I just got started on a campaign taking place in Nentir vale, where I am going to use Reavers of Harkenworld (level 2-4) and Madness at Gardmore Abbey (level 6-8). I am hoping to run a campaign going from around level 1 to 10, with the players getting more and more control, power and responsibilty in the area.
Yesterday was the first session of the campaign, and already they derailed the whole thing. Or, should I say changed the course of the campaign markedly, as I was winging half of the session anyway.
They PC's entered an abondoned manor house on the edge of a small village called Redwood situated on the road between Fallcrest and Harken. There they found Stelian's (the Vrylokka Paladin/Sorcerer) ancestral armor. And the kobolds found them there and ambushed them. Both parties then got ambushed when the kobold fetishes and amulets got destroyed during the battle, releasing two ghosts (of the guards of the manor) and a roaming Spectre.
Stelian has some ancestral claim to the town, but it's over a hundred years old, and they had heard some rumours of weapon smuggling and wanted to check in on the local Knight, Erik Faust. Anything to discredit him would make it easier to get Stelian into the position as the knight of Redwood.
Anyway, the Bard, Leoward proceeded to get them all invited to the knights home, tricking Leah, the wife of the knight to hold a big feast. He held a great performance and the PC's gathered a lot of intelligence. Among other things, wealth that probably showed the rumors of smuggling to be true and also they uncovered the connection to the Iron Circle mercenaries and the coming invasion of Harkenworld.
Having read some of the DM hints found on this forum and in links from this forum, I tried to give all the hints multiple times, via varied means and it really payed off. The players came up with several theories and managed to settle on the right one after some good ideas on checking on which ones where real. Especially Leoward's player made some shrewd moves, weaving in tales of brave historical defenses of Harken and seeing the knight's momentary surprised look that gave confirmation that he was onto the real deal.
Skipping a lot more of the role-playing and little details the players discovered, they decided on going down to the river and the crossing not far from the ruins of Kalton Manor. They hoped to find some more clues, which they did. The dwarven druid Thaim and changed into a wolf when he ran into a trigger happy sentry. He ran back into the woods, when Lubash, the half-orc thug sneaked up on the sentry, stabbed him once during surprised, won initiative and killed him with the second stab. Good work, and they were still unnoticed.
That quickly went bad, but not until after Lubash had scouted the camp, seeing 13-14 people at the camp site, several barrels of supplies and the parts for a Catapult. Right after that, the wolf getting spotted a second time and shot, while Lubash ran into a third sentry that spotted him and they both bailed. Stelian and Leoward then openly walked into a welcoming band. Leoward did some name dropping , talking of the kobolds they were hunting for the knight Eric Faust. He managed to make the Iron Circle leader so unsure of what to do that he let them go.
Now, the players backed up a little and started to wonder what they were going to do here. The dead sentry would spill the beans that they were a liability and they reasoned that the Iron Circle guys at the camp would send one or more messengers that they would proceed to capture and interogate.
Now, I hadn't really planned on what they would do with the camp, and I thought the players reasoning to be good and sent a messenger, right into their ambush. They caught him alive and actually managed to subvert him to their cause. Fun times! He spilled the beans on the invasion plan, saying it was imminent and that the catapults and the supplies weren't necessary if the invasion went as planned.
The players reasoned that they should get back to the Baron at Fallcrest and tell their story there. Not the best solution for Harken maybe, bet very good if they wanted to discredit the knight at Redwood, that they wanted to remove from power!
Yet again, I was in unplanned territory and reasoned that the knight, Erik Faust, would get the necessary information the next day, get paranoid and would try to intercept them before they reached fallcrest. He travelled incognito with three of his own men and two men supplied by the Iron Circle. They caught up with the players just two hours walking outside Fallcrest.
The battle went badly, for both sides. Stelian, Thaim and Erik and his right-hand man went down at about the same time early in the fight. The PC's barely managed to save Thaim (his second wind was triggered after he had failed two death saves). Stelian managed to get into a fight with one Iron Circle representative and one of the men-at-arms, both nearly unhurt, while he was barely above bloodied. He managed to subvert the Iron Circle cutthroat with some good intimidate/diplomacy and they ganged up on the last man-at-arms.
... that is, the last one standing. One of the Iron Circle Cutthroats and run of, being chased by Lubash, the other man-at-arms getting hunted by the wolf-druid Thaim. Lubash finished his cutthroat followed the druid and they teamed up, taking down the last escaping combattant, but not before Lubash going down as well. The only PC not going down was Leoward.
Now, they PC's have just killed a noble (the knight Erik Faust), and are about to enter Fallcrest, telling the Baron about the smuggling taking place near Redwood. The PC's were hiding the death of the knight, but let his horse loose, so it will be discovered relatively quickly (it was a really expensive destrier, quite unique for the area).
I haven't yet planned on what happens next, but I think the PC's will find themself in trouble, possibly with relatives of the dead knight, possibly with the Baron of Fallcrest. They are one step closer to taking command of Redwood though, as it's keeper is dead.
