2004? The Nightmares Among Us
Challenge Rating:
Though any Incarna Play Scenario can be adapted for any Challenge Rating, it is suggested that characters
Approximately 4-6 characters are best suited for this; some follower with powers of faith is required for the premise of getting there. Knowledge of undead
The characters are needed and should arrive a few days ahead of time. a couple days wont make a difference, but 3-4 will. There is a larger concern, and any test of Grace will reveal its better to stay than to go.
Rumors of Amarga:
What local characters may know:
Long has Amraga been under the heavy lash of the ___ rulers/
Intro >
North Pass
Godraec
* If a follower can adjure a couple of Comfort prayers, the targets will be put into a place where the surgery to remove his leg will be far less likely to kill him (it wont). They ask if any healer among the group can spare a day to aid in helping with the wounded. Though this may make the group late, its a worthy cause. The soldiers are all of Lightbringer faiths, but a follower spreading healing will also have a chance to gain a convert for their faith if different. Proselytizing to the soldiers can at best, achieve a ‘favored’ result – granting the follower 1 Offering.
GMS
………..
CONVERTING PEOPLE (proselytize)
empathy (reading the target(s); success = +1), conviction (inspired delivery; success = +1), = advanced, in a link “other things may affect a followers chance to convert”
persuade check
Critical: Transcendent – divine presence is channeled, complete conversion with donations; gain +5 to Offering
Full: Conversion – donation made & switches active tithe and worship; gain +1 to offering
Major: Impressed – donations will be offered and will attend worship – +1 RS to further conversion checks/all penalties to convert negated
Ave: Interest – small donation made once, will offset penalties to convert later
Simple: Aware – a fleeting increased awareness is gained
Fail: Indifferent – experience is soon forgotten
Fumble: Disfavor – something strikes a malign chord in the message or interpretation; -1 RS future attempts and epithets and dispersions cast if target follower is near
These are base lines. Harmony considerations will also factor in the response and existing follower status to another faith may preclude anything except a dogmatic response according to tenants and inter-faith relationship.
The proselytizer should receive both CS and RS penalties when going into areas where their message will be reacted to negatively.
Hamlet of Hormlau
Initial Approach >
Ahead the road spills out into a busy scattered township. You can hear the sounds of rushing water and see several creeks go through or around this mountain valley. A few places have orchards (some burnt) and a few places to grow vegetables, but the valley is mostly rocky. A recently repaired sign reads ‘Welcome to Hormlau’. It’s obvious the area is spilling over with refugees still, as the tents and ramshackle buildings attest to. What was once a sleepy hamlet is a bustling town. Dirty children run and play dangerously in front of burdened carts of ore and coal. The scene is confusing and the smell even worse. You pass a new graveyard on your way into the town, many new graves are obvious, while a few visitors weep and wail over fresh sites.
d ends
The PC’s will stop here for rest and discover that the east road is held by Company Redlance – at least that is the name the mercenaries and cutthroats that guard that way now call themselves. They exact a heavy toll. There is only one major inn in this town of some 700 folk; the Whitehoof Inn. There are also several bed-and-breakfast places, 2 boarding houses, a hotel near the hot springs and a couple of taverns let the mine rowdies crash in the common room for a slight sum.
> It is here that the PC’s will first encounter the danger. Eli will burst into the Inn, seeking Sheriff Saul Pagrach (recently elected). The party will see Eli have heated words with Saul and then leave. Saul will leave, only to return an hour or-so later, to meet up with another man whom he issues some orders to and then there is a gathering of community leaders in the common room.
> “Good people, I have heard that three bandits have been caught near the Two-Shade Mine. I assure you that our forces continue to protect our livelihood and that I have not forgotten the so recent violence here. I have asked for help from the guards at Fort Godraec and they are willing. ”
Villa Van Furst & the Van Furst Family
Searching for Silke
When did she go missing? She;s been gone about 3 days. Three days was all it took for many to rise as undead when the vampire bride of Lord Solth was on the loose.
Where was she last seen?
> Family interview
> Ruined orchards near Morgath Creek
– One of the loals working at the Inn swears he saw her there a night ago
> Abandoned House
– One of the refugees swears she as seen 2 nights ago there… but only at night.
Ruined orchards near Morganth Creek
3 bandits, stragglers of ___ have taken refuge here. They are almost recovered from their wounds, and ready to make a try at returning to their comrades in ____.
Abandoned House of the Merchant Drecksal
> Silke was seen here after dark. In reality, she was searching the burnt ruins for Marjorie Drecksal’s Star of Ikribu – a family holy item her and Majorie had used in the past to protect their husbands against the shadows of madness in Nissru Vale. Her husband Kaliver returned home, but they were murdered a fortnight ago, though 1 son survived the rest of the family burned to death. The reference here should make Silke appear as though she may be haunting the home of noted Light Worshipers.
