Diplomatic Mission to Dassen

So, on the way to Bresk, the diplomat falls unconscious throuogh the scripted event. As they approach the city, they happen along Talon men accosting the "assassin" and her smugglers. My group interceded just as they attacked the woman. Since my players (characters) are not particularly blood-thirsty (except one orc whose mantra seems to be "kill 'em all") and I tend not to play my "monsters" as suicidal-fight to the death unless their personality calls for it, near the end of the encounter, the commander surrendered at a point where he had absolutely nothing to lose. Now they have 7 prisoners (they killed 5 talon - it never ocurred to take any of them alive during the fight, it rarely does since 4e is rather unique in how it handles enemy death).

So now they decided to take the whole gang, Talon, assassin, and halflings, all to Brest and let the King sort the mess out. Now, that solved the problem of the check point; the guards were only too happy to let the party in. OTOH, the most likely result is to charge them with assaulting the guards. Of course, the talon don't have any proof of the girl's guilt, either.

Now I'm struggling with two things:

One, involving them in the political diplomatic scene; I don't see that happening at this point.

Getting them back on the original plot; that shouldn't be difficult. Worst case scenario, they get thrown in the hoosegow and they escape as plan b of the adventure. I could info-dump the earlier scene at Gallo's but I'd prefer them to be involved directly. I could also just have them brought before the King and have them observe the scene. Since Balan was unconscious for the entire assault, he, at least, should be clear.

Any suggestions?

First of all, I believe in 4e you can simply choose automatically to 'take them alive' when you reduce an enemy to 0 hp. You don't have to take any sort of penalty to attack. When they hit 0, you decide if it was a knockout blow or a lethal blow.

They're diplomatic envoys from Seaquen. They should have some sort of documentation to that effect, so they would be able to attend the king's audience. However, there probably would be guards there, both to protect everyone in case these alleged criminals start a fight, and to report to the king so that he can decide whether to honor their diplomatic papers.

I'm confused as to why your party thought that was a good idea ... taking an assassin, accused by the crown, and the royal troops sent to stop her (whom you've just attacked and mostly killed) back to the crown just seems like a recipe for a dead assassin and arrested and executed PCs. Did the gate guards just let them into Bresk with the party holding the Talon captain prisoner? Didn't the captain simply order the gate guards to arrest the party when they reached the city? These seem like obvious results ...

That said, here you are. So what do you do? I think you have the party arrested. Jinis is in the castle dungeon and can fill the PCs in on the political circumstances, including Glibglammer's influence, and the king's recent paranoia. Jinis encourages the party to figure out how to escape and get to Gallo in order to warn him about Steppengard's madness. Jinis probably suspects an imminent attack and needs to warn his Duke. The adventure proceeds from there.

Ormazd said:

That said, here you are. So what do you do? I think you have the party arrested. Jinis is in the castle dungeon and can fill the PCs in on the political circumstances, including Glibglammer's influence, and the king's recent paranoia. Jinis encourages the party to figure out how to escape and get to Gallo in order to warn him about Steppengard's madness. Jinis probably suspects an imminent attack and needs to warn his Duke. The adventure proceeds from there.

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Yep, I agree. The dungeon's all stat'd out and ready to use, so it's an easy option, and makes the most sense from a verisimilitude perspective. it's a good way of showing the political tension in town and the social madness that's resulted from such high-profile assassinations. Having the group's diplomatic papers callously ignored because everyone's afraid and paranoid would "show, don't tell" the situation nicely.

Ormazd said:

I'm confused as to why your party thought that was a good idea ... taking an assassin, accused by the crown, and the royal troops sent to stop her (whom you've just attacked and mostly killed) back to the crown just seems like a recipe for a dead assassin and arrested and executed PCs. Did the gate guards just let them into Bresk with the party holding the Talon captain prisoner? Didn't the captain simply order the gate guards to arrest the party when they reached the city? These seem like obvious results ...

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Well, yeah, it was expected to likely go badly. OTOH, what were they to do? Once the guards surrendered, they had limited options:
Kill one group or the other? Certainly the most pragmatic but wasn't gonna happen.
Let them both go? Now they're aiding and abetting an assassin and will have the kingdom after them as soon as the talon get back to Bresk. That is, after they hunt down the halflings/assassin anyway.
Tie up the talon? That makes them Remhoraz bait.

Their way, they get two things:
One, they possibly give the girl her chance in court. If the king is decent, as his previous rep seems to imply, the talon may need proof to execute her.

Two, turning themselves in gets them a day in court as well and at least aren't fugitives.

And yes, upon arriving at the gate, they announced their situation with the talon guard yelling his. They were taken into 'custody' while the mess was sorted out. Obviously, they will to make their case. Ultimately they'll probably need to escape prison.

In hindsight, perhaps the best option would have been to let the girl/halflings go, let the talon go after a delay, and then get Balan into Bresk independently, thus cutting themselves loose of the plot.

That said, here you are. So what do you do? I think you have the party arrested. Jinis is in the castle dungeon and can fill the PCs in on the political circumstances, including Glibglammer's influence, and the king's recent paranoia. Jinis encourages the party to figure out how to escape and get to Gallo in order to warn him about Steppengard's madness. Jinis probably suspects an imminent attack and needs to warn his Duke. The adventure proceeds from there.

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Yeah, a variant of this could work.

RangerWickett said:

First of all, I believe in 4e you can simply choose automatically to 'take them alive' when you reduce an enemy to 0 hp. You don't have to take any sort of penalty to attack. When they hit 0, you decide if it was a knockout blow or a lethal blow.

Click to expand...

Yeah, I know that; that's why I said it never ocurred to them to take them alive, even though it's very easy in 4e.

They're diplomatic envoys from Seaquen. They should have some sort of documentation to that effect, so they would be able to attend the king's audience. However, there probably would be guards there, both to protect everyone in case these alleged criminals start a fight, and to report to the king so that he can decide whether to honor their diplomatic papers.

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Something like that. I'm just wondering, at this point, why they would be allowed into court at all, except to answer to charges, as opposed to act as diplomatic envoy.

Because in law-abiding countries the mere accusation of wrongdoing is not sufficient for guilt. Even if the talon claims they interfered with a lawful execution and that they murdered his squad-mates, the fact that they're showing up to talk rather than going on the run should earn them enough points to at least be allowed in. With reasonable precautions, of course.