Café de Nuit

Spring-Heeled Jacks

Paridon is buzzing over the recent reports of a devil-like man attacking women and robbing men in various alleyways and badly lit streets.

As if Paridon didn't have enough problems already! What is happening to this fair city?

Actually, the so-called Spring-heeled Jack is not one but multiple individuals. Three to be precise; three brothers born in the circus and raised as performers and thieves by their cunning father.

Gifted acrobats, the brothers used their natural atheltic skills to pick pockets, pilfer goods, and more importantly run away. While their father was a clever man with both a sharp mind for business and enough sense to avoid overstaying his welcome, the brothers are much more foolhardy and the Spring-Heeled Jack gimmick is their latest attempt at creating a diversion so they may go about their regular thieving without much notice.

On their father's death bed the brothers swore an oath to find a way to stop running and find a more permanent residence. Paridon was big and its shadows large enough to engulf them in a veil of darkness forever, they thought. However, lacking the paternal wisdom they found themselves in too many close calls and needed something new.

And so the younger brother thought of a ruse. Give the law something to chase after, something big, something mean, something scary so that petty thieves would be left alone... for a while. Not to mention that they could lead the men away from their usual hideout.

After a few too many drinks they came up with the concept for a masked bandit more monster than man, as mischievous as he is lecherous. Each one would take turns with some minor changes to the gimmick.

Claws to render the clothes of innocent ladies, fire breathing to scare the braver men, slick "skin" to escape arrest, oils to mask their scent, deathly palour and horns for a little supernatural fear...

The Dark Powers reigning over Paridon decided to add to the trickery by snagging an unsuspecting Tiefling who roughly matches the more popular descriptions of Spring-Heeled Jack and his exploits.

This particular Tiefling isn't particularly malicious, but neither does he care much about other people's property. Confused and alone, he survives through theft and has only a passable understanding of the local vernacular.

Another fine mess for Our Heroes to clean up - or make still worse!

A priest of Ezra (or whatever the Domain decides) has taken a heavy load of gold from the tombs under the chapel, burried along with various wealthy people in the hopes of bribing the ferry-man into letting them get to Paradise. He stole to feed a gambling habit and then stole some more to pay the money back.

He has been cursed not only with madness but with inflicting madness. As per European dark ages folklore, madness is a contagious disease. Unfortunately for his parishoners, he speaks to a lot of people a lot of the time - especially on the holy day of the week (does Ezra have some Sunday equivalent? I mean she's basically Christ of the Mist, right?).

The players are faced with a mad town and must fix things - perhaps their family are involved, perhaps they're troubled by the news of a new 'thieves' guild'. Each mad person has a few clues to the source of the troubles (aside from the fact that each one attended a sermon lately, which isn't a big clue). Mostly the mad people talk of Ezra, money or crushing guilt.

'Armour's chink and the wheel's clink;
I'll get you a drink, and about me you'll think
Like a fountain of colours, but none from a rainbow
Coming from the mountain, I make men crow.'

.... or something perhaps more lyrical. Moving swiftly on! All the townsfolk are jibbering such half-rhymed riddles and are obsessing over money, religion and especially religious icons (swords in the case of Ezra). The supposed thieves guild is a lie - normal townsfolk are more money-obsessed than ever and regularly attempt to steal cash and jewellery. In fact, when the characters arrive in town, if they look rich then they'll be each robbed by an untrained pick-pocket five times before reaching an inn (then robbed again in the inn by an equally poor pick-pocket).

If the characters hear a sermon from the priest (probably on the topic of not coveting money) they start going a little mad and must make checks not to steal gold when they see it.

Killing the now nuts priest who covets gold will only make him rise as a ghost. The problem can only be resolved by making the priest restore the money to the dead. This will be much easier if he's in ghost form, but not impossible either way. And as always - if the characters venture into the catacombs they will find the dead rather wrestless. Destroying their bodies won't make them happier. The priest's 'Failed Power Check' powers concern not being noticed by the dead and some thieving abilities.

And if anyone's looking for a challenge: What about an adventure with no supernatural element, an all-human, non-magical cast? Ordinarily not such a challenge, but doing so while retaining a Ravenloft feel might be tricky.

Black Knight wrote:Unfortunately for his parishoners, he speaks to a lot of people a lot of the time - especially on the holy day of the week (does Ezra have some Sunday equivalent? I mean she's basically Christ of the Mist, right?).

Anchorites have the equivalent Sunday, but instead of an arbitrary day (i.e. Sunday or Saturday) for worship they hold services every 5 days. So in a 365 day year, any specific sect holds service 73 times. The odd thing is, every sect bases their service schedule on the day their sect was established, but each sect does not share a service day ever. I did a whole calendar (using a real calendar) to plot out major holidays, religious holy days (and services), and dates of importance.

Dark Angel wrote:

Black Knight wrote:Unfortunately for his parishoners, he speaks to a lot of people a lot of the time - especially on the holy day of the week (does Ezra have some Sunday equivalent? I mean she's basically Christ of the Mist, right?).

Anchorites have the equivalent Sunday, but instead of an arbitrary day (i.e. Sunday or Saturday) for worship they hold services every 5 days. So in a 365 day year, any specific sect holds service 73 times. The odd thing is, every sect bases their service schedule on the day their sect was established, but each sect does not share a service day ever. I did a whole calendar (using a real calendar) to plot out major holidays, religious holy days (and services), and dates of importance.

Is that 5 days because there is supposed to be 5 faiths of Ezra?

