Adventure for Just Another Maguffin

North Revealed CAMPAIGN CHRONICLE >> The North Revealed is a Living World campaign set in The Northern Hearthlands/Grand Duchy of Rhyl of the [Fantasy] Steel Realms.
** The source of the following material is from this campaign. **

This is an adventure designed around a group of rogues. It can focus on either combat skills, soft skills of stealth & avoidance, or a combo to accomplish the mission. The basics are to scout, skulk, grab and go and rendezvous to hand off the mission objective. The group is independent operators, known to illegal/underground operatives of larger criminal organizations, hired to retrieve the item of Orblivat.

The PCs are hired by Salamander Guild operatives under the guise of being Old Rhylian family agents. The Tea Lodge Network of Rhyl agents monitor the progress of the entire affair.

For the GM: 1) Turn over any rock and you will likely find us. – The Salamander’s Guild is everywhere. 2) Nothing happens in the north that is not discussed over tea. – The Tea House of the North_ serves all..

Back Story
They rented a villa to secure the item.

Operatives killed the adventurers in an ambush trap when they brought the Orblivat back. This also killed most of the officers of Darkstone Security and about 20 more – their current forces are low; They try to portray a larger number of inhabitants at the rented villa to keep locals away.

Dead Adventurer Loot

Most of it can have been taken to local money lenders and store houses for later inventory and assessment; Some loot may still be there – journals, clues, mundane supplies, and artifacts from the journey. Journal? Illusory Script? Included an anti spirit weapon with sentience that cannot be sold in city of Klyben as it keeps reacting to buyers and rebelling. Can a PC later tame it? Was it corrupted by the Orblivat?

BASIC FLOW

    = Insight = something about the Dale and Jordan no right (no family colors, etc.)

  1. PCs have 2 days before mercenaries set out to claim it,
    = get half orb made, no one knows

  2. Get There > being followed? 500 miles @ 30 miles per day 17 days
    = both Tea agent and Salamander agent follow no detect
    = neither detect each other

  3. Arrive > blend in, being followed?
    Smoked fish w/bark sauce + alcohol
    Kemethian – water fowl, nets, harpoons, eels, muscles, woven reeds, millipedes in the willow + cypress trees + white swamp oak = barrels for whiskey
    DC 12 wisdom = sense = mellowness at station = fumes/miasma ; + distillation
    Raised platforms in wetlands,

  4. Scout > avoid detection
    COVER STORY = +1 to 4 depending on quality
    DC 10 intro
    Dont take kindly to criminal type
    Pop 600
    4 big rooms, 4 single rooms, common room
    6 run down estates, 6 ok
    spring festival every year = get rented out
    No more “noble” families
    > info broker is just an enthusiastic local to guide them around
    Swamp folk version of burning man “soggy man” (spring Ezrilus festival)
    Kyle = contact for property in festival rental
    > smarmy, barely knows a few ‘cant phrases and words; dress better, has 2 “sales associates” Neel and Bob
    Rashai’s Trade House
    3 taverns = local brews
    1 Pickled Fish
    2 Mike Lit’s
    3 Titus Pullo’s > 3 men speak can rumspiringa cholos and came back
    16, 20 = agents watch

    DC 20 PErception = Cant marks on the front

    Agents must choose if the PCS split

    Final Encounter – The Hand-Off

    The PCs move to deliver to the rendezvous point in City of Sheffet; Riders Alley is a long alley on the east side of the Merchants Enclave – often amateur horse races are done here but not in the winter. On the far east end is the Thirsty Mare’s Tavern. The upstairs game room has been rented – meet the contact ‘Micahel Golde’ there.

    If there is one flaw, operatives of the Salamander’s Guild often adopt names that include a color name in them.

    Entrance

    2 guards; check out any PCs approach – looking for symbols and signs of professional

    1. Enter > avoid traps
      @carriage = 2 teams of 2 with dogs (silent)
      2 stealth walkers – quiet in armor. Prowl around.
    2. Seek > avoid guards and traps
    3. Find > lock break, disable alarm
    4. Grab > guardians
    5. Leave > avoid guards and traps
    6. Journey > followed/attacked?
    7. Hand-Off!

    Defenders: Darkstone Security. The name is familiar to all of you. They are security experts, and known for leaving no one alive to talk against them. They have rented an old villa in Kemethian Station in the County of Dunaine to the east. It is unknown the exact composition of forces there, but at least a dozen and probably more hired help who have no idea what’s going on. The object is being kept there in secret until the mercenary band can secure it and return it to the capital. Go there, get the object, and then go to the City of Sheffet nearby. A message will be waiting at the Thirsty Mare’s Tavern of where to go for the hand-off.