Yesterday was the first session of the campaign, and already they derailed the whole thing. Or, should I say changed the course of the campaign markedly, as I was winging half of the session anyway.
They PC's entered an abondoned manor house on the edge of a small village called Redwood situated on the road between Fallcrest and Harken. There they found Stelian's (the Vrylokka Paladin/Sorcerer) ancestral armor. And the kobolds found them there and ambushed them. Both parties then got ambushed when the kobold fetishes and amulets got destroyed during the battle, releasing two ghosts (of the guards of the manor) and a roaming Spectre.
Stelian has some ancestral claim to the town, but it's over a hundred years old, and they had heard some rumours of weapon smuggling and wanted to check in on the local Knight, Erik Faust. Anything to discredit him would make it easier to get Stelian into the position as the knight of Redwood.
Anyway, the Bard, Leoward proceeded to get them all invited to the knights home, tricking Leah, the wife of the knight to hold a big feast. He held a great performance and the PC's gathered a lot of intelligence. Among other things, wealth that probably showed the rumors of smuggling to be true and also they uncovered the connection to the Iron Circle mercenaries and the coming invasion of Harkenworld.
Having read some of the DM hints found on this forum and in links from this forum, I tried to give all the hints multiple times, via varied means and it really payed off. The players came up with several theories and managed to settle on the right one after some good ideas on checking on which ones where real. Especially Leoward's player made some shrewd moves, weaving in tales of brave historical defenses of Harken and seeing the knight's momentary surprised look that gave confirmation that he was onto the real deal.
Skipping a lot more of the role-playing and little details the players discovered, they decided on going down to the river and the crossing not far from the ruins of Kalton Manor. They hoped to find some more clues, which they did. The dwarven druid Thaim and changed into a wolf when he ran into a trigger happy sentry. He ran back into the woods, when Lubash, the half-orc thug sneaked up on the sentry, stabbed him once during surprised, won initiative and killed him with the second stab. Good work, and they were still unnoticed.
That quickly went bad, but not until after Lubash had scouted the camp, seeing 13-14 people at the camp site, several barrels of supplies and the parts for a Catapult. Right after that, the wolf getting spotted a second time and shot, while Lubash ran into a third sentry that spotted him and they both bailed. Stelian and Leoward then openly walked into a welcoming band. Leoward did some name dropping , talking of the kobolds they were hunting for the knight Eric Faust. He managed to make the Iron Circle leader so unsure of what to do that he let them go.
Now, the players backed up a little and started to wonder what they were going to do here. The dead sentry would spill the beans that they were a liability and they reasoned that the Iron Circle guys at the camp would send one or more messengers that they would proceed to capture and interogate.
Now, I hadn't really planned on what they would do with the camp, and I thought the players reasoning to be good and sent a messenger, right into their ambush. They caught him alive and actually managed to subvert him to their cause. Fun times! He spilled the beans on the invasion plan, saying it was imminent and that the catapults and the supplies weren't necessary if the invasion went as planned.
The players reasoned that they should get back to the Baron at Fallcrest and tell their story there. Not the best solution for Harken maybe, bet very good if they wanted to discredit the knight at Redwood, that they wanted to remove from power!
Yet again, I was in unplanned territory and reasoned that the knight, Erik Faust, would get the necessary information the next day, get paranoid and would try to intercept them before they reached fallcrest. He travelled incognito with three of his own men and two men supplied by the Iron Circle. They caught up with the players just two hours walking outside Fallcrest.
The battle went badly, for both sides. Stelian, Thaim and Erik and his right-hand man went down at about the same time early in the fight. The PC's barely managed to save Thaim (his second wind was triggered after he had failed two death saves). Stelian managed to get into a fight with one Iron Circle representative and one of the men-at-arms, both nearly unhurt, while he was barely above bloodied. He managed to subvert the Iron Circle cutthroat with some good intimidate/diplomacy and they ganged up on the last man-at-arms.
... that is, the last one standing. One of the Iron Circle Cutthroats and run of, being chased by Lubash, the other man-at-arms getting hunted by the wolf-druid Thaim. Lubash finished his cutthroat followed the druid and they teamed up, taking down the last escaping combattant, but not before Lubash going down as well. The only PC not going down was Leoward.
Now, they PC's have just killed a noble (the knight Erik Faust), and are about to enter Fallcrest, telling the Baron about the smuggling taking place near Redwood. The PC's were hiding the death of the knight, but let his horse loose, so it will be discovered relatively quickly (it was a really expensive destrier, quite unique for the area).
I haven't yet planned on what happens next, but I think the PC's will find themself in trouble, possibly with relatives of the dead knight, possibly with the Baron of Fallcrest. They are one step closer to taking command of Redwood though, as it's keeper is dead.
The party has created a mission and a direction for itself. You could always go any number of ways with this. The Baron for instance might just think to himself that the PC is a better choice of knight, maybe because he knows a bit more than he should about how that transfer happened. Perhaps there's a connection between a PC and the Baron that would make this seem even more logical. The Iron Circle seem fairly thuggish, but they're not particularly stupid. They might send someone in under cover to discredit the party, assassinate one or more of them, etc. 
