Destiny. Every DM and every player would like to think that the characters are destined to become heroes; but at the same time, no player likes to feel that he’s a victim of Fate, that he has been stripped of free will, and any wise DM is loathe to do so.
Glancing at these ingredients, it immediately struck me that the most troublesome one was Destiny. I hate abstract “literary” ingredients. However, rather than shy away from the challenge this time and try to sneak this ingredient in at the last minute, I’ve decided to turn this one around and try to craft an adventure that plays on Destiny as the primary ingredient. The hope is to give players a sense that they can be destined for greatness, without stripping them of free will, and that such an adventure can be done deftly by the DM.
I make no predictions as to my success in this risky endeavor...
Ingredients
Unstable Platform: The scene for the final battle; a storm-tossed floating island (actually the back of the dragon turtle).
Crippled Aboleth: Our arch-villain, a powerful, advanced aboleth, imprisoned and “crippled” by circumstances.
Dragon Turtle: Our final confrontation takes place on an island that rises from the sea; actually the back of this critter.
Magic Mouth: The hook by which we first snare the players.
Forgotten Tongue: The language spoken by the forebears of the PCs and their (hopefully) twice-vanquished foe—and the magic mouth.
Destiny: The meta-ingredient that flavors the entire adventure
BACKGROUND
Eons ago, before the great continent was divided and the old empires sank into the sea, the world was ruled by a powerful, malevolent entity. This entity forced its way into the human dimension from a space beyond space; through countless rifts it bubbled and oozed, and at each rift it formed a physical manifestation of itself—the aboleth; many seemingly individual creatures, all merely parts of a greater, evil, whole.
Through generations the aboleth imposed their will upon an enslaved people. Eventually, a band of heroes arose against the aboleth, forcing them out of this dimension and sealing the rift against their return—but merely for a time. In defeating this extra-dimensional foe, they realized the cyclical nature of time. Their work would hold, but not forever, and the battle would begin anew some day.
Though they would be long dead, physically, their destiny was to face this foe again, and they prepared against that coming day.
DESTINY
The PCs are these heroes reborn. They may be changed physically, they may remember nothing of their former lives, but they will slowly come to understand the task before them. It is not a matter of free will. Destiny is not automatically opposed to free-will; it is not predestination, but it is foreknowledge of the outcome. The PCs may choose whatever path they wish, but their situation is such that whatever they choose, they must come to grips with their destiny.
THE FETISH
The first “hook” is set when the DM places a seemingly random piece of treasure before the players. This treasure is a small statuette, a fetish seemingly crafted by some sea-faring race. (The statuette depicts, perhaps, some tentacled, vaguely anthropomorphic thing, and radiates alteration magic). The statuette is carved to appear wearing some sort of talisman which it clutches to its chest, obscuring it with its hands. Should anyone touch the talisman, it activates a permanent magic mouth. The tentacles on the thing’s face part and the mouth utters some nonsense in a forgotten tongue; say, for example,
"Ph'nglui mglw'nafh wgah'nagl fhtagn."
The PCs will be utterly at a loss to identify this speech; indeed, in all likelihood there are none alive who can decipher its meaning. Despite the fact that it sounds strangely familiar, it may be nothing more than a curiosity to the PCs. Indeed, they may simply decide to sell it.
If the PCs are capable of studying the fetish, they will find that it radiates alteration magic, and there appear to be several permanent magic mouth spells upon it.
ODD OCCURRENCES
Beginning now at his leisure, and occurring rarely and randomly throughout our heroes’ regular adventuring lives, the DM should begin to weave the threads of the players’ destiny—threads seemingly unrelated, but which he will masterfully pull together later to make the PCs dance like puppets.
Accoutrements: Here and there, the DM can drop additional items of treasure in the player’s path. It is not important that these items have any cohesive identity (for example, it would not do to repeat sea or tentacle themes so as to bash the players over the head with their destiny). The DMs goal here should be to very slowly attire the PCs in gear that will eventually become reminiscent of the original heroes. It does not matter what the items are, nor even to whom they are allotted, merely that each item have some memorable (and, later, recognizable) feature. The PCs will not grow to resemble the former heroes so much as the DM will later prove the former heroes to resemble the PCs.
Legendary Roles: The DM should be on the lookout for players that are slipping into roles or patterns that he can later use to make legends of them: The fire-mage. The storm-calling druid. The fighter with a favored weapon. The talker, the trickster, the gambler. Watch for the players to form habits that the DM can tie together later in vague, but unmistakable ways.
Dreams: A classic weapon in the DM’s arsenal, the players may occasionally have disturbing dreams; one may dream in the forgotten tongue; remembering nothing, he may be unaware of these dreams until he calls out and awaken his companions. (If the players have the fetish, it may respond to this muttering).
Ancient Emnities: The DM may hint at the return of the aboleth; indeed, as the "prime" aboleth returns, it will try to seek out and preemptively destroy the PCs. Imagine the particularly horrific (and bizarre) spectacle of an illithid hit-man, sent to dispatch the PCs; vanquished, he mutters—yes! physically utters!-- some nonsense in a forgotten tongue before suddenly using his tentacles to extract his own brain before the PCs can learn anything from him. (If the players have the fetish, it may respond to this muttering...)
As such occurrences mount, more bizarre (yet meaningful) things may occur: the PCs receive some deference from an unexpected adversary (a band of kuo-toa allow them to pass—or a seemingly peaceful delegation goes nuts and attacks them on sight; a displacer beast in a mix of unrelated foes, inexplicably bows before the party before slinking off and abandoning its current masters, etc.).
HOOK REDUX
Eventually, the DM will need to set his hook to bring the players to the climax, unless the players will seek out their destiny on their own. Be patient.
