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Message: <blockquote data-quote="The_Universe" data-source="post: 2021500" data-attributes="member: 8944">A hypothetical situation that I'd like to see how others would solve (or at least react to):   The King's artificer has uncovered a stash full of ancient magical lore, and within this repository of lost knowledge, he has found the formulae for creating the McGuffin of Unimaginable Power.   The Kingdom's enemies have long been martialed against her, and the War that Lasts Forever may finally end, with those enemies as the victors.   With a heavy heart, the King agrees to allow the artificer the men and resources necessary to bring the dark formulae to fruition - he will not allow his kingdom to pass so easily into oblivion.  The artificer summons a dozen men and women, each experts in part of what the formulae for the McGuffin requires.   For nine months they toil, observing their growing creation, ready to unleash it on the Kingdom's barbarous enemies once it has reached its full potential.   The thirteen work tirelessly, but two of them have secrets.... The artificer knows that the formulae upon which they all have worked will birth not *one* McGuffin, but *two!*  He hopes to keep the second a secret, even from his colleagues, so that the kingdom will always have a weapon to use in its direst need - one that it's enemies have no chance of ever finding out about! A second, one of the summoned experts, is not all that she seems.  Actually a spy sent by one of the Kingdom's dark and nefarious enemies, she has helped create the McGuffin, as she plots to steal it for her own Lord's use.  Unaware that a second McGuffin grows along with the first, she assumes that her theft will rob the Kingdom of its last and greatest hope.   The day comes that the McGuffin(s) are finally ready!  The artificer dismisses his fellows to another part of their great laboratories so that he may birth the first and second McGuffins in secret!  He does this as planned, but the McGuffins are each more dangerous than he could have imagined.  He emerges from the laboratory to present the first McGuffin to his colleagues, weakened immensely.  As they wonder at its power, he returns to hide the second, so that even his colleagues will not know of it.   Alas, he dies as he finishes hiding it, and his secret exists now only in his private journals.  Eleven of his fellows rush to try to save him, unaware of how he died, save that the McGuffins had something to do with the cause...while the twelfth moves from the laboratory toward a place where she could teleport herself and the McGuffin to the safety of her Dark Lord's lair.   But, before she can move too far, the eleven become aware of her (and the McGuffin's) absence.  Quickly, they move to make sure that she cannot escape the palace (or at least the city) by magical or nonmagical means.  They need to find her before she can escape with the McGuffin!   HOW DO THEY DO IT!?   Assume that they have access to: A well-trained army of around 1000 men. 200 mages of varying levels (a mixture of Wizards and Sorcerers). 150 Clerics   A militia/police force of 500 men.(Other personnel and equipment may be available upon request) Good luck!</blockquote>

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