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<blockquote data-quote="EzekielRaiden" data-source="post: 8693149" data-attributes="member: 6790260"><p>As an overview, the structure of the adventure was as follows:</p><p></p><p>[SPOILER="Adventure components"]1. Players arrive in the Jinnistani city of Mt. Matahat, which is located inside the mountain. (It's lit up during the day because the side of the mountain is made of transparent crystal--probably the work of an ancient noble genie.) For my group, they needed a favor that only a foreign dignitary could provide; your group would likely have its own reasons.</p><p>2. They secured an audience with one of the four sultans of the city. (It rotates who's Padishah Sultan(a) every couple of centuries, as the original Padishah Sultana of Mt. Matahat had four noble genie children and didn't want them resorting to violence over the throne.) He, being a subtle manipulator type, had the party seek out an audience with his brother, in order to retain plausible deniability.</p><p>3. The party did favors for the younger brother, and for their boon from him, asked to attend an upcoming masquerade ball (timed to match a every-other-year lunar eclipse). Younger brother got them nice costumes to wear. (You can use whatever one-session adventure you like as the favor for the younger brother.)</p><p>4. The eldest sister is the current ruler, but she's been paranoid someone is trying to overthrow her, and thus becoming draconian. The elder brother (2nd oldest sibling) wants the PCs to investigate, looking for any evidence that his sister has gone truly overboard; if they can find anything, he can use it to pressure the royal court into a vote of no confidence, which will allow him to ascend the throne a century early. Even if they turn up nothing, he'll grant their request--just having them as an asset at the party is worth the paltry thing they're looking for. (Again, this might need adjustment for your group.)</p><p>5. Before the party begins, the players have the chance to talk to the staff/servants. This is their first opportunity to gather clues, though they don't know that it's going to be for a murder mystery yet. (I sprung the murder on the players--they thought this was going to be pure courtly intrigue at first!) My group chose to be friendly with the servants, particularly in the kitchen; others could choose the guards, footmen, groundskeepers, or various other workers.</p><p>6. At the party, set in a manor estate with various magical protections to prevent invasion or untoward behavior, things go well at first. They meet some foreign dignitaries, greet the Padishah Sultana, and generally have fun. Then, there's a row between one of the guests (the young Baron of Cinders) and the Secretary of Agriculture for Mt. Matahat. The secretary said something disparaging (seemingly by accident) and the Baron took offense; the secretary departs to another part of the manor.</p><p>7. An hour later, just after the lunar eclipse has reached its height, a woman's scream is heard from the top floor, and the body is found with an obviously efreet-wought (that is, fire-genie) dagger in his back. The body is currently in livor mortis (blood settling) and his clothes are disheveled. (Successful examination reveals he's been re-dressed, and there is no blood on his clothes around the wound--meaning, the dagger was planted <em>after</em> death, once the blood no longer had pressure to push it out of the wound.)</p><p>8. Conversations with the servants revealed a key clue: one of the other visiting dignitaries, who had been at the manor for diplomatic deals prior to the party, had received a dress delivered to her so she could attend the party. The servant who received it explicitly said the dress was <em>blue</em>. The dress the woman wore during the party was explicitly <em>red</em>.</p><p>9. Kitchen servants identified that the victim had requested coffee be sent to his room a little while before the party began, but it was left outside his room rather than brought in. (Checking the coffee reveals it was poisoned with a narcotic drug--in small doses it produces euphoria, in large doses it is quite fatal.) [Aside: this was one of the <em>multiple</em> levels of misdirection: another possible suspect was someone who, the party learned, had been hooked on this drug and his supply was missing. It had been stolen by the perpetrator in order to commit the murder, and acting as another possible fail-safe should the true method of death be discovered.)</p><p>10. Examining the papers in the man's room, they discovered who he'd been working with. A successful analysis proved that some of the documents had been forged, and that the authentic documents pointed to the woman who'd been with him--the one who had the strange dress of apparently changing color! They also found suspicious connections among the woman's stuff to accounts they knew connected back to a merchant in their home city, whom the party has quarrelled with in the past, a man named Jafar el-Aly.</p><p>11. The Baron of Cinders--along with the Prince of the South Wind, Sahl--were effectively under temporary house arrest as possible suspects for assaulting the Padishah Sultana's court. Interviewing them, the party realized that <em>the victim had to have been dead <strong>before</strong> his quarrel with the Baron</em>. Meaning whoever had had that quarrel, they were using illusions or shapeshifting to pretend to be the victim after he was already dead.