If the players have the statuette, or if they have passed it off to a sage, he may eventually return to them with additional information. Indeed, even if the players sold the statuette, the buyer may return—or a buyer several times removed (through great calamity), who has at last tracked the players down!
Alternately, the significance of the statue may dawn on the players, and they must seek it out again. Indeed, the more the players seem to realize at this point, the more they can connect the dots, the harder it should be for them to recover the statue; it may by now have fallen into the hands of the aboleth’s minions.
At any rate, it becomes clear to the players that the statue speaks, and awaits some response. If the proper response is given this activates another magic mouth and the statue will speak again. The DM is free to decide how many keywords the players must find, and how they may find them: the statue makes the first utterance, the mind flayer’s key is spoken, and the statue utters a new phrase; this new phrase triggers some memory in the dreaming PC, who speaks the next keyword, and the statue utters the next line of verse and waits again.
You can play this game as often as you like but ultimately, the statue will complete the verse.
The players may have a rush of memory and, suddenly, a rough translation of the verse comes to them:
In his tomb the god lies dreaming
Till the six* eons-riven return
And rising up descend again to death’s embrace.
(* or however many party members there are...)
When the verse is complete, the fetish unclasps its hands, and the carved talisman around its neck is made real. Removing the talisman, it reveals a bold, arcane symbol on one side and a carved map on the other.
DAWNING DESTINY
The map bears only the vaguest resemblance to any geography known by the players, though eventually it will lead them to the general vicinity where they need to be—a hint of familiar coastline at the edge of the continent, perhaps. The map shows an island where none exists—but upon arriving, the players spot a small, coral-crusted island off the coastline.
There are ancient, alien, muck-drenched structures atop the island!
Journeying to the island, the players walk among the slimy structures. They will see carvings on the walls, showing heroes locked in battle with tentacled creatures. Here, the thunder-caller parts the steaming sea with a bolt from the sky. There, a wizard cloaked in fire blasts a group of fish-like men. Yet another carving shows a mighty warrior (“Wearing YOUR breastplate!”) standing victorious over a pile of butchered illithid. Another carving shows a charismatic leader urging a wave of followers onward.
Whatever the party’s composition and gear, there are clues here aplenty, enough coincidences (though not too exact) to give them the growing sense that, somehow, they’ve been here before, and they’ve done these things that are set in ancient stone. The heroes of the carvings should not be a mirror of the PCs, but every player should find something to remind him of his character.
One grand carving shows the group using the talisman to force the aboleth into a stasis bubble of sorts, imprisoning it.
Eventually, the players will discover a tomb in the center of the island; the door may be unlocked by the use of the talisman and a socketed “keyhole” of sorts; or it may be thrown aside by their foe, freed from stasis and now grown to terrible power.
FINAL BATTLE
The PCs have two main problems to contend with.
First, the island is in fact the back of a very, very old colossal dragon turtle. If the PCs are fairly weak, the dragon turtle may be presented as an ally of the original heroes, tasked with safeguarding the aboleth in this tomb-like prison, and now a source of information to the players. His ability to aid them is somewhat hampered; he has been asleep at the bottom of the sea for a long time, and at any rate there’s not much he can do without risking tipping the PCs and the aboleth into the ocean.
Tipping the aboleth into the ocean would be a very bad thing, as that is precisely what it wants; it can then escape fairly easily to the depths. As long as the turtle remains on the surface, the aboleth is crippled; it moves slowly across dry land, and will have to slog its way across the coral-encrusted island and down to the water.
The aboleth is the party’s greater concern. If the PCs are fairly powerful, the aboleth may have already dominated the dragon turtle; and at any rate, when the hostilities start, it will begin attempting to do so. It should become apparent to the PCs rather quickly that, with the door to his prison now open, the aboleth could escape to the sea.
Either by dominating the dragon turtle, or by tricking the PCs into unloading dangerous spells onto the poor thing’s back, the aboleth will begin trying to get the dragon turtle to submerge again. The fight here could last several rounds, with the aboleth intermittently gaining control over the dragon turtle. Any player holding the talisman will realize that it can be used to further cripple the aboleth: if the PC presents the talisman (and passes a Turn Undead check against the aboleth), he can dispel the aboleth’s spell-like abilities and psionics.
At any rate, as the dragon turtle moves and heaves about in the ocean, the heroes will find themselves on an increasingly unstable platform on which they must fight; the entire island will intermittently go awash with heaving waves (the players may spot a colossal flipper heaving into view from time to time before slapping angrily back into the waves). At times the entire surface could be submerged: both the players and the aboleth will be caught as the water collapses around them until the “island” surfaces again and the water runs off, swirling the PCs and the aboleth around and completely rearranging the entire battlefield.
The time is at hand for the players to confront their destiny—though the future is not indelibly set. Their destiny is merely to contend with the prime aboleth, as they have once done before (and may, indeed, do again and again until the end of time). They may succeed, in which case they may see the aboleth banished or imprisoned again. Tales that filter back to them may speak of a “concussion” of sorts as this keystone aboleth is destroyed: lesser aboleth disappear in a pile of sludge, mind flayers the world over are mysteriously stunned, kuo-toa are left in complete disarray.
Or the heroes may flee, forced then to fight a growing menace as the aboleth and others of its kin begin to reassert their influence across the world.
Or they may fail utterly, kicking off a new campaign set in a world of aboleth enslavement.
The DMs greatest flexibility is not at the start of this adventure, nor at the seeming conclusion, but in the intervening span during which he weaves the threads and lays the clues of the players’ destiny. The longer and more subtly he can keep the threads growing and building*, the more impressive will be the completed weave when the players can finally step back and see the whole picture.
) isn't likely.
