Café de Nuit

Edit : Well, you guys dont have the spellcheck option. I hope my barage of spelling mistakes wont make this huge first post unreadable. And I apologise in advance, I'm french and all.


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By popular request, I have returned to the scene of D&D after an absence of 4 years. My new players wanted to play in ravenloft, and this fitted me quite well, since I believe ravenloft is the only decent setting out there because adventures in it incorporate something that lack in other worlds: story and atmosphere.
To play in this world all over again fits me for another reason, that is, I have plenty of tested adventures under my belt, and in two weeks, I am going to do one of the best one I did.

The original idea for this adventure was inspired from the adventure suggestion section in the Ravenloft boxset, and it goes like this : the players are trapped in a huge mansion with a familly of aristocrats and their relative, and one of the girl gave birth to a sneaky, ugly little creature thats going to kill'em all, and they have to survive the night. Its a scenario ripped off from Alien 1, 3 and the movie The Thing.
So in the adventure, the PCs will be stuck in the manor with a dozen important different NPCs, all of them with a wide variety of personalities, and thus, they will all have a different interactions with the PCs. Heck, this whole adventure is based on how the players and NPCs will interact between each other, once the paranoia and distrust will be in place, and the more realist this interaction will be, the better. After all, if the players dont make allies, they'll probably be killed by a mourning father and a vengeful former-husband, or somebody else gone crazy out of fear.

Now, I consider myself a pretty good DM. I am a master at creating a believable, realistic atmosphere for the players, and they know me for making adventure caracterized by an intrigue inside a riddle wrapped into a mistery leading to a trap, all of it with a taste of moral ambiguity and choices. But where I suck is when it comes to impersonate NPC. I have the facial expression range of an inguana. Hell, toward the end of the night, after 4 hours of non-stop playing, I dont even bother to impersonate NPC at all. It just goes something like this :

PC : so I ask the highpriest " Oh, great warlord of Tempus, may I require another chance to bring back the head of this vile orc shaman who defiled our great temple ?"
DM : (using the same monotonous ton of voice I use for every NPC since the beginning of the campaign, may they be male of female) : The highpriest reply by saying that you had your chance, and snap your neck.

So here's what I tought : I have this player I know very well, who's a ****ing god when it comes to acting. He just love's it, and he's funny like hell when he does his interpretations. So just for this quest, I thought I could delegate to him the burden of playing the different NPCs. I will do the storytelling, atmosphere building, intrigue weaving that I'm good at, and he'll play the various caracters. How about that ? Is it crazy enough to work ? Did anyone else did it before ? Did it worked ?!? Do you guys have any tips ?

And here's another question. How should I design my creature ? I have a pretty good idea, but I think that if we'd brainstorm on it, we could come up with something great. It doesn't have to be an already existing monster. And dont give me any of this 3rd edition slang, I play on the good ol' trusty second one.

Right of the bat, it has to be growing and changing. Like in the book, it will probably be gaining 8 hp per hours, plus some other habilities. Also, it could move silently and hide in shadow very well, or, while we're at it, it could simply phase from shadows trough shadow instantaneously. That would make it suprising and sneaky. And it should be resilient, too. For exemple, it could regenerate at a high rate, or have acide blood that rapidly make weapons uselsss after 2 or 3 hits.
As for its appearance, it doesn't really matter : like the creature in Alien 1, it will be seen very rarely, and only in the darkness. And finally, it doesn't have to be that deadly, since the real danger in this quest isn't the monster, but the other bastards trapped into the manor, who are going crazy, ill-advised and reckless out of fear and paranoia.

And if you guys are interested, I could go deeper into the details of this quest, for the fun of developing it together. I know exactly every chapter of this story, but I haven't spent time yet to do the NPCs. Hell, I dont even have the map of the manor.

B~E wrote:So just for this quest, I thought I could delegate to him the burden of playing the different NPCs. I will do the storytelling, atmosphere building, intrigue weaving that I'm good at, and he'll play the various caracters. How about that ? Is it crazy enough to work ? Did anyone else did it before ? Did it worked ?!? Do you guys have any tips ?

Well, I have used other players for NPCs - but not for playing ALL of them. I use him to play only one NPC, for example the main enemy. Somebody who shoud be very clever and ruthless (but it is hard to DM, create an atmosphere and at the same be VERY clever all the time and adopt myself into new situations), so I use somebody else who can concentrate to one character just like PCs, which makes him considerably more dangerous. For example for playing Strahd/Azalin etc. against PCs I would use some other player, preferably other RL DM who knows the atmosphere, history, characters. And I always give him some guidelines he should follow.

