Hey y’all, I’m running the Emerald Spire for a group of friends. We’re still on Splinterden right now, but in reading ahead I notice that on Level 10: The Magma Vault, the dragons’ hoard includes a copy of the diabolic chapter of the Book of the Damned. My players are competent enough that I don’t doubt they’ll get it out of the locked case, and even though artifacts are hard to identify I suspect they’ll figure it out, or at least figure out that it’s a powerful artifact. The party is mostly good-aligned, no evil members, so I doubt they’re going to want to keep it. So…what do they do with it? If I haven’t read far enough ahead and they need it at a lower level, just say so. But if not? Obviously, artifacts don’t have prices per se, and even if they did no one in Fort Inevitable could afford it. I’m sure the Hellknights would simply confiscate it if they knew about it (and I’m equally sure my players will not be telling them about it). It occurred to me to have an Exscinder Archon show up and insist that they turn it over for proper disposal (he will, of course, compensate them fairly and they will have Heaven’s thanks etc etc)…and then a similarly-powerful devil pop in and say “Screw those guys, Hell will give you a much better deal”, make them choose which force to align themselves with (they’re mostly Good, but they’re also greedy adventurers, so that might be a real decision). If I go that route, what would be fair compensation? Obviously I don’t want to break WBL, but the BotD has arguably done that already.
I guess they could try feeding it to one of the proteins a few levels later, but since they don’t have the other chapters that’s basically pointless, and even if they find out what it is they may not discover how to destroy it. And I’m not sure they’re capital-G Good enough to destroy an artifact they could profit from.
So…thoughts?
Plenty of answers in the original question. I've always found there's little use in fretting over what the PCs "might" do too far in the future. When the time comes, the players and their characters rarely cooperate. Part of the fun of being the GM is reacting on the fly and coming up with solutions for problems that you didn't know you had. Now, if you have a specific issue that is another story.