Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 mbeacom Apr 02, 2015 22:10:34	TL: DR I'm soliciting ideas for how to make an an original and creative encounter (level 16-18ish) with the third horseman of the apocolypse. Famine. Anything goes.   Long Version   Hey Everybody, I run for a group of experienced players. We're nearly 2 years deep in a 5E campaign and nearing the end. Were pretty much every encounter is a barn burner. The party is averaging level 16 and I need some ideas.    The current state of affairs is that the red wizards (who they started tangling with in the Dragonspear module released at GenCon 2013) are trying to fix the crapfest that the party created by thwarting them in the Dragonspear adventure. The elemental princes the red wizards were attempting to summon are still coming but what has been lost is the ability to control them in any fashion. So the red wizards and the parties goals temporarily align.   So the Red Wizards have initiated a massive ritual drawing power from the weave all over the world. This weakening, the pulling of the energy to fuel the ritual has allowed some bad guys to try to gain entrance. Those bad guys are the 4 horsemen of the apocolypse. They're using the opportunity to get into the world and wreak havoc. Since pretty much all the uber powerful red wizards are somehow involved in the ritual, the party is tasked to thwart the 4 horsemen, who, of course are slipping through one at a time. They've already dealt with Penstilence and War and it worked out great. We had a great time. But I've now set the bar pretty high and I'm totally stumped for what to do with famine.   So far, I've been using the Death Knight as the basis for the horsemen, with MASSIVE tweaks to abilities and using some serious narrative and plot driven abilities. Pestilence summoned customized Slaads that poisoned and perverted everything they touched. War drove a chariot in the clouds while marshalling a massive horde of humanoids of all types descending on a city to lay waste to it and everything in their path.    I have lots of ideas for the horseman Death but I'm totally drawing a creative blank on Famine.  Anyone got any sweet world shaking ideas for how to personify Famine using some 5E monster as a baseline? One note is that these horsemen can't(need not) be killed. The goal is ultimately to drive them off, convincing them that their efforts would be better spent elsewhere. So direct conflict with them is fine but not required. The conflict/combat can be against their legions or powers or whatever. Anything goes. Thanks to anyone who reads this all and particular thanks to anyone who shares an idea no matter how small. I usually just need an idea or two to get me rolling in the right direction.
#2 Captain_Kobold Apr 02, 2015 23:29:58	Some form of Hag or similar perverted natural creature, using reversed Druidic magic to blight the ground and summon swarms of vermin and rot to attack crops and food stores? Travelling hidden from place to place, with the only clues being the devastation left behind?   Perhaps the focus is not on direct conflict, but in detective work: the characters will have to establish a pattern and realise that seemingly unrelated incidents in different areas are connected, then predict the next place that Famine will strike.   They will also have to deal with the fallout from Famine's attacks: people starving and panicking, possibly rioting and invading other communities that weren't affected etc. That would add a social pillar to the conflict: the party can't just slaughter peasant mobs wholesale, but would have to talk them down and possibly try to provide food for them in a land where its becoming increasingly scarce.   If you want the party to be able to fight Famine directly, some form of attack or aura dealing levels of exhaustion might be fitting.
#3 LordKaen Apr 03, 2015 0:42:02	Agreed. Fighting famine should be represented by things like exhaustion and weakness. While I can't give you exact spells that have that effect, I recommend weaking the players and lowering their STR scores and damage output. Or you could go the other way and make SOMETHING attack them ravenously. A swarm of locusts spell, or of hungry rats. Maybe even wolves or regular people turned mad out of basic need for food. Hell, you could also cast spells to make the party literally starve mid-fight, only keeping off the effect by eating something. Which won't be easy if their food supplies are eaten, poisoned, rotten etc, etc etc. If you want to be really evil, you could make Famine itself attempt to dominate a party member with a spell and force them to attempt to eat their buddies out of sheer desperation. I am liking this idea, as creepy as it gets.
#4 BenignFacist Apr 03, 2015 3:25:46	Perhaps rather than a traditional BBEG, famine could be a condition that the players and their allies must overcome.     How you lead up to the encounter is obviously your choice - personally I'd foreshadow with the starved, crazed NPCs crawling around, clawing at each other, eating pretty much anything (including each other..), emaciated cattle stumbling listlessly along, grain silos and farms stripped bare and so on. Stillness, gnawing, desperation - hunger.   When first encountered, Famine, statted as some disposable, moderately threatening enemy, (perhaps a death knight or high level themed paladin), attacks full-on, from flying spectral horse back, rasping and whispering.    The party should have no real issue dropping Famine in this form - and that is Famine's plan. Once 'defeated', famine explodes in a cloud of ghostly, buzzing grey locusts that rushes out over a larger (1/2 mile) area, lingers for a minute or so (long enough for all involved to wonder what's going on) before rapidly dissipating, sinking into the soil/ground beneath everyone's feet.   Then the real battle begins - the party and those that were in the area of the blast, will gradually become more and more hungry. You can represent this with various saves, stat penalties and so on, as well as detailed descriptions of the gnawing, hollow hunger that churns within their stomachs, wracks their bodies and shrivels their hearts.   Naturally, non-heroes are effected the quickest and also act as an example of what lies in store for the characters. Said non-heroes become crazed with hunger, attacking each other and the party. While in no way a threat to the party, each character will have to chose to strike down innocents in order to survive - or hold them off by feeding them with whatever resources they have available.    Likewise, the local wildlife, including monsters, are similarly effected. Wandering monster checks should rise rapidly, with the local fauna frantically roaming the area, desperately seeking something to eat. Like the non-heroes they are also crazed and will attack targets that they would never dare attack before. We can also through in some some signs of how desperate these creatures are, with dogs gnawing at sheep's skulls, goblins attacking ogres and birds attacking each other.   While this slow burn is progressing, the characters are under pressure to find a way of saving themselves (and ideally, as many other folks as possible). How this is, again, up to you. Personally I'd drop some rumours, have a few encounters select NPCs and ultimately require the PCs to perform some ritual of varying intensity - perhaps they must, under the above conditions, plant a field with a blessed crop and guard it for X days until it grows (where it rapidly propagates and, more importantly, symbolically slaps famine around its metaphysical face, causing famine to retreat back to where ever horsemen of the apocalypse come from.) (Of course, we could always tweak the above. Perhaps the party, intestate of being ravished by hunger (or while they are!) are getting fatter and fatter. In a realm where everyone is looking for something to eat, things could get very messy very quickly, with the party being the number one item on the menu. Or perhaps famine keeps reforming as a death knight/themed paladin while the events are unfolding, seeking to prevent the party from completing whatever ritual you've determined will win the day.)    Bottom line: I'd make a 'fight with famine' into a disaster scenario/humanitarian crisis, where the party must work to save as many as they can, under appaling conditions, before its too late.