    Darkstone Security

    Basic Facts about Darkstone Security

    10 Darkstone Security has a large (dark) stone block building in the City of Rhylan, they are security experts;
    10 They like to stay out of the headlines, using word of mouth for referrals.
    15 They hire mercenaries to supplement their numbers and capabilities, and tend to leave no witnesses – rather leave a trail of bodies than a trail of clues.
    15 Preferably they hire veterans off The Autumn Wall when they need excessive force or muscle.
    20 The group is believed to have a series of fake companies that come and go and to hide their operations under.

    Getting There

    Blending In/Finding a Base of Operations

    Scouting the Mansion

    > Bars on the Windows
    > Dark inside
    > No guards apparent

    Entering the Mansion

    Rooftop

    Front Door

    Servants/Kitchen Entrance

    Domed Ballroom Entrance

    Inside the Mansion

    ::: poison centipede

    Villa

    Encounter areas in manse have bloodstained areas where big fights w/adv happened.
    There is a stable and carriage barn outside (empty and trapped)

    Stable w/Smithy

    Carriage Barn

    Servants Quarters (outside)

    Some Darkstone Security turning on each other – bodies in places lying in the open.

    Most are dead
    While Darkstone Security FIND: a fake one is in box, burned with a “do not open” – inspect = its been opened
    > it is hidden in the room.
    Green slime trap!
    If its too easy, magus apprentice and guards attacks PCs

    Front Hall

    > MAIN ENTRANCE

    Sitting Room/Parlor

    Office

    Kitchen

    > SERVANT/KITCHEN ENTRANCE

    Wine Cellar
    Food Cellar

    Servants Quarters (inside)

    The Ballroom

    Massive open area that they have put up temporary walls in to hide the object. Like a maze.

    Leaving the Mansion

    > Alerts
    > City Watch
    > Local Ambushers (someone recognized Darkstone and got interested)
    > Tea House Agent

    Journey to Thirsty Mare’s Tavern

    > Tea House Agent following
    > Local ambushes (they dont know what the PCs haven, just that it might be valuable)
    > Arguing among themselves

    Final Delivery

    Freds Pants
    = half of the payment if the PCs slow things down.
    Then to Thirsty Mare

    You enter and the contact motions to lock the door behind you. After, he motions for you to place the item on one of the tables, and reveal it. You do so. His eyes get wide. Micahel Golde says “Excellent! Our group’s fortunes are assured now…”

    PER = group vs. family

    Right then, there is a knock at the door. A woman’s voice says, “The ale you ordered sir!” The contact looks at you and smiles, nodding to the door. You look through the peephole to confirm and there is a single server and a large tray of ales. The contact looks at you questioningly – as if saying ‘well, go on’ and you open the door, everyone ready for some ambush. Only a lone server is there, and everyone loses some tension. She looks around scared, feeling the tension. She rushes to drop the drinks the contact ordered on a table, leaving the tray and moving quickly to leave. She looks to slip out the door quietly, but closes the door, whirls around and reveals a loaded hand crossbow under her long winter sleeve, pointed at the contact. “I beg you not to! The item must not fall into the hands of the salamanders!”

    The Tea House agent is there. Disguised as a tavern server interrupts and brings ale per request. She places tray moves to leave spins with a hand crossbow hidden under the winter sleeve. It is poisoned. And she has a glass vial of Gaseous Form and one of Fog Cloud.
    Rogue 7th

    CONVERSATION =
    When PCs make a decision, the item’s influence now kicks in. Each PC make a DC 13 save vs. Charisma
    Success = Choose any outcome
    Fail = opposite of chosen path

    Item Properties
    It was once dedicated to Aerna, meant to unify a group, keep the peace, and provide a sworn oath conduit of power to share.
    Sundering it with the weapon halved its potency and reversed its direction of power – discord rather than accord.
    Can set several minds/factions against each other – subtle, over time.

    Outcomes

    Tea Houses Succeed

    1. CY 9129, the remains of Krastivir’s Orblivat goes into a snow globe lamp in the Tea Lodge of Sheffet the county of Dunaine. There, it goes to serve in swaying a group of women connected to the Old Rhylian family – the Old Rhylander Coalition. The power “of two minds” is channeled in a meeting with political wives to turn them (and their husband’s) away from a particular course of a political power play their families are involved in. This power play could de-stabilize the duchy. Dame madam __ – the leader of the (somewhat secret) Old Rhylander Coalition can be talked out of pushing her husband and other nobles to influence their husbands in attempting a coup.
    2. The powerful peace conference the PCs initially involved in has normal chance of success
    3. also, makes surviving PCs forget, they are set up with a happy family and retire

    Salamanders Guild Success

    1. Used to control trade at Klyben in the guild hall; all items of note are 33% higher cost, gangs become more powerful, items 10% more cost in general.
    2. The Old Rhylander Coalition of the families of the Kingdoms of old Rhylan tries a coup; half families replaced.
    3. The powerful peace conference the PCs initially involved in has higher chance of fail.
    4. They are rewarded with manses and good brides – eventually killed by a ‘company’ magus and death wishes executed to give more money to the Darkstone Security outfit.