</p><p>12. Examining the room and the outside of the house, they realized that the windows of the victim's room had been left unlocked, and the plants growing on the exterior of the building had been damaged. Someone had climbed on the outside of the building, while people were busy paying attention to the party.</p><p>13. An interview with one of the other suspects--the woman who had found him--revealed that the victim had been carrying on a secret affair with her, despite their outward appearance of antagonism. The two had been subtly funneling money into private accounts, so they could retire and live out the rest of their lives together in some other court. She confessed to having stabbed him (which the party already knew wasn't what killed him) because she thought he had betrayed her.</p><p>14. Finally they put it all together: the aforementioned diplomat woman had stolen the drugs from that other dignitary, whom she had gotten addicted to that drug in the first place. She requested a meeting with the man, because she was already there to conduct diplomatic discussions, and killed him by poisoning his coffee. She then pretended to be him at the party, intentionally riling up the Baron of Cinders to make him look guilty of murder. She then returned to the body in his room (where <em>livor mortis</em> had set in), used magic (probably a bag of holding) to carry him up to the top floor by <em>climing on the outside of the house</em>. She then deposited him in the room where he was found, left the knife in easy reach of his location, and venomously directed the man's lover to him.</p><p>15. With the correct perpetrator caught, it would <em>seem</em> like everything is good. However, this whole fiasco played perfectly into the elder brother sultan's hands: even though the victim had been resurrected and the killer caught, his elder sister's <em>incredibly poor</em> handling of the diplomatic situation was ample evidence for a vote of no confidence, meaning he was essentially guaranteed to become Padishah Sultan; he gladly fulfilled their request and, in effect, now has warm feelings specifically toward the party and the city they come from, a major diplomatic boon for their own city's ruler (a Sultana herself.)[/SPOILER]</p><p></p><p>I used a neat mansion map I found online, I'll have to get you a link. But yeah that's pretty much the overall journey. As I said, a lot of distinct clues, few of which were smoking guns and none of which were a breadcrumb trail per se. Some of the clues do relate (e.g. the coffee, the poison, the drug addict it was stolen from, etc.; or the state of the body, the lack of blood around the wound, the body's clothes, etc.) but I did my best to create as many totally distinct clue locus points as I could so that the players could <em>easily</em> miss half the clues and still potentially solve the mystery.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="EzekielRaiden, post: 8693149, member: 6790260"] As an overview, the structure of the adventure was as follows: [SPOILER="Adventure components"]1. Players arrive in the Jinnistani city of Mt. Matahat, which is located inside the mountain. (It's lit up during the day because the side of the mountain is made of transparent crystal--probably the work of an ancient noble genie.) For my group, they needed a favor that only a foreign dignitary could provide; your group would likely have its own reasons. 2. They secured an audience with one of the four sultans of the city. (It rotates who's Padishah Sultan(a) every couple of centuries, as the original Padishah Sultana of Mt. Matahat had four noble genie children and didn't want them resorting to violence over the throne.) He, being a subtle manipulator type, had the party seek out an audience with his brother, in order to retain plausible deniability. 3. The party did favors for the younger brother, and for their boon from him, asked to attend an upcoming masquerade ball (timed to match a every-other-year lunar eclipse). Younger brother got them nice costumes to wear. (You can use whatever one-session adventure you like as the favor for the younger brother.) 4. The eldest sister is the current ruler, but she's been paranoid someone is trying to overthrow her, and thus becoming draconian. The elder brother (2nd oldest sibling) wants the PCs to investigate, looking for any evidence that his sister has gone truly overboard; if they can find anything, he can use it to pressure the royal court into a vote of no confidence, which will allow him to ascend the throne a century early. Even if they turn up nothing, he'll grant their request--just having them as an asset at the party is worth the paltry thing they're looking for. (Again, this might need adjustment for your group.) 5. Before the party begins, the players have the chance to talk to the staff/servants. This is their first opportunity to gather clues, though they don't know that it's going to be for a murder mystery yet. (I sprung the murder on the players--they thought this was going to be pure courtly intrigue at first!) My group chose to be friendly with the servants, particularly in the kitchen; others could choose the guards, footmen, groundskeepers, or various other workers. 6. At the party, set in a manor estate with various magical protections to prevent invasion or untoward behavior, things go well at first. They meet some foreign dignitaries, greet the Padishah Sultana, and generally have fun. Then, there's a row between one of the guests (the young Baron of Cinders) and the Secretary of Agriculture for Mt. Matahat. The secretary said something disparaging (seemingly by accident) and the Baron took offense; the secretary departs to another part of the manor. 