Five thugs walk into a bar

[corwyn77]

So I'm finally starting up my wotbs campaign and I was looking for an interesting way to involve each of them in the first encounter.

My PCs are:

Elf Avenger/Wizard - easy enough, discovering Torrent while looking for a way out of town

Eladrin Warlock/Executioner resistance member - even easier, on assignment

Orc Fighter/Cleric - cursed by visions from Tiamat (ironic given the changes made to the adventure path by one of the posters on these boards) and looking for a cure. One attempt at a cure 'gifted him with divine powers. Likely to look for a violent solution first.

Halfling Rogue/Bard failed (badly) merchant now turned to adventuring

Human Warlord (gladiator theme) morally ambiguous with a bad temper and new to the city.

All are local aside from the warlord. All, again aside from the warlord, are effectively hybrid.

The warlord may be the toughest since the rest of my players tend to be fairly heroic plus he's new to the group so something of a loose cannon as to how he'll react.

 

[OnlineDM]

The cursed Fighter/Cleric could be hoping to find help at the Lyceum and therefore is recruited by Torrent since she's looking for people to go there.

The failed merchant can be looking for a change of scenery, getting out of Gate Pass - again, ripe for recruiting by Torrent or one of the other PCs.

The warlord... sigh. I always struggle with people who want to play "morally ambiguous" characters. Could he have perhaps been recruited as muscle? Maybe Torrent sees some potential in him to be channeled to the side of good and has made him a project - get this guy on the straight and narrow so he can help Seaquen!

 

[corwyn77]

that parallels what I ended up doing with the first two - the orc basically volunteered because Lyceum is probably his best hope for a cure and the merchant, well having recently arrived prospects aren't much better here.

I'm at a bit of a loss for the Warlord, both because of his morally ambiguous and because he's a new player so I'm not sure how to motivate him. I didn't want to set a precedent of 'hiring' one of the characters and not the others. In the end, I stole an idea from one of the game write-ups on these forums and had him invited by accident, meant for someone else. He assumed at the time that it was an invite to meet a contact for some underground fight club.

So far it's working and he's tagging along, presumably because there's no future for an independent gladiator in a city about to go to war. The player isn't using it as an excuse to be a jerk so for now I'll just concentrate on group motivation and hope for the best. And yeah, Torrent will definitely try to work some 'last best hope' magic.

 

[Artur Hawkwing]

Hmm. The delivered by mistake invitation can always turn out to not be truly a mistake. But some entity (or entities) manipulating the situation from safely behind the scenes who perhaps sends someone to the warlord to explain to him what is going on or being asked of him, he learns that he message was meant to bring him to this point safely, and bringing him with the others provided him protection to insure his safe arrival.

However, before he can learn the rest of the story, they are interrupted (an attack, a riot, any number of things) the messenger either tells him to remain with the others and they will come back, or, if you want to add some intrigue, is killed by an assassin's crossbow bolt through the neck. Not before the messenger can tell him that if anything goes wrong, he should remain with his traveling companions until another contact can locate him.

It could then be a load of fun to weave this little story angle into the tapestry with the story/stories for the others, intertwined at the hip far before they ever realized it.

The Wheel Weaves As The Wheel Wills.

-AHW

 

[jeffh]

The "loose cannon" is going to need to learn to work with others if he is to be at all effective as a Warlord... might be a good opportunity for roleplaying and character growth. There's a bard in my current 4E group who is (intentionally on the player's part) going through an arc like that.