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Message: <blockquote data-quote="tleilaxu" data-source="post: 1369942" data-attributes="member: 1289">BODY SNATCHERSround 1: tleilaxu's entryThis is a quick little event that can be dropped into any human city that has a nearby population of demihumans (lizardmen can be changed to orcs, sahuagin, or whatever is appropriate for your campaign).The PCs have come to a mid-sized city Why?1.    the city has a famous wizard, Acheon,  living nearby with whom the party wants to talk2.    the party has been hired to escort the lizardmen delegation3.    attractions of a city: looking for work, resting from adventure, utilizing shops, etcThe city is situated close to a swampy wooded area in which live several villages of lizardmen. The wizard, Acheon lives in a tower one day’s journey away from the town in a wooded area close to the lizardmen. Acheon is a renowned transmuter and alchemist. There are a variety of reasons the party may want to talk with Acheon. Perhaps one of them has been cursed or polymorphed? Perhaps the party wizard is interested in buying transmutation scrolls? Or the party needs potions of some kind. Acheon is ideal for all these purposes. Unfortunately for the PCs, he is also rather withdrawn, and doesn’t like visitors. The relationship between the human city and the lizardmen villages has been adversarial. Humans make incursions into lizardmen territory and destroy the environment; lizardmen go on raids to outlying homesteads. Recent developments have changed this equation. A large deposit of coal has been discovered in a part of the marshes that lizardmen do not live in. Its location, however, makes it extremely vulnerable to lizardmen attacks. This spurs on the leaders of the human city to make peace with the lizardmen. In exchange for recognizing the lizardmen border, and trade rights, the humans will be allowed to lease the area with the coal deposits. This is the situation the characters arrive to. Unfortunately for them, there is a conspiracy underneath the seemly innocuous developments.A lizardman delegation has set off to the human city for the official recognition of the treaty. Every member of the delegation has been killed and replaced by a doppelganger (these don’t necessarily have to be the same as the MM doppelgangers. Adjust HD to party level). The doppelgangers are members of a secret cabal or illuminati which seeks to adjust the political face of the world to be more favorable to them. Various officials in the human city have also been replaced by face-dancers, err, doppelgangers.The event that spurs on the adventure happens at the public signing ceremony. If the PCs are not present at this, they hear about it within minutes of its occurrence as the news spreads over the town. If the PCs are guarding the lizardmen contingent, it happens right in front of them.First, an arrow is fired from the window of a nearby building, apparently killing the leader of the lizardmen. The lizardmen immediately start to slaughter the human courtiers. Simultaneously, Mass Suggestions are cast on the crowd, including “The lizardmen are killing everyone, run!”; “Someone assassinated the lizardmen leader, run!”, which incite panic in the crowd. The PCs, if they are not convinced to run by the suggestions, are attacked by both the lizardmen and the guards for the human courtiers. If the party does not run they are quickly overwhelmed by shear numbers and are subdued and arrested. If any doppelgangers are killed by the party, they revert to their natural forms. The two groups of doppelgangers aren’t actually attacking each other to kill, but are staging the entire scene with the aid of illusion and enchantment spells.The doppelganger conspiracy is run by two leaders, Waff and Scrytale. Waff is posing as one of the members of the human city council while Scrytale is the (apparently) dead lizardman leader. The doppelgangers desire to both weaken the human city and turn the lizardfolk away from the humans so that the doppelgangers can (in the future) use the lizardfolk as their surrogates in the area. The PCs are either taken to jail or manage to escape from the city guards. If the PCs are in jail, they will be interrogated by city guards (a few of which are doppelgangers) and finally will meet with Councilor Aedon (who is actually Waff) offers the PCs their freedom in exchange for asking the wizard Acheon for his help against the lizardmen. He provides the PCs with suitable documents, etc. If the PCs get away from the guards, they have a few options. First, they can just hightail it out of town. This is the worst result from the party, as they will be wanted as accomplices to an assassination. Their other options are to head for the lizardmen village or to visit the wizard Acheon.If traveling to the lizardman village, the PCs are met with suspicion. They have heard that the lizardmen delegation has been assassinated and are preparing for war. They will not accept the help of humans, but are interested in the details of what the PCs tell them. If told about any dead doppelganger bodies, the lizardmen will consult among themselves, but will still decide to march on the ciry.If, previous to the assassination scene, the PCs try to visit Acheon, they will be rebuffed by his retainers. Acheon’s tower is guarded by strange dogs, including axiomatic hounds(others are dire, awakened, or other appropriate templates). The gate of Acheon’s tower will be answered by Isset, his enhanced familiar, who is an anthropomorphic, axiomatic dog. The PCs will be told that Acheon is out, or Acheon is very busy and to come back later.After the assassination attempt, Acheon will (reluctantly) become available to the PCs. He explains his work. He seeks the quintessential substance that creatures are made out of. He distills the impure essence of normal creatures in an attempt to create superior beings. His dog guardians are the result of his breeding program, where canines from the material planes are mixed with otherworldy dogs to create strange hybrids. His main magical apparatus is a giant clear tank filled with a  strange liquid. Acheon explains that it essentially transmutes the substance of a creature to add or change templates. Various potions and scrolls are available to the party for purchace. When told of the situation, Acheon consults his crystal ball and announces that both the area has been infested with shapeshifters. He provides one of his dogs, an awakened hound with the ability to discern shapeshifter and a shapeshifter bane shortsword. The PCs now have the tools to root out the shapeshifter infestation that afflicts the town. When the PCs start to destroy the shapeshifters in the city, Waff (the leader) makes preparations to leave. His is protected by an amulet that blocks revelations about his shapeshifter nature. When the PCs make a complete (as far as they can tell) sweep through the doppelgangers, Waff will present them with a reward for their services of emeralds and magical weapons. However, in 24 hours the emeralds are revealed as pieces of dung and the magical weapons are actually cursed, making Waff’s reward false. In the meantime, Waff has stripped the city vaults of value and has disappeared into the web of the doppelganger illuminati. The PCs may chase him down for revenge and may learn more about the continental conspiracy this way.Summary:Conspiracy of doppelgangers: The face-dancer illuminatiMass Suggestion: used on the people present at the fake assassinationOtherworldly dogs: Acheon’s guardians. Also the dog who can discern shapeshifter.Panic: The reaction of the crowd from the suggestions.Suspicious Lizardfolk: The general demenour of lizardfolk towards humans, more so after the assassination.False Reward: The reward given the party by Waff, leader of the doppelgangers.</blockquote>

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