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Message: <blockquote data-quote="The 1 and the Prime" data-source="post: 5237525" data-attributes="member: 91434">Fine. They know it is something called a yellow creeper. Do they know what it looks like? I mean, I remembered vaguely the yellow creeper from years back when I read the OP, and I can't even remember right now from earlier today what the description said the plant looked like. So the PCs know kinda what the plant is capable of, but c'mon, it's no shark with a freakin laserbeam attached to its head.Maybe toss the PCs a bone and say they remember it has purple flowers and suggest to them a search party should be organized by the townspeople. The townspeople go out, search around, and bring back twenty different clippings of stuff they find all around that has purple flowers. Except not all the townspeople who went out came back. Or maybe you don't throw them a bone and they have to send someone on a trip to ask the sage at the local university in the provincial capital what a Yellow Creeper looks like. Adventure hook.And you're telling me that NO ONE in a town of potentially a thousand people dislikes the PCs? There isn't a like local mall cop always trying to show the Feds up and embarrass them (and maybe will blame the PCs for bungles)? There aren't any peacenik druid types around who like think it is a tragedy, but it is just one of mother earth's creatures man, and you gotta just let the wild areas be wild, man (you don't like OWN a Yellow Creeper, man!)?Fine. It really isn't that high risk. The initial stages of the infestation simply cause the host to linger near the edges of their home territory until they are noticed, typically by a family member. They then flee if they are pursued, luring a family member with them deeper into the woods. There intermediate stage hosts ambush the unsuspecting family member and bring it to the plant for infestation. If the intermediate stage hosts are unable to subdue the party pursuing the initial stage host, they will die without revealing the location or identity of the Flower. Regardless, the flower has largely accomplished its goal of seed dispersion and creating a fertile capsule for the seeds, even if the placement is somewhat more haphazard than would happen if the cycle completed in the slain hosts. I don't think you understand the plant that well, why exactly are these zombies that valuable? They are marginally more valuable to the plant than stowing seeds away in digestive tracts or letting them fly on the wind.What did the PCs do with the thrall's bodies BTW? I'm guessing next year may be a bumper crop of Yellow Creepers in the Grave Yard if they just let the ignorant townspeople handle them.Still, even if the flower is something special and actually intelligent, it probably would rustle cattle to get new hosts (rather than townspeople).</blockquote>

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