Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 skrapsan Oct 29, 2013 7:43:03	Context: system: 3.5/pathfinder Eberron. playstyle: sandbox/impro DMing. # of PCs: 5 (human barbarian, half elf bard, gnome rouge, kalashtar sorcerern and human monk.   OK so as my context states I have a bard in the party, and he's a Lyrandar half elf. And his highest wish is to obtain an airship. And I'm inclined to give it to him. For a price... So the Idea is that somewhere along the way he will find a crashed airship. And the only part still intact is actually the elemental ring. But the elemental comand tool is gone. What I need ideas for is, what other hoops can I make the party jump through? For those who know them, I think I plan on using the pathfinder downtime rules. Or a variation of them, but we will have to see. I have an idea that he will need to keep the ship a secret so that Lyrandar don't just come and take it back and gives it to someone else.   So any ideas?
#2 AvonRekaes Nov 06, 2013 14:58:56	How bout location? Where is the crashed ship exactly? How will he haul it back to a drydock to get it repaired?
#3 StrikerGreen Nov 07, 2013 12:57:55	First off, great idea! This sounds like a very fun 'alternative treasure' item for your entire party! Yes, your Lyrandar player is the only one who will be able to operate the ship, but you may wish to make the ship more of a 'club house' for the entire party. If you're able to get every PC interested in how the Airship could benefit them (an arcane lab for the wizard, a music room for the bard, a training room for the fighter, a kitchen for those who like to cook, a library to store knowledge, a trophy room where the party can display items gained from their adventures) you can create many different adventures that the whole party can invest in.   There are many different components, spells, magic items, and experts the group would need to get the ship airbourne; it might take a number of adventures. Of course hanging over the whole endeavor is the possibility that House Lyrandar will come back for the ship. I actually would encourage you to have them do just that and then allow the PCs the chance to fight them off!
#4 skrapsan Nov 12, 2013 21:43:36	AvonRekaes: I don't know exactly where they will find it. My sessions are quite freeform. I find interesting events that I wish to throw at them from time to time. But mostly their actions are what drives the story. So most likely I will use it as a cliffhanger. Preferably they will find the ship in the mournland, but I don't know.   StrikerGreen: Indeed this is thought to be the partys clubhouse. The Bard is already voted the social glue of the group. I have agreed with the gnome rouge that his now bankrupt parrents are actually elemental binders. It should help make him feel important to the story at least in some ways. And the idea of House Lyrandar comming to claim his ship is of course something I will have to use. Should give him a great choise, Be free to do your own thing, but loose all official connections to your house. This means completely tied of from using all airship docking towers and other house resources such as lawyer protection etc etc. Or give up the ships possition and get a great boost with your house's standing. Land on the fasttrack for one day piloting your own ship with house aproval. But then you are not as free as with the other ship. But you will have access to all the resources.     Now for hoops to jump through, bear in mind that all these hoops build on the premisse that they decide to keep the ship.   There is a big hole in the hull. This needs to be fixed with soarwood. This means traveling to Aerenal to "purchuse" some without house Lyrandar knowing.   Then there is the matter of all the dead in the ship, what to do with them? Burry them't if they are found within the mournland will the bodies be preserved?   Parts of the khyber shard matrix is broken. I have not yet decided if the elemental should have escaped or not. But you will need someone to fix the matrix leading the elemental ring.   The elemental comand wheel is gone. They will have to track down a new/used one, without the houses finding out.   Anyone else got any Ideas?
#5 AvonRekaes Nov 13, 2013 13:40:19	Sorry, my questions weren't really meant to grill you. They were meant to be the hoops you wanted your PC to jump through.   Hauling a broken airship to a clandestine drydock would be the very first hoop they need to jump, and that can be an adventure in itself. Off the top of my head, you'd need either an extraordinarily large team of draft horses, along with their riders and handlers (and therefore being a not very clandestine option), or a person with an elemental bound vehicle of some kind, maybe an earthsled that can earthglide underneath the wreckage, then come up from underneath it, then be driven to another location. Locating such a device, and then one that can be bought/rented no questions asked, or one that can be piloted by an operator that prides himself on discretion....    Seems like a pretty big hoop!
