trying to get ideas from Hustle hasn't really been helping (partly because I've lent the first five seasons out to friends and haven't gotten them back yet). Other than that, all I can think of is taking various short cons, like Dog In A Bar and scaling them up.
Sure, most of it would be in the character's backstory where I can try to be vague about it, but it'd help if I have a few catchy Con names to throw around and a framework to describe them.
Anyone got any ideas for long cons that could be pulled in Golarion, or even ones you've pulled in-game yourself?
I can imagine some variation on goat pasture/moose pasture hustles, where you sell someone or a lot of someones some insanely rich gold or gem claim, typically after first 'salting' the ground with gems and gold. You of course sell it for several times what you paid for the layout. This being Golarion, any buyers who visit 'their' claim will probably find monsters of some sort in residence and annoyed at the intrusion.
There's the Drake Inheritance Scam. Tell someone that you have proof that they are descended from one of the Ascended Gods like Iomedae or Cayden Cailean. This means that as their heir, you are entitled to part of the revenues of their church/temple. "However, we need some money to afford a potent enough mage to cast all the spells required to prove it to them. For a small amount of cast..."
Better still, when they figure they've been hustled and start looking for blood, send a friend to them who will offer to hire a lawyer or assassin for revenge, and split the take!
In Andoran, you can try 'Pay To Save Our Enslaved Fellow Citizens from the Vile land of Katapesh'. Collect money to free the slaves and then take off with it.
While this might be going way too far, a scam used IRL in slave-holding nations was to offer to help slaves escape their owners. You get them out and after moving them a week or so away from their prior owner, sadly break the news that the money has run out. Gee, if only you had something valuable to sell... Of course it'd only be for a week, mind, and you'd come back for them. You broke them out once already, didn't you?
Maybe you could work a romance bunco with a helpful doppleganger or the like.
I can imagine some variation on goat pasture/moose pasture hustles, where you sell someone or a lot of someones some insanely rich gold or gem claim, typically after first 'salting' the ground with gems and gold. You of course sell it for several times what you paid for the layout. This being Golarion, any buyers who visit 'their' claim will probably find monsters of some sort in residence and annoyed at the intrusion.
There's the Drake Inheritance Scam. Tell someone that you have proof that they are descended from one of the Ascended Gods like Iomedae or Cayden Cailean. This means that as their heir, you are entitled to part of the revenues of their church/temple. "However, we need some money to afford a potent enough mage to cast all the spells required to prove it to them. For a small amount of cast..."
Forgot about those two - and both of those were in Hustle. Hell; the first one was in one of the more creative episodes too (the one this clip's from, shame the title spoils the joke, though)
Quote:
Better still, when they figure they've been hustled and start looking for blood, send a friend to them who will offer to hire a lawyer or assassin for revenge, and split the take!
They did this too - first episode of season 8. I think it's been too long since I last watched the show.
Quote:
In Andoran, you can try 'Pay To Save Our Enslaved Fellow Citizens from the Vile land of Katapesh'. Collect money to free the slaves and then take off with it.
While this might be going way too far, a scam used IRL in slave-holding nations was to offer to help slaves escape their owners. You get them out and after moving them a week or so away from their prior owner, sadly break the news that the money has run out. Gee, if only you had something valuable to sell... Of course it'd only be for a week, mind, and you'd come back for them. You broke them out once already, didn't you?
Maybe you could work a romance bunco with a helpful doppleganger or the like.
I can see those working, even if they're a bit... 'dirtier' than what a character I make would do. Mind you; there's probably a way to con someone out of both slaves and money - make him think keeping those particular slaves is more of a liability than its worth and 'offer to take them off his hands'.
Anyone got some ideas, even just a basic one, for certain old grifter stories? As an example; one Robert Vaughn's character in Hustle related once was when one grifter and his crew in the 1920s managed to rip off three separate marks, simultaneously, with the Spanish Prisoner.
Worldwound Gambit, one of the Tales novels set in Golarion, is all about a con artist and his team trying to pull off a big con job.
