The party has happened across a knight looking for a lost princess (cliche, I know, but bare with me).
The princess is rich, intelligent, and very nice. Her father (now deceased) was one of the lands greatest inventors, along with one of the kings. She has a number of craft feats and is a wizard. It was suggested by a friend that I make her spell book not a traditional spell book, but a set of glasses (like google glass). It fits with her because she has weak eyes as well and explains why she gets upset if anyone takes her glasses.
Storyline I was looking for help on: the princess loves history and information. She cannot fight and is very non-aggressive and trusting. She tends to disappear on treasure hunts looking for lost bits of knowledge and history. This brought her in contact with a devil prince from Dis. He became obsessed with her, seeing her intelligence as someone who could potentially play in his league. She cannot get rid of him. He has 'saved' her a couple of times, and proposed as well, and she keeps trying to separate herself from him. He attacked her two months ago, and once she recovered she went looking for an artifact she heard about that might be able to scare him off or keep him away from her.
So she went missing, and is trying not to involve anyone to try to keep 'innocent' people out of his reach.
I intend her to get kidnapped by bad guys (maybe treasure hunters as well...?), hoping the party finds her, and then the devil shows up to threaten the party unless she gives him what she wants.
Thoughts...? Too cliche? In the party is a bard, barbarian, arcane magic user of some type (player undecided on class) and paladin.
There's no such thing as too cliché in this game. :)
Some thoughts;
Maybe she found the item & it's keeping her shielded from the devils scrying/location magics?
Thus forcing him to look for her the mundane way.
Maybe the knight the party encounters IS the devil prince.
Maybe even adventure/traval with him on occasion?
If the princess can disguise herself as well as remain undetected then you can kite the party all over creation & into gods-know-what situations as they run down rumors looking for her.
Maybe she found how to keep herself hidden from him, but is now looking for something to actually deal with him (banish/imprison/etc). At some point, since she can't actually fight, she needs the PCs to retrieve it for her.
Maybe, if the PCs don't know what she actually looks like, they can meet her undisguised every now & then. Like a randomly re-occurring NPC adventurer. Thus bringing her intelligence, charm, & even $ into play.
Even needing rescuing on occasion. (NOW what'd she get into??)
And when it all eventually comes to a head? Say when the devil prince ultimately tracks her down & walks in. The party'll be like: "You!...You're....{party looks to the left, party looks to the right. Roll initiative....}
I second the idea of the knight being related to the devil prince/possibly being him. Considering devils are the tricky ones that's right up their alley to do something like that, it certainly isn't outside his power to disguise himself and enlist aid from mortals if he can't locate her through normal means
I was just thinking that it could be entertaining if there are a couple of obstacles in their way, like a boarder guard who wont let them pass, or a town that is being raided by bandits that needs protection. The devil gets upset that they are getting off track and gets rid of the problem. So they come back to find that the boarder guard was brutally killed in the middle of the night and the new guy is very bribe-able, or all the bandits were killed or had a change of heart. Something that might make them think 'thats strange' but not put it together until the end.
The princess won't tell anyone that he is a devil to try to keep people out of it and 'safe'? Might help the shock of the big reveal at the end?
Another thought, perhaps the artifact is in multiple parts and she needs to find all of them? so she has a strong non detection part of it, but is after another part? Perhaps he has leaked false information to bait her and the party into a trap?
Also, should he be the knight, or inflitrated the head of the knightly order? Getting the innocent and well intentioned knights to actually help him? Damn their souls while he is at it?
The damsel's going to come across as a bit "got yourself into this" if she doesn't give people important information like "he's a devil". Some players can be very unforgiving about stuff like that. :P
If you really want to break with cliches, you could make the lost target a prince, or make it a female knight seeking him/her. Doesn't change anything important, but does catch the players a bit off-guard!
Maybe she doesn't know he's really a full-blown devil prince and just thinks he's a lesser devil serving his lords? That gives a more plausible reason for her to not tell people about it in part because of their safety but also because normal devils although uncommon aren't huge world ending news, devil princes tend to draw the attention of entire crusades and the like, or even celestial beings. That said in what way is he obsessed? I know you said to have her "play in his league" but is that all there is to it? Seems a bit mundane for a devil prince to get worked up about that unless he needs her for something specific or I might not understand the scope of her intellect in this campaign, I mean Balor's are pretty damn smart with 24 Int and he surely has underlings of that power. Overall I like the concept, it might be more compelling if the devil has a particular goal in mind to making her serve him.
I agree... I had built a series of prophecies into the spirituality and history here. I was thinking perhaps one of the major game changing ones involves her and he want to control her to control the outcome.
Idea #2 she is into ancient history, lore, and artifacts, I was thinking that perhaps she started to find and ancient set of artifacts, some he wants, one is rumoured to be able to kill -or worse - control him, and he feels he needs her to get to them.
I also agree about her not knowing his strength, perhaps she knows he is a devil, thinks he is a lesser one, or perhaps she just thinks he is a powerful, evil man?
If this were the plot to a movie, the Princess would be the hero, which is why you are probably having problems involving the PCs. It's her story, not theirs. As a GM, one should never fall in love with their NPCs to the point where they take over the story and this seems to be the point this campaign has reached. Reading the synopsis above, I see no involvement from the players.
My first thought is that the Princess' involvement needs to be toned down a lot. This sounds dangerously close to the Elminster Syndrome where an NPC is the hero making all of the power moves and controlling the events of a campaign. PCs should never be made to play second fiddle to a NPC in their own campaign.
I would suggest having the knight be a servant of the demon. He recruits the PCs to help "save the princess", but when they finally find her, he reveals his true nature and the demon reveals this is part of his plan to threaten the princess by placing the PCs in danger.
The heroes could find the Princess' magic glasses or something to that effect to know she is in danger and set out to save her. They could be approached by the knight to save her. He could have the glasses with him, but it would be better to have them fight their way through considerable forces to find the Princess, only to find her glasses.
Then, they could embark on a deeper quest to find her, discovering more about the true nature of events along the way. I'd have to hear more about the PCs place in this story before I could make any further suggestions. To this point, they are the NPCs in the background, waiting to be told what to do.