It has always worked very well. These have been the best games, most thrilling, since the PCs know that the other player is ruthless and merciless.

The only disadvantage is that the other player has to be in the other room usually (except when he is directly interacting with PCs), so for some time somebody feels not-so-exited. But since the other player-NPC is just a tool - which I have told him - he has no complaints when most of my concentration goes to regular players.

Shortly: I recommend using other people for NPCs. Possibly a great game!

One possible problem with a duo-DMing arrangement: the two of you don't have the same brain. This will be more or less of a problem depending on your adventure's complexity.

What would happen, if for some reason, the DM-assistant had one of the NPCs do or say something you didn't expect? Or send the PCs on a false lead? What if either of you forget something vital the other had said and you end up contradicting each other? If there's a mistake, can you correct it without the players' noticing? (Players: let's go to the attic! DM: OK, but the door to the attic is sealed, so... Players: What? But the housemaid said she went there for spare sheets every day?... DM: What do you mean? The attic is empty, except for a hidden cloaker, and... oops!)

I think one should give those issues some thought before sharing the DMing power with another.

Igor the Henchman wrote:One possible problem with a duo-DMing arrangement: the two of you don't have the same brain. This will be more or less of a problem depending on your adventure's complexity.

What would happen, if for some reason, the DM-assistant had one of the NPCs do or say something you didn't expect? Or send the PCs on a false lead? What if either of you forget something vital the other had said and you end up contradicting each other? If there's a mistake, can you correct it without the players' noticing? (Players: let's go to the attic! DM: OK, but the door to the attic is sealed, so... Players: What? But the housemaid said she went there for spare sheets every day?... DM: What do you mean? The attic is empty, except for a hidden cloaker, and... oops!)

I think one should give those issues some thought before sharing the DMing power with another.

The two brains thing shouldn't be a problem, since I will have properly briefed him, and my adventure will not be very complex, nor very long in fact. Here's a rapide resumé of the chapters :

- The PC run away from their devastated town (we have just finished a "prequel" campaign that lasted 6 weeks, which explain how their city got absorbed into Ravenloft, and it culminated in the city being overun by undead in a "Day of the Dead" kind of way. Its an adventure I'd suggest you do, very fun.)

- Due to the fact that they're fleeing away from the city, the PCs wander away in the forest, get lost due to the Ravenloft fogs, and during the day they get into a fight where it must become clear to them that they will not survive the night in this suddently hostile world.

- TAt 8 PM, they find the manor, and ask to spend the night there.

- The PCs interact with the NPCs. There will be between 6 and 10 of them, and this part will last between 9 and 10 PM, where the caracters will go to bed.

- At 11 PM, the girl give birth to rapidly growing monster. The wretched thing kills her, and whoever else was present in the room.

- NPCs start dying, and only a few PCs (not even all of them) knows its a monster.

-As a result, the PCs interact with now paranoid, fear-crazed and mourning NPCs.

-The PCs kill the creature, leave the house, all before 6 AM. .

This adventure wont be very complex because there are very few predetermined events and very few predetermined NPC encounter. I leave most of the development of the story to my PCs' unmatched ability to get into trouble and afterward escape certain death by a hair. My co-master will impersonate the NPCs as he see fit, according to the situation and to the NPCs' predetermined personality and goals. I fact, I am ready to bet the success of my adventure on the flexibility of my story and my ability to develope a coherant and increasingly complex adventure on the spot..

However, I will play probably one or two of the most important NPCs.

The only encounters I have predetermined so far are the following :

- When the girl give birth and is immediatly murdered by her little freak, one of the PC will arrive on the scene before everyone else, then the creature will jump on him, spill some blood on him, and manage to run away. Then, the father and husband will arrive, to see their girl murdered in a most grusome manner, and the PC, a stranger, covered with blood. Impending justice will follow.
This dramatic event will set the tone for the rest of the night, and it will be up to the PCs to convince the familly that their friend is innocent. This will probably result in himbeing locked up, by himself, in a dark room, until dawn.

- At some point, the mother will eventualy take her own life in front of one of the PC.

- the majority of the remaining NPC will start of scared by the murder, but will still be more or less neutral toward the PCs. Their behaviors will evolve depending on how the PCs try to gain their trust to survive the night. So the father and ex-husband will probably be the first NPCs to distrust the heros, and more may follow.
Oh, and screaming constently that its the newborn monster thats killing everybody wont help your credibility. =)

- a certain level of paranoia will reign between the players, for only one or two of the heros will have seen the monster.

