Quickleaf's Banner Marches campaign

[Quickleaf]

As many of you know I'm running a game for a great group of seven players, and have an Obsidian Portal page dedicated to the "Banner Marches" campaign. It's 4e and right now, as of finishing Dragon Mountain, they are 13th level. The campaign is a very loose continuation of a another 4e campaign I ran (with some of the same players, only one of the same PCs), with some influences from other games other DMs in the group have run.

This thread is for plotting and brainstorming cool stuff. My players should stay out explosive runes.

The overarching story involves foreign invasion, the Orbs of Dragonkind, Drow, and the Wild Hunt! The Banner Marches face a joint invasion by mages of the magocracy Suleistarn and the drow of Menzoberranzan. On the one hand, the invasion is a reaction to events: for the mages it is the impending Holy Conquest of Cascadene (Empire of the Dawn Dragon) with their metallic dragons, while for the drow it is a catastrophe in the Underdark forcing them to relocate Menzoberranzan. On the other hand, the invasion is driven by baser motives: the mages covet the abundant magic energy of the Banner Marches, whereas the drow desire revenge (and not just against the elves).


The PCs are...

Kirito (human / fighter, weapon master / bloodsworn / unaligned)
Kirito is based on the brash protagonist of the anime Sword Art Online. He led a party of inexperienced adventurers into Dragon Mountain, and they were mostly killed off. This has lead to some conflict with the Knight-Commander of the King's Army, whose son was one of those adventuerers.

Lily (human / Elementalist, lyrandar wind-rider / primordial adept / good)
Lily is a bit of a mystery. She apparently was once a Succubus but somehow gained a truly human body, mind, and, perhaps, soul. She is also mystically connected to Tristan Capri.

Miri (human / barbarian, nocturnal / animal master / good)
Miri is the only returning character from the old campaign. She is a fierce warrior of the highlands berserker tribe called the Nic'Epona, who take their name from mystical planeswalking horses which come to the highlands to mate and frolic.

Rafael (half-elf / bard-warlord, captain of fortune / Bregan d'Aerthe mercenary / good)
Rafael is a wandering duelist with a penchant for getting into trouble. He has a soft spot for oppressed peoples, particularly elves (in the setting Demi-humans have historically been oppressed by humans). Years ago he served as an agent of the drowish mercenary guild called Bregan d'Aerthe; whether he still is connected to the drow is ambiguous.

Tristan Capri (revenant / cavalier-vampire, valiant cavalier / ironwrought / unaligned)
The "Unkillable" Tristan Capri is a legend in the lands of Kthorvinth. He is the reimagining of a 1e/2e paladin who was turned into a vampire by Strahd, returned as a servant of the Raven Queen. He seems to have an intuitive understanding of monsters and their psychology, and is something of a forlorn figure.

Zolar (deva / wizard, unseen mage / seer / lawful good)
Zolar is enjoying the first month of his latest incarnation. Previously he was a character in another friend's 4e campaign who died facing a shadow dragon. He is a servant of Bahamut even though he studies the arcane arts. When he incarnated he was greeted by a priest of Bahamut who had predicted his rebirth thru the stars...as well as the rebirth of Zolar's rakshasa nemesis!

 

[Quickleaf]

For next game, the PCs are "headed back to town with the loot" and want to meet with the king at Tir Uldeir.

Fighting the dragon, they'd failed to stop the mountain from planeshifting and so I had them in a state of flux, trapped between planes. The wizard managed to planeshift the mountain back...50 miles to the northeast in the same mountain range! They have a 50-mile trek back to base camp, another 5 miles to the mountain town (while encumbered with treasure), and another 100-miles or so back to Tir Uldeir. There are winter storms brewing in the mountains and the mountains are slow going, but the PCs have slain/dispersed the mountain troll warband, have slain the 2 red dragons of these mountains, and have a tentative truce with the kobolds - it's unlikely they'll face monsters while taking the mountains back. If they descend to the woodlands, they'll have a random encounter but travel faster.

Several items of the dragon's treasure are cursed (they suspect this), and several curses and diseases are afflicting various party members. Not sure yet how I'll incorporate this...

Also the paladin player moved and is bowing out of the game.

Once they leave the mountain town, they'll have their horses and carts to transport the treasure across the Misty Downs. When they rest at some point, I plan on introducing the Wild Hunt with a short combat encounter to save a fleeing elven girl (they're a bloodthirsty lot and by this point I suspect they'll want a fight, and also I'm using this to test out some things to speed up long player turns).

At Tir Uldeir the PCs are a bit worried that they may have inadvertently done harm to the royal line. The dragon cast a High Magic spell during their fight which hid her in a gem in one of her human disguises...the spell also grabbed four innocent NPCs and trapped their dreaming consciousnesses in other gems...among these were the King and his grandmother the Dowager Queen. To dispel the dragon's hiding (as well as a dangerous environmental effect) during the fight, the PCs decided to smash all the gems knowing that it could endanger the trapped NPCs. I still need to figure out just what has happened to these NPCs...something like madness or a coma I'm guessing...