#6 Beoric Nov 13, 2013 21:00:37	I would think that it would be easier to bring the artisans to the ship, rather than dragging the ship overland to the artisans.  Of course, they would need to convince the necessary non-adventurers to travel into dangerous territory, and pay them well to do it.  Escorting a civilian could be an advanture.   I would also think that the hole in the hull probably would not affect its airworthiness, so replacing the wheel and repairing the elemental bindings would be a priority.  Repairing the elemental bindings likely means dealing with Zils, not Lyrandar.  Zils working off-book will likely be willing to do it for cheap as long as you do them a small favour ...   It would be interesting to develop just what Lyrander salvage rules are - assuming it is a Lyrandar ship and not a private ship with a Lyrander or excoriate pilot.  It may be that Lyrander is sufficiently happy to have ships running that they tell any member of the House that if they can salvage it, they can keep it (for a cut of profits, of course) - particularly if it is in a dangerous area.  There are enough other issues that I might be inclined to take that position, because if he loses too much favour with his House, where is he going to dock?  The logistics of having to park miles from a city and try to conceal, or leave a party to protect, the vessel every time you want to travel could quickly become un-fun.   If Lyrander allows salvange, the real threat could then be rival (and unscrupulous) salvage teams once they hear of it.  A team with the means to float it and then tow it by air would have a distinct advantage.  Ther's lots of potential there - every Lyrandar airship captain should have a rival captain as a foil, competitor and recurring antagonist.   To either raise money or influence in the House, someone might present himself as a backer, who likely has his own agenda, and in any event will want favours or services in return.   Also, it could have been carrying a unique or dangerous cargo that a number of factions, including governments, could be interested in recovering.   I am assuming the bard is dragonmarked and will be able to fly the thing, but he will need another dragonmarked pilot for when he takes a break, and he will need a crew.  A hiring montage could be fun, and there is all sorts of potential to end up hiring an agent of one of the factions already mentioned.   My $0.02.
#7 skrapsan Nov 14, 2013 7:37:31	Those are some great Ideas, I must admitt I had not thought about the third option of Lyrandar wanting it in opperation again. I Have thought about the ship being something special, a prototype of some sort. I think I might still go that route, but more of the lines that, this ship was a prototype that Lyrandar felt were not efficient enough. It was tried to do to many things at one time. So the cargo hull is to small, but the passanger section is not big enough either. I also had not considered the surounding area as adventurelike. But now that you mentioned it, it makes sense. I will have to make myself a map of some sort. as to how the area looks.   When it comes to the hull breach, well I figured that it's soarwood that makes sure that the ship actually floats/flies. So if enough of it is lost, the ship won't lift off. But with the Lyrandar help package we have a whole lot of "for future services" deals potentially being made. I like it.
#8 StrikerGreen Nov 18, 2013 8:13:02	The idea of a 'secret repair project' is very Eberron, to me. I like the idea that the party will have to make connections and alliances with black market / underworld contacts to get access to the needed artisans/experts, materials, and schematics to say nothing of trying to keep the project on the downlow!   The amount of kooky NPCs you could bring in are staggering; repairing the airship could be a really fulfilling and robust story arc!
#9 skrapsan Dec 03, 2013 21:04:49	So they found the ship, they played a plott twist card. And demanded that something good would happen... Think the card was called something along the lines of an unexpected boon. A bit of context. They were trapped between a village full of Lycans, and a camp of semi fannatic Silver flame knights who wished to destroy them. And the moral conundrum was who do we help? So when they found the ship, well they figured, well we want the forrest cleared of "competition" lets help the knights sack the village. Since if we help the village more knights will arive. And so they helped a bunch of silver flame knights commit a small genocide, killing of around 30 or so Lycans who just wished to live in peace.   I have got to make them pay for that later on... /evil laugh   Anyways, I explained to them the three options they had. Turn it in for a proffit and increased social standing in the house. Return it, borrow monney and manpower from the house and get to sail if for a fee. Or repair it without the house finding out and loose access to the docking towers etc. They haven't really decided.
#10 Beoric Dec 03, 2013 21:50:48	Yeah, that's really kind of sad.  When my players do something like that I can't help but rub their faces in just how evil an act it is.  Making it about children is a good technique, either making it clear that the knights were butchering them, or if it is too late for that, saddling them with adoreable orphan children whose parents they helped to kill.  I would also be inclined to make the knights recurring antagonists so the PCs regret helping them.  Maybe the knights should discover teh existence of the airship and commandeer it.