- I'm tempted to trow in a minor poltergeist, who's never directly seen, but presence always felt in the forme of the usual moving objects, shape only seen at the corner of the eye, footsteps, ect.


And thats is all. I trust the rest of the story will evolve by itself, powered by the dinamics of the PCs and the NPCs.

Also, does anyone have a sugestion on why the girl gave birth to a monster ? I am tempted to use the good old "Terribly Familly Secret Involving Vistany Curse". Even if it isn't original, my players are new to ravenloft, so its alright.

Finally, does anyone have a suggestion of creature I could use ?

In the original adventure it was a naga, if memory serves. Try using a broodling Kython from the Book of Vile Darkness, they even look like Gieger's Alien aliens!

Yes, the naga was one of the suggestions. As for the Book of the Vile darkness, well, I kinda dont have that. HEck, my DnD material is pretty outdated, from the second edition.

What about a feyr then?

What the hell is that ?

2nd Ed Monsterous Manual, Page 116.

Okay, I always feel dirty when I plug my own work, but I wrote a well-recieved expansion on fihyrs (alternatively feyr or feyers) in the most recent Quoth the Raven (#11). It is in 3.5 but could probably be converted or stripped for ideas. The whys should write themselves.
The monster itself is in Monster Manual II for 3E and in the big Monstrous Manual in 2E.

Or it could be some manner of demon or half-field. Perhaps the young girl had a visit paid to her by everyone's favorite, if overused, NPC. The Phantom Lover could also fit the same role, it was never answered what manner of children he would sire IIRC.

B~E wrote:Right of the bat, it has to be growing and changing. Like in the book, it will probably be gaining 8 hp per hours, plus some other habilities. Also, it could move silently and hide in shadow very well, or, while we're at it, it could simply phase from shadows trough shadow instantaneously. That would make it suprising and sneaky. And it should be resilient, too. For exemple, it could regenerate at a high rate, or have acide blood that rapidly make weapons uselsss after 2 or 3 hits.

Another idea would to have the creature (baby) be some sort of unique caliban. Some sort of dark force or magic warped the child and now it is a hideous mutation running about the manner. Was one of the family members an evil wizard? Maybe their was a dark curse place on the manor or grounds long ago? Perhaps, the family is just so degenerate that they've eventually spawned a child that is as ugly outside as the rest of them are within?

Since you are using second edition, I would merely add whatever special abilities you feel are appropriate to it (i.e. give it acidic blood and regeneration abilities to make it a more fearsome opponent to fight). Depending upon your ideas, you can increase these abilities and add new ones as the child grows older. Perhaps, this would lead to a whole series of adventures as the mutant child (not truly dead) escapes at the end...

B~E wrote:Where I suck is when it comes to impersonate NPC. I have the facial expression range of an inguana. Hell, toward the end of the night, after 4 hours of non-stop playing, I dont even bother to impersonate NPC at all.

I tend to suffer from this same dilemma. While I can come up with some great adventure ideas and flesh out some truly memoriable NPCs, my overall acting ability wanes as I am trying to cover the seventh or eigth character of the evening. One practice that I've found useful is using a particular item (or prop) for each NPC. A hat, glasses, or other item helps me keep NPCs straights as my lack of voices and faces shines through. This might not help much in this situation, but you might consider it food for thought for future gatherings.

As this land has just recently been absorbed by RavenLoft, perhaps the creature(baby) should be the first manifestation of the Dark Powers influence over it.

IIRC, there was a Dungeon adventure years ago that used a similar Alien-ripoff scenario. It used a red slaad larva (kind of a giant-tadpole-turned-piranha) as the monster, drawing on the actual life cycle of that outsider species, IIRC.

I think the assistant DM could work quite well. One word of advice, I had a similar adventure involving a LARGE amount of NPCs in one house and a mystery to be solved. I recommend finding pictures to match the NPCs and printing them to show the players. It definately helps them (and you!) keep track of who they are talking to.

Also make sure you (and your assistant) know the motivations (at least the basic ones) of each NPC. Why are they here, what will be their reaction to events you know will occur. That sort of thing... The great thing about having lots of NPC's is that each on can react differently to the same circumstance, further adding realism and enhancing their characters.

gonzoron wrote:I recommend finding pictures to match the NPCs and printing them to show the players. It definately helps them (and you!) keep track of who they are talking to.

That's a really good idea, gonzoron. Do you happen to know any place that hosts a good collection of character pictures? Dragon magazine used to have pages with portraits included, but they don't seem to do this anymore...