Pathfinder 1E looking for ideas: Buddy cops search for lost pet.

[Herobizkit]

I'm hoping to start a Pathfinder series of adventures for two players who will be playing a "buddy cop" duo - likely investigators but no idea what character classes as yet. I hope to use the Eberron setting as inspiration.

I have an idea for the first adventure - as new investigators, they are given the seemingly trivial task of finding a pet that has gone missing somewhere in the city.

The twist: the client is actually the pet in question. I intend to use an intelligent animal as the "abductee" who is also capable of human (or whatever) speech with the possibility of having it join the party as an tag-along NPC.

I'm having trouble filling in the blanks in between, however.

What I need is some nuggets of inspiration to throw into the pot. All input welcome.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

1) you might want to mine Simon Green's "Hawk & Fisher" stories for ideas. Ditto Glen Cook's "Garrett, P.I." books as well.

2) Anthro animals are a possibility, as are werecreatures and animals that have been Awakened.

3) farther out suggestions include undead or flesh golem pets. Think Frankenwienie.

4) perhaps the pet is not what it seems- it is a doppelganger gathering info on the (deceased) pet's owner.

 

[Herobizkit]

I'm brainstorming at the moment, trying to answer questions such as:
- how did said pet get abducted, or was it even abducted at all?
- what kind of clues could I use? What kind of NPCs?
- Should I even put a fight in there somewhere, and if so, what?

You know, all that DM biz.

 

[radja]

just an idea... you could have the pet mastermind the abduction him/her/itself, to get away from its abusive or alignment incompatible master. Would work well with things like blink dogs. Blink dogs could also work well in a party of investigators, usually impersonating a normal (tracking) dog.

 

[gamerprinter]

Is it a familiar for a witch whose alignment has changed so drastically, that the intelligent cat (or whatever) ran away, however, the witch with so many of her own enemies suspects someone has stolen her cat?

 

[Mr.E_Danger]

I like the idea of it being the owner itself, perhaps polymorphed. The person who "hired" the detectives is a wizard who polymorphed him, but he escaped before he could trap him. The now polymorphed person could be an influential or powerful guy in the city/land. Until the duo is high enough level to free him or break the spell, he could be an NPC that helps them out of jams

 

[Herobizkit]

These are all great ideas. I really like the idea of the blink dog, and it makes for a resilent NPC for low levels. Making it speak is optional... and something I don't have to do right away. The blink dog is intelligent enough to understand basic speech, so it doesn't have to get in the way of the heroes, either.

I may also introduce a pixie as a 'talky' NPC later on, possibly even as a healer.

This could later be worked into a campaign arc: 'fey' creatures appear to seek the heroes' help as 'aberrations' become more common.