Well I was considering it more bluff by omission. He thinks that
they're just dead bugs and doesn't realize he gave away an item of value.
...erm....ok. But the first thing I said upon picking them up was that they were valuable:
This... (pick up the vial with insect wings, hold it up to my eye and shake it gently) ...is valuable.
((I thought that Aduial was going on behalf of the king and her own initiative? Either way, Lorsen has just figured out that Aduial is not closely working with House Dmarra and it's allies which had had previously believed/assumed.))
...we left some of the details fuzzy, but from my character background:
"...having had her fill of the court of Nosarri, she instead wandered elsewhere though the kingdom. Within a few short months she ended up in the northern lands belonging to Count Marcus of House Dmarra. There she found petty noble squabbling over a variety of topics mostly of no particular interest...
...Aduial became aware of many nobles within House Dmarra expressing growing annoyance over the actions of their neighbor to the south, Narseus. Rumors abound within the court that the official mayor of the town is mere pawn to his Marshal, Lorsen. That he is secretly a member of the assassin's guild. That he is possessed by demons. That he has such terrible blackmail secrets that the mayor and town council dare not reign him in. Any number of theories, but little of substance. But regardless of the truth of the matter, Narseus is a port through which a not-insignificant amount of trade passes and a growing number of nobles have begun to think of it as a matter demanding action. But what action? Narseus is not part of any beholden fief, and there seems little to be done short of direct military intervention, which so far...few feel is justified. A more subtle approach would be preferable.
Subtle? Non-military solutions preferred? Clearly, this was an opportunity for Aduial to perform a favor for a noble lord that might be responded to with a favor in exchange."
From the beginning I thought my motivation for being here was to ingratiate myself to house Dmarra by helping stabilize the region for their benefit. The Baron Radhan plotline was
introduced here, and in that post you even mentioned that I might or might not reveal my "complete" mission later. I assumed it was a lead-in to the main plot, kind of like Orsi, except that it's seemed to grow a life of its own. And then I didn't even get the PM mentioning the king's message until later. I just went with it.
But...we can easily resolve that simply by saying that Aduial either misunderstood the
nature of their interest in the Baron's well-being, or alternately simply by saying that as an outsider to court Dmarra (she is) they were deliberately using her to serve their own goals by feeding her bad information, figuring that if things went bad none of the blame would be placed on them.
Aduial has already begun to suspect that it might not be in her best interest to be helpful to house Dmarra after all...but that's largely based on the fact that she's perceiving Lorsen as a guy who's basically well intentioned, with a big problem and a shortage of information, and just trying to do the best he can with what he has to work with.
wizards
Hmm. Ok. At some point we'll need to clarify some things about how magic works in this campaign. So far I've cast only a single spell, but there are a few things that are very likely to come up.
Personally, in my own campaigns that I run I use a totally custom set of house rules because even since 1st edition D&D has always had strangely inconsistent rules for handling magic. I glanced through the 3.5 players handbook last night, and they look to be even worse than first edition. Seems like they tried to fix things that weren't broken and ignored some of the things that were.
No, the boy didn't speak the tongue of the north.
they had a child. A child from the northern wastes who had strange tattoos
I'm kind of having to deduce things here that would be totally common knowledge. Trafnor was originally described an as "ancient demonic tongue." But it turns out that Lorsen speaks it...and apparently even his maid recognizes it. So it's hardly as rare as I assumed it to be. On page 3 it was mentioned that the boy was brought from the northern wastes...and it wasn't until page 7 when Lorsen revealed that he spoke Trafnor that it was first described as the "tongue of the north." Prior to that, in the original post in the "starting area" spoiler the "lands to the north and west" were described as belonging to Count Dmarra. So...I guess...the orcs live norther
er and Trafnor is their language. So, I can take that and retroactively deduce that Trafnor is apparently common orcish, spoken widely in the northern
er lands...where the boy comes from...therefore the boy has probably had contact with orcs.
Aside from the fact that I would obviously not have assumed that Lorsen didn't speak any "common orcish" when I knew he'd been waging war against orcs 5 years ago...Aduial would have known that Trafnor is commonly spoken in the north rather than having to deduce it from a stray comment, and would reasonably have made the connection to the boy back on page 3 when she was first told the boy was from the northern wastes. All her deductions about the demonic connections and the sacrifice are now in question because the
far simpler explanation is that he was simply a survivor of an orcish raid. I have no evidence that there's anything really demonic going on or any cults at all except Lorsen's insistence of these things and the rumormongering of peasants. Again, the
far simpler explanation is that the boy recognized the knife because he's from the north where the orcs are, a survivor of an orcish raid, and it's an orcish blade. It's enchanted against elves because there were elves in the north with the orcs. We have evidence that there were...because that's where the boy came from. The only thing really tying him to the demon cult plotline is that his name appeared on the parchments from the caravan...but I only realized that it was
his name when I read it because I had already connected him to the demon cult plotline. Without that connection, I would have had no reason to suspect his name was the one being mentioned on the parchment until just now when he told me that was his name. I suspected the need for a ritual sacrifice...elves are rare, and the boy was brought here, with the knife being brought here to do the ritual. But in light of recent events and realizations, it makes far more sense that there are no cults at all, nothing is amiss, the halflings were just selling spooky trade goods, and the knife is just a generic orcish weapon with an anti-elven enchantment.
...so...yeah. We have enough twists and misunderstandings going on here that I think things are starting to not make sense. I understand if you, as the DM, would rather not spoil the story by clarifying things. And I'll try to have Aduial just roll with it...but...just realize that while a day or two ago I was looking at situations and thinking "ok, the reason for that is either this, this or that." Now, I'm kind of looking at things and thinking "...uhh...ok, maybe he was mind controlled and did stuff and has no memory of it, because if not, there might not be anything going on at all."
I suppose it's possible there is a halfling cult, and the Baron is in on it despite being a half-elf himself. He freaked out over the law going after Orsi simply because they're both cultists, and all the emotional backstory from Erwin was just...overstated. Or maybe the halflings have a mage who's been mind controlling him for years...for some reason.
But again, at this point, "nothing really is going on, the halflings are dealing in spooky trade goods and the Marshal is panicking needlessly" seems to fit the available information better.
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Topic: Schemes and Shadows (Read 22762 times)