Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="happyelf" data-source="post: 3206334" data-attributes="member: 40394">What if the potions she's making aren't as non-magical as the theives think?What is the magic is in the note book, a rune hidden in the alchemical formula? The formula does create a workable healing potion, but it has a key ingredient- a drop of blood from whoever posesses the book. When the potion is drunk, it doesn't heal the damage, but transfers it from the recipient to the keeper of the rune, via the magical bond created by the drop of blood. This damage could manifest directly, or take the form of an illness or premature ageing.Now, the noblewoman knows this, but the thieves don't- after all, they only know what she's leaked them. She's trying to get somebody to steal the book, because it's the only way she can escape what she sees as the curse of the rune. While she may think of it as a curse, it doesn't have to really be one- she's probably gone a bit batty from what she's been through.If you don't want her to be the one to leak the info, you could introduce a third party (such as a servant) who wants to get the rune away from the noblewomen for her own sake, possibly even to save her from what they may seemas looming damnation for dealing in dark magic.The noblewomen could be using the potions to prolong the health of her deathly ill daughter, but doing so is taking a huge toll on her. A loyal servant, or perhaps even the daughter herself, might leak info to the thieves, in order to free the noblewomen from the burden she's taken on, without letting her know what's going on.This scenario gives you two main assets:*Lots of plot twisty drama about people's motives and who did what, if you use the idea of the sick daughter leaking it herself, that would be particularly interesting I think. There's the moral issue of who deserve the potions, and the family tragedy of a sick daughter who would rather die than be such a burden to their mother. For an extra twist, make it look like a sour old butler leaked the info(possibly for personal gain), but reveal later that he did it at the daughter's request. Of course, he'll probably try and take the rap to avoid letting the noblewoman in on what's really going on.*Even if the PC's do hand the forumla over to the thieves, it won't work how they expect and somebody (probably the pc's) will have to answer for it. Possibly in blood, one way or another. If you want to be really mean you could kill off the guild's chief alchemist during the first "test" of the forumla*, wich could for instance involve a NPC or PC being held down, dealt a gory mortal wound, and then given the potion- at wich point their wounds heal, and the alchemist screams and keels over dead. *(assuming he think's nothing of adding a drop of his own blood, YMMV)</blockquote>

Verification