No, there are only 4 sects (in my campaign at least). Borcan, Dementlieu, Mordent, and Darkon host services once or twice a week (given each does it every 5 days, but never on the same day). It would be kind of cool to have a pentad of faiths of Ezra, but the Darkonian sects seems too... finalizing. With Borca and Dementlieu already competing to establish who came first and Mordent working the revisionist angle, not sure how another sect could come in without being too intrusive or too forced compared to what is already in. Maybe the one true faith that unites the others (after a nasty exchange of words and, more likely weapons).

The rumor is that there will be a fifth and final sect one day because the number five figures so prominently in other aspects of the faith (like Fifth Day, which Dark Angel mentioned.)

Gonzoron of the FoS wrote:The rumor is that there will be a fifth and final sect one day because the number five figures so prominently in other aspects of the faith (like Fifth Day, which Dark Angel mentioned.)

I can't help this one.

Are they saving this for 5th edition?!

What's this? People other than me posting? Oh my little thread, you might yet grow up to rival a 4th/5th ed complaints/comments thread.

Maybe one day... maybe one day...

Five decades ago, an advanced civilization (elves? Ming-era Chinese merchants? Great War British cryptographers?) sent a delegation of traders to the Core. They traded various items and knowledge, in return for a future obligation.

One of the things they gave the Core was the secret of gunpowder. When the traders left, the gunpowder technology sparked off a rebellion against the cavalry and pikemen of the nobility and the social order almost collapsed.

Five decades later, the original recipient of the secret of gunpowder is long dead and even his name has been erased from the history books to prevent a similar uprising in future. Now the advanced nation's traders are back, expecting performance of their obligations and surprised at how frail the Core's social order proved to be.

Decades ago, a priest named Loquitur ("the speaker") volunteered to be immured so he could act as a go-between for the realms of the living and the dead. His sacrifice was supposed to put an end to the uprisings of the dead.

However, the undead are still occasionally active, and the nation is constantly in fear of a fullscale overthrow by the dead.

A jawbone, fabled to be stolen from the Loquitur's body, has turned up and numerous forces are working to secure it.

Video games have a long tradition of using horror cinema as a source of inspiration. This time, I purloin the world of horror games for the sake of the Dread Realms.

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The grave quest

Someone is unearthing graves and desecrating tombs, but this one shows signs of purpose with specific parts being harvested from the cadavers. Also, it is the rich and noble of male gender who seem to be the target.

So far, eyes, hearts, rib bones, and nails have been taken from corpses in the domain of Borca. And at least one grieving widow claims a precious ring was stolen from her husband's hand but this may be a simple case of typical grave robbery.

No one knows who the culprit is nor the purpose of such an odd collection.

Video games have a long tradition of using horror cinema as a source of inspiration. This time, I purloin the world of horror games for the sake of the Dread Realms.

No prize if you catch all the references.

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The Strange Case of Dr.Herman

The good doctor Herman of Paridon has recently found a way to tap into the ethereal plane, but prolonged exposure to his machine's odd planar energies have had some unexpected side effects.

Sudden bouts of rage accompanied by visions of odd creatures chasing him haunt him whenever his stress reaches a critical mass. Not only that, but he transforms physically into a deformed creature with a hunchback.

Today of all day is his wedding, but he just HAD to work. Never one to slack off, the good doctor agreed to see an elderly patient on the other side of town despite this being his wedding day.

Alas, it seems as if the whole city has conspired to make his journey back as painful and stressful as possible.

As things get rougher and rougher, the good doctor feels his grip on reality loosen and the creatures begin their attack. Fortunately, he gains some psychic powers in his new, stress-induced form.

In truth, he doesn't really change and the "creatures" are the psychic impressions of random living creatures as they appear in a (partly) dark powers created parallel pocket domain (the machine generated a pocket domain, the dark powers imbued it with its unique properties).

The longer the doctor stays in the pocket domain, the more he loses himself to it and forgets who he really is.

In an isolated farming region in Falkovnia, all the crops have been contaminated by St Anthony's Fire and the food is running low. In one of the towns of this region (the one the PC's are in) people started to desperate a while back, so they gather all money and tradable items they could spare and sent a wagon caravan to exchange them for good grains.
The problem really starts when the people of the town realize that the caravan didn't come back in the time it should have. The situation is now dire, with really little food remaining and no more money, the town can’t hope to survive the long winter ahead, so the PC's are given what little supplies the town can spare and sent to find out what happened to the caravan and the grain it was supposed to bring back.

In the surrounding towns the heroes discover that things are even worst, some have already runned out of food and have been eating the infected grain, as a result now most people is running around mad with hallucinations. This madness seems to be worst the more they travel and soon, they start seeing villagers engaging in strange ritualistic murders in the fields or going in massive witch hunts and, of course, they become a targets for both. This means they are taking much longer than anticipated to get somewhere where there's good food, and their own provisions are starting to run out. Will they make it in time, or will they be faced with a choice between starvation and madness?

When (and if) they finally reach the only town in the region with crops that haven't been infected, they notice people act very politely but strangely towards them, and nobody has seen the caravan sent by the town.
The truth is a Hag has founded a cult to her evil patron in that town, and has converted all the townspeople. The crop blight is caused by her in an attempt to bring madness to the region so she can convert more people, that’s the reason for the blood sacrifices and witch trials in the surrounding towns, people is accepting or fighting the hag's influence in their own grain-maddened way.

Zettaijin wrote:The Strange Case of Dr.Herman

Jekyll and Hyde game for the NES?