7. An hour later, just after the lunar eclipse has reached its height, a woman's scream is heard from the top floor, and the body is found with an obviously efreet-wought (that is, fire-genie) dagger in his back. The body is currently in livor mortis (blood settling) and his clothes are disheveled. (Successful examination reveals he's been re-dressed, and there is no blood on his clothes around the wound--meaning, the dagger was planted [I]after[/I] death, once the blood no longer had pressure to push it out of the wound.) 8. Conversations with the servants revealed a key clue: one of the other visiting dignitaries, who had been at the manor for diplomatic deals prior to the party, had received a dress delivered to her so she could attend the party. The servant who received it explicitly said the dress was [I]blue[/I]. The dress the woman wore during the party was explicitly [I]red[/I]. 9. Kitchen servants identified that the victim had requested coffee be sent to his room a little while before the party began, but it was left outside his room rather than brought in. (Checking the coffee reveals it was poisoned with a narcotic drug--in small doses it produces euphoria, in large doses it is quite fatal.) [Aside: this was one of the [I]multiple[/I] levels of misdirection: another possible suspect was someone who, the party learned, had been hooked on this drug and his supply was missing. It had been stolen by the perpetrator in order to commit the murder, and acting as another possible fail-safe should the true method of death be discovered.) 10. Examining the papers in the man's room, they discovered who he'd been working with. A successful analysis proved that some of the documents had been forged, and that the authentic documents pointed to the woman who'd been with him--the one who had the strange dress of apparently changing color! They also found suspicious connections among the woman's stuff to accounts they knew connected back to a merchant in their home city, whom the party has quarrelled with in the past, a man named Jafar el-Aly. 11. The Baron of Cinders--along with the Prince of the South Wind, Sahl--were effectively under temporary house arrest as possible suspects for assaulting the Padishah Sultana's court. Interviewing them, the party realized that [I]the victim had to have been dead [B]before[/B] his quarrel with the Baron[/I]. Meaning whoever had had that quarrel, they were using illusions or shapeshifting to pretend to be the victim after he was already dead. 12. Examining the room and the outside of the house, they realized that the windows of the victim's room had been left unlocked, and the plants growing on the exterior of the building had been damaged. Someone had climbed on the outside of the building, while people were busy paying attention to the party. 13. An interview with one of the other suspects--the woman who had found him--revealed that the victim had been carrying on a secret affair with her, despite their outward appearance of antagonism. The two had been subtly funneling money into private accounts, so they could retire and live out the rest of their lives together in some other court. She confessed to having stabbed him (which the party already knew wasn't what killed him) because she thought he had betrayed her. 14. Finally they put it all together: the aforementioned diplomat woman had stolen the drugs from that other dignitary, whom she had gotten addicted to that drug in the first place. She requested a meeting with the man, because she was already there to conduct diplomatic discussions, and killed him by poisoning his coffee. She then pretended to be him at the party, intentionally riling up the Baron of Cinders to make him look guilty of murder. She then returned to the body in his room (where [I]livor mortis[/I] had set in), used magic (probably a bag of holding) to carry him up to the top floor by [I]climing on the outside of the house[/I]. She then deposited him in the room where he was found, left the knife in easy reach of his location, and venomously directed the man's lover to him. 15. With the correct perpetrator caught, it would [I]seem[/I] like everything is good. However, this whole fiasco played perfectly into the elder brother sultan's hands: even though the victim had been resurrected and the killer caught, his elder sister's [I]incredibly poor[/I] handling of the diplomatic situation was ample evidence for a vote of no confidence, meaning he was essentially guaranteed to become Padishah Sultan; he gladly fulfilled their request and, in effect, now has warm feelings specifically toward the party and the city they come from, a major diplomatic boon for their own city's ruler (a Sultana herself.)[/SPOILER] I used a neat mansion map I found online, I'll have to get you a link. But yeah that's pretty much the overall journey. As I said, a lot of distinct clues, few of which were smoking guns and none of which were a breadcrumb trail per se. Some of the clues do relate (e.g. the coffee, the poison, the drug addict it was stolen from, etc.; or the state of the body, the lack of blood around the wound, the body's clothes, etc.) but I did my best to create as many totally distinct clue locus points as I could so that the players could [I]easily[/I] miss half the clues and still potentially solve the mystery. [/QUOTE]
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