#11 skrapsan Dec 05, 2013 12:04:01	I proably won't rub their noses to hard in it at first. But then later, once they are safely out of the way the Khoranberg Chronicle will report that a border town has been sacked and everyone in it murdered. Then a few days later the people will lay blame to Thrane, due to silver flame knights being spotted in the area. So Aundair will comitt troops to the area to secure the small village. And of course repopulate it. Then Thrane will answer that this is all a plott to plant solidiers so Aundair can take back Thaliost  in one swift move.(city right along the border). And they too will deploy troops. And then Medaani will get involved and that is when the party will realise that their social status as heroes (they saved a few important people and cleaned up a cult in Starilaskur) is on the line.   At least that is my thoughts for now...
#12 Beoric Dec 05, 2013 17:01:52	Oh, that is very nice indeed!
#13 StrikerGreen Dec 06, 2013 10:23:53	I agree that rubbing the PC's face in their morally gray actions is not the best way to make sure they are 'having fun'. However, actions prompt reactions and I like how you're tying their choices into a broader political context.   You may wish to ask your players, out of game, where they want to go with their team. Do they want to be shady characters? Are they interested in the politics of Thaliost?
#14 skrapsan Dec 06, 2013 10:46:42	They have claimed to enjoy a good moral dilemma. But they are also quite self sentered. So I figure they won't really care about Thaliost at all. I'm mostly using it as a piece to show them that "hey stuff happens of screen as well." Building a predecense for when I later will make the Bards nemesis be granted a single wish from the Lyrandar heads of family. And of course she chooses to gain posession of the Highwind (their ship). And since she did some amazingly awesome stuff for the betterment of the house, well they are inclined to give it to her. This will be after they have repaired it and really started enjoying having free rides all over the world.   PS: I have warned them that I'm going to make them hate me, not because I aim to kill characters, but because I wish to make their lives as adventurers hard.
#15 Syltorian Dec 07, 2013 10:32:40	It's a good idea to have them realise that their party affects the world, even if they don't care about the consequences. I take village was on the Aundairian side of the border? If so, you can really show off how vulnerable the Peace of Thronehold is. Never mind Thaliost: this could lead to the next war. Thrane in particular will have to make some serious efforts, as their Knights were the aggressors. I take it they acted without the knowledge of Flamekeep? Considering that the current Keeper seems unlikely to condone wholesale murder even of lycans, that's the impression I get.   If so, you could turn the party's reasoning on its head. You said they figured that, if they helped the village, more Knights would arrive. In reality, these Knights had gone rogue, and there were no reinforcements; however, Aundair will send investigators (as you indicate in a previous post). Aundair soldiery, Royal Eyes, Medani investigatives, then Phiarlan assassins and Thuranni bounty hunters to take out the culprits and offer up some scapegoats to the Warcrimes Tribunal. They'll probably stumble over that airship soon enough, if the PCs haven't repaired it by then.   Depending on how hard you want to hit them, Medani might also discover that a scion of Lyrandar was involved. In order to save face, Lyrandar might want to excoriate the bard, if they want to avoid giving the impression that they ordered the execution of an entire village to protect a prototype and the trade secrets it carried (even if it was a failure, which story is the press more likely to publish?) This might also be something that the newspapers controlled by Mordakesh (the right hand of the rakshasa overlord of war, outlined in the Dragon Article on Rak Tulkesh) would use to let hostilities flare up again. Unfortunately, that would also strip him of the right to own an airship, which would be too early considering you have planned to make them enjoy it before taking it away from them again (and that seems to be the best to create dramatic tension and the feeling of real loss).   For a twist, it may also be possible that Thrane is right in claiming the situation was set up by Aundair, in order to show the world how bad the Thranes are. In that case, the Silver Flame knights were not what they appeared, but members of the Royal Eyes in disguise, or else agents of the Citadel or Karrnath trying to slow the peace process between Aundair and Thrane.   How do you think the party wants to take this? Realise their mistake and atone, or try and see whether they can get away with it - or even turn the situation to their advantage? With troops massing on both sides, the borders may also be closed rapidly, which would increase the profits from smuggling. That could be exploited by anyone with, say, a working airship.
#16 StrikerGreen Dec 11, 2013 8:23:09	I love the idea of 'Renegade Knights" of the Silver Flame 'going it alone' to start their own Pogrom. This could introduce some great allies/enemies to the group as they meet other Knights of the Silverflame who are seeking to bring the renegades to stand before the Keeper of the Flame.