OTHER ADVENTURES
Lord of bronze, Prinz Alzandricos was born in Blackcrag area and swept north in the Persepia Campaign. It is said that his father’s tomb, d’Pilliphos III lies somewhere in the hills. The locales all claim it to be true, though no proof is ever offered. Those who go looknig, vanish.
The PRinz, a quasi-pagan of Wyld Faith understood that the roots of anima lay on special places – where spiritual forces gather and linger… thresholds between worlds where humans encountered the numinous and felt the pull from another world.
He sought mountain springs, caves, wells – unusual geological formations where places where the membrane between different dimensions might rupture. Like many of the places the greatest oracles were built over.
Pagans – animists – were devoted to the dead and the tombs of the dead – especially those of heroes that transcended humanity and those who would seek to imitate them after. The grander the omb,the more powerful it would be for the spirit world. Idolatry and symbolism – material symbolism – were the order for the pagans. PRecious metals and things men would spill blood for were used in pagan temples, to draw the spirits (not for their wealth). PAganism was strong in the isolated region – and stronger still after the tomb was built. Much opposition from the church of light was made – the tomb practically deified the fallen Prinz and they hated the locals for it. It was a tomb that would rival the fallen cleric of
Amargan was built upon the ruins of the city of Telluence, in turn built upon the remains of the city of Durolak. In 8731, archeologist Fendrake Declerk mapped out the likely resting spot of the Prinz under the church of Ikribu…
================================================
ORIGINAL NOTES FROM BEN:
Now, on their website (farlandworld.com), they solicit adventures to be submitted. That I know of, they aren’t for pay. I would like to submit this (after we finish and test-play it) to them. Are you down?
A side trek for the campaign I’m running right now. It is at www.farlandworld.com/index3.html.
Here are the notes from what I already ran. Obviously, we would need to change it (not a PCs mother, for example).
The Nightmares Among Us
Beckenhausen
The battle for freedom was long and hard. While many families did their ancestors great discredit and cowered in their cellars, a few did what they could to actively bring about the end of the tyranny of the Lord Sloth. Nearly four centuries of oppression was not enough to quash the spirits of the Van Fursts, the Rademachers, the Sweisheimers and more. Generation after generation, these ancient families sent forth their well trained youths to attack evil where they found it. Though they were from diverse economic and social backgrounds, none of this mattered as time and again they found the only other families to be fighting to be the aforementioned.
The Lords of the West have risen. Heroes have slain the Lord of Sloth. But his minions still wander the countryside. And evil is still afoot.
Eli and Brillara Van Furst’s mother, Silke, has disappeared. This is not unheard, of course. You all know of family members that have disappeared. But when it is your family member that may become a member of the walking dead, it is especially chilling. Not only on the sentimental side of things. But also on the knowledge side of things. It is well known that vampires and some other higher order undead maintain their memories after they’ve been turned. If a member of one of the important resistance families is turned, that member needs to be hunted down. Immediately.
If she is simply missing, this, too, needs to be solved.
Most NPCs the players will be questioning in the hamlet of Van Furst will be friendly or indifferent (unless otherwise noted). An opposed (Diplomacy) DC of 15 is needed to raise from indifferent to friendly or from friendly to helpful.
When did she go missing?
Eli and Brillara saw her last Dwardae.
Today is Wedae.
They haven’t seen her since. But only just today got back in town.
They were on a mission to bring supplies to an outlying, newly constructed temple to Heshtail
Gretel Von Vranken saw her Amdae a little after sunset.
If asked too directly what she was doing out after sunset, she reverts to unfriendly.
If asked if she saw her before that, she claims that she has seen her since then, but only at night.
She says she saw her that same Wedae night that Ellen and Brillara saw her. She looked pale.
If the PCs do a Knowledge check (Religion) DC 12 they’ll know that she could not possibly be a vampire if this is true (she would have had to be buried longer than that).
If the PCs do a Sense Motive check (unopposed) DC 10, they sense she is telling the truth.
If asked what she was wearing, Gretel will says that it was dark and grey and rainy. All she could tell was that she was wearing loose clothing.
She was wearing Grey and Black robes…but in the dark, all Gretel could see was that they were black.
The mystery is solved by the fact that Silke is a cleric or paladin (some sort of servant) of Grlashh and left to due his bidding.
I’ve already run it. There is very little combat in it. Just enough to scare PCs with only 2 NPC levels inside for the night.