[FR] Waterdeep in Ashes

[Marimmar@Home]

What happened/will happen

Hi all, I'm back from visiting castles and am very thankful for all the input given here so far. To make this story more believable/reasonable, I'm going to address some things here.

1) Why did Waterdeep send out an expeditionary force?
- The North is currently in a state of war with ogre/troll attacks from the Spine of the World. Some warlord is trying to carve his own kingdom and puts strong pressure on the Lord's Alliance. There has been no open warfare so far only guerilla strikes.
- Reports from the Loudwater region indicated that a Zhentish high priest is amassing a large army of humanoids and desert nomads from the Anauroch region in an attempt to expand the Zhentish influence further towards Waterdeep.
- The Lords of Waterdeep dispatched an army assembled from Lord's Alliance nations and it's own guard to strike at the Zhents before they could open a second front against the Alliance. (Our heroes followed in the reserve)

2) Why was the Waterdhavian army destroyed?
- The Waterdhavian army went so far as Llorkh and laid siege to the town. Before they could storm the town scouts reported a large force in the Anauroch. Unwilling to get caught between the town defenders and the Zhentish army moving their way, the Waterdshavians left a small force to prevent the town defenders from leaving and went to engage the Zhentish army in the desert. When they engaged the enemy army, something unexpected happened, the ground started shaking and a colossal pyramid shaped wheeled construct with a goat headed ram mounted on it's front side emerged from the desert sands and broke the Waterdhavian's center. Completely immune to magic it simply rolled forward crushing men and beast like flys underneath it's gargantuan wheels. The battle was very onesided then, ended quickly and few survivors were left. The dead Waterdhavian soldiers ended up as food for the humanoid forces and their supplies fed the desert nomads. Nevertheless the zhentish army took casualties as well and retreated toward their secret base within Anauroch to meet up with reinforcements.

More later...

~Marimmar

 

[Sanackranib]

fall of waterdeep

the fall of waterdeep would cause a seriously major war in the north and I would expect Cormyr ro march west anexing a large chunk on its way to "liberate waterdeep"

Somthing else to consider is the fact that there are not only a large amount of soldiers in waterdeep but also the guard, the watch. the watchfull order of mages and protectorates along with numerous temple complexes, nobel villas and merchant houses who also have their own troops. and that doesn't even account for the many adventurers who reside in or near waterdeep to adventure in undermountian. this place would be difficult at best to sack without major divine (and I am talking direct physical manistifation of a major deity) but would IMO not be possible to hold. its just too big and too importent to too many folks. the elves from the retreat would likly show up in force so forget about sea travel as well.

what a DM's nightmare!!!

 

[Mark the Hammer]

Waterdeep

It does not matter if you think that Waterdeep could/should fall because, it this campaign it did...Why? THE DM SAID SO!! As a DM that is a good enough reason for me. Why keep arguing over if it could or could not occur??? Somehow, someway it did happen. Have fun with the fire & chaos...

 

[Henry]

I'm enjoying this immensely, so I am giving it another BUMP before sending it to its rightful home, over in Plots and Places. Carry on, good annihilators!

 

[Mystery Man]

2) Why was the Waterdhavian army destroyed?

Sweet. What was the big pyramid thing? I must know!!!

 

[Renfield]

Oooooh Yummy

Wow,

I just recently got on these boards and this post caught my eye. I mean Waterdeep? In ashes? By servants of Bane no less? I figured the thread would be full of idiocies that went beyond even my golden nugget of putting dishwashing liquid (for the sink) into a dishwasher >.< or would actually have something intrigueing! It was the latter I am glad to say.

Now the Bane thing sort of threw me off, Zhents under Banish rule always seemed like Shredder and his Footsoldiers in the cartoon series of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Essentially comical badguys for the goodguys to whoop on that once in awhile would throw a surprise the goodguys way. Sorry, always rooted for Cyric, chaos and all that :-D

Oh, and to answer the question of the big pyramid thing. That's from an old 1st edition module, something involving desert nomads I believe? I have it in one of my boxes... about a few hundred miles away in my hometown Nasty pyramid, icky pyramid, delicious from a DM (my own) standpoint.

Also, lay waste to Waterdeep being a DM's Nightmare? Only for those unadventurous sissies who are afraid of change and a little bit of chaos, I think it's a delicious idea if played out properly, not sure how the whole phantom idea would work, numerous factors to take into play... but ah well, that doesn't seem to be the thing the man is doing anyway.

Now, going on the assumption the realms is canon you could easily rule out Elminster, either have him still be in hell or just recently freed. He's not exactly up to snuff right now, rest and recoup is what he needs, not saving Waterdeep, Khelben can do that, right?

Betrayal? Wonderful idea, perhaps Piergieron (sp?) has a falling out, something occurs to his daughter (if I recall he had a daughter that's a shining up and comming paladin.) and this (maybe combined with a few other things) causes him to lose faith and go blackguard. Of course it wouldn't be all that simple, but hey, Lord Soth had an emotional mind screwing and that was enough to make him quite a significant villain for Dragonlance. How about Khelben, there are two things that he loves completely in all his cold neutrality, his wife, and his city. Say city is controlled by Zhents and his wife is slain? That'd cause some seriously mental alteration no spells required. Likely he'd become cold and obsessed to dangerous levels with getting Waterdeep back that he's considered more of a liability than a leader.

Halaster, hell, it'd be nice putting the madman in the spotlight, everyones talking about him being a badguy for this one, why not play off of his new "Chosen of Mystra" status. Not to mention his somewhat regained level of sanity. Wouldn't it be ironic for the leader of the resistance to be Halaster Blackcloak, Ruler of Undermountain?

Now another thing, people are so worried about NPC badassness they forget why there are so many buff good NPC's: because there are so many MORE baddy organizations! You have Red Wizards, Cult of Dragon, Zhents, The Kraken, numerous assassin type guilds and thief type guilds, Shades, just skim through Lords of Darkness and there's a plethera of baddies many with far greater numbers than the good guys (the good guys simply have higher levels, kobold tactics anyone?) All the buff goodguys have their handsfull. Cormyr? They're still getting up on their feet after Azoun IV's death. Thay? Not only do they have enclaves in almost every city (a nice advantage if certain alliances are made btw) but they can easily keep Aglarond and Rasheman busy, they have for quite some time afterall. Just because it's busy in one corner of the Realms doesn't mean it isn't in another.

Also, what about this "Can't do this Can't do that?" you think there was so much stability in how the realms are now that a little imagination couldn't change anything, sheesh, and practically berating the poor guy saying that serious 'big gun' tactics would be needed? Where's your creativity. Simply because Elminster or Drizzt of Waterdeep are tough good guys doesn't make them 100% immortal. Anyway, I should stop chiding you before I gain enmity on these boards before I even establish myself. Anyway I'm done for now, hope you guys enjoy/appreciate/don't hate me for the long rant. I'm Gone, toodles.

Zach, aka: Renfield, aka: Mr. Happy, aka: Ithian

 

[Derulbaskul]

(snip)
1) Pray to Bane with some big sacrifices and use commune spells to to ensure that he is on board with my plan. As the God of Strife, this attack will be right up his ally and it will certainly cause more mortals to fear him so this should be an easy sell.
(snip)
Victor Sim
Destroyer of Worlds

Actually, strife is no longer one of Bane's portfolios. I know one of the 3E books mentions that it is but it is corrected in the subseqent errata.

Cyric is your man for strife now....

Cheers
D