Summaries make it seem interesting, but some of the stuff mentioned does put me off and it feels more like an "epic" con than I'm thinking.
I just mean stuff where you're selling Lord High Muckety-Much the Arch of Aroden, or selling someone a race horse that couldn't beat a one-legged pony. Otherwise parting rich, corrupt so-and-sos from all that extra cash. And this paragraph swiftly turned into a description of the mindset of the grifters I'm thinking of so ignore what's in the spoiler unless you need some fodder for a con-artist character who needs to espouse why they do what they do.
Spoiler:
Essentially the impressiveness comes not from the scale, but how smoothly and neatly it's done; basically putting the artist in con-artist. Particularly where magic is concerned; any old hedge mage can whammy someone with a Charm Person or the like and get them to sign any old thing or hand over their purse, but a grifter should need only their wits and their smile. By the time the mark realises he's been conned, he can't do anything about it; either he can't go to the authorities without admitting to doing something illegal himself, he can't use his influence without becoming a laughing stock among his social circle, he thinks the grifter is already dead or that the deal they were buying into has genuinely failed.
Besides; the world's already corrupt. Nobles abuse their position to get what they want, heads of larger industries or guilds taking more than their fair share at the expense of others and Cheliax... that country's name is practically a synonym for this sort of thing. All the grifter is doing is seeing if they can take it as well as dish it out.
Actually; here's a story that could work for it. Nicking a few things from Hustle and from an episode of Jonathan Creek but should do the job.
Con Story:
A very prestigious gallery in Absalom is holding a special exhibit - for a brief period, a sword once wielded by Aroden is put on display. The exhibit also contains a number of considerably-valuable pieces, among them being a portrait of Aroden, said to have been painted by one of his priests mere decades before his death. A heist occurs and, to the shock of everyone (and especially the ones in charge of security), both the sword and portrait are stolen. The town criers and broadsheets all announce the theft to the public. A couple of days later, a wealthy foreigner meets with the thieves responsible and buys the sword and portrait, having won a silent auction on the black market for the pieces. And not long after, the sword and portrait both turn up, never having even left the room - the portrait hidden inside the room's hollow door and the sword tucked into a recess in the back of a statue. The thieves tell the buyer that the ones that appeared are forgeries, placed there by Absalom's government to avoid embarrassment.
But he's not the only buyer.
In truth, the items were never actually stolen, simply hidden. With the theft all over the news, the ones who broke in take the money from every bidder and sell them replicas and forgeries. After all; why steal something and sell it once, when you can make everyone think you stole it and sell it six times over?
Should do the job for a framework - slap some grifter-sounding names to it, pretty it up a little and it could make for a good urban legend among the grifting community of Absalom.
For TONS of con job inspiration, look no further than the TV show, Leverage. They may be "Robin Hood" in their reasons, but every episode is named after the different scams they pull on the bad guys.
Not only that, but using something like Leverage as an example, you would be a good guy, yet you would have that 'fun' of being a con artist in the game.
Yeah, already seen Leverage, should've mentioned. Watched it originally since I'd heard it described as the American version of Hustle (incidentally; really interesting to see how two different cultures approached the same basic premise). Burn Notice as well, the protagonist of that even said that spies and grifters do much the same things but for different reasons.
Actually; which god in Golarion would have "conning wealthy, corrupt smegheads" as part of their wheelhouse? I can't think of any theft-related gods off the top of my head, not that aren't leaning towards the lower half of the alignment grid, at least.
It seems like Scott Lynch's Gentleman Bastards series is required reading...the books follow a group of master con-artists in a gritty medieval-esq fantasy setting.
Actually; which god in Golarion would have "conning wealthy, corrupt smegheads" as part of their wheelhouse? I can't think of any theft-related gods off the top of my head, not that aren't leaning towards the lower half of the alignment grid, at least.
I could see a Caydenite or CG Calistrian being involved in that sort of thing.
I checked out Inner Sea Gods, and no good deity listed there has the Thievery subdomain. Make of that what you will.
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