#5 mbeacom Apr 03, 2015 7:31:33	These ideas are PERFECT. I LOVE the idea that Famine is an "Anti-Druid" in the way that a deathknight is an "Anti-paladin". While Druids empower and support the life force around them, Famine consumes and decays it. Perfect! Using levels of exhaustion instead of raw damage is brilliant. I can write this monster up this afternoon and use it by tonight. And for their minions/legions, I love the swarms. I'm totally using swarms. Feels great. An anti druid that exausts you and summons swarms. This is on the right track. Finally, having famine be a two stage event, where the first direct stage is surprisingly easy (but crazy and exciting), only to be followed by a more world altering event (like famine NEEDS someone to destroy it to fully realize itself) that leads them to conflict with literally the world itself starving and trying to consume the players. I envision NPCs, animals, crazed insects(harmless but evocative), even the ground (decaying bodies provide nutrients for the soil!) trying to consume the PCs as the last great source of energy around. Awesome.
#6 Nevvur Apr 03, 2015 10:33:02	If you go with the evil druid, here's a subclass I wrote awhile ago you might like to use: Circle of the Plague
#7 mbeacom Apr 03, 2015 13:03:45	Nevvur wrote:
#8 BRJN Apr 03, 2015 16:20:42	Some descriptive texts and materials you might find useful: - One winter during the Hundred Years' War, the "failure of bread": fungus in crops meant dough would not rise and bake, instead the crust burnt and the inner loaf turned to slimy liquid. - During a long siege, food runs out and people start eating things they would never consider normally.  Horses, rats, shoe leather become fair game. - "The Killing Fields" of Cambodia - Khmer Rouge government deliberately caused a crop failure by killing off experienced farm labor.  Descriptions abound.  Book Death by Government has an encapsulated chapter. - Death by Government in general has a lot of specific incidents and descriptions you can use. - Josephus' History has this chapter title: the Great Extremity to Which the Jews Were Reduced.  (Roman siege of Jerusalem 72 AD, ended with burning down the Temple, executing the survivors, and leveling the city) - 3e Complete Divine has an anti-Druid class called Blighter. - Defiling magic (Dark Sun) accomplishes much the same result in the end. - Goddess Chauntea and some others may send clerics to help after Famine raises its ugly head.  This could be a way to provide information / rare ritual components / special equipment. - As always, a Thesaurus for many synonyms to describe the situation with clear and compelling words, never repetitive or boring.
(Reply to #8) mbeacom	BRJN wrote:
#10 tubadancross Apr 03, 2015 18:46:05	I am actually running the horsemen in my campaign, though they are more neutral, not necessarily bad. Things I have for Famine: Firstly, Famine (Fames) lives in a swamp with very few edible plants. The moisture causes food (even rations) to rot more quickly if not stored properly. Tree Stride: At-will Tree Stride throughout Famine's lair (the swamp.)  Aura of Decomposition: a ten mile aura that causes decomposition to increase to around 100x what it normally is. The party first notices this when they try to eat and it is treated as if it were a one-time thing, but it becomes evident lter if they kill anything in that area (and makes ressurection much harder if a player dies, though revivify I still let work as normal.) Fun times when they decided to take a short rest by some recently deceased enemies and by the end of the rest the bodies were already unrecognizable from an hour ago, save for armor and gear. Aura of Hunger: a one mile aura that causes ravenous hunger. I have each character make a CON save equal to 10+however many hours they have consecutively spent within a mile of Famine. On a failed save they gain a level of exhaustion and make a CHA save. On a failed CHA save I send them a private message (we play on skype) and tell them they have gained the flaw "Hungry: I will do whatever I can to fill my stomache." The food tasting of rot. This only works well if you have players who like to really play the role of their characters and won't let on that I have sent them a private message (One of my favorite times being a player repeatedly eating 'just one more' rotten rations as I asked, "Are you sure you want to do that? You've already eaten 5 and you get the feeling they are rotten.") I'm glad my players have a good time doing this sort of thing, really makes DMing more enjoyable. Summon Insect Swarm: Famine may summon a single large insect swarm as a bonus action or three large insect swarms as a full action. (Insect swarms deal damage as the spell, have 1hp, and are immune to attacks that are not AOE.) This is unfair to the players if the party does not have AOE attacks, in which case I wouldn't use it. Sickle of the Harvest: Famine's weapon is a sickle. It has a -5 to hit but on a successful hit deals 1 level of exhaustion. If Famine is defeated the sickle disapppears. I should note my players have met all of the horsemen, but have only fought Pestilence (arguably the most 'evil' of the four in how I portrayed each one.)
#11 mbeacom Apr 04, 2015 7:31:39	tubadancross wrote: