[Private] Thread for Fantasy Game Masters

[lostcheerio]

Fantasy for the Players Fantasy Premise in Brief: Evil wizards are about to consume a fey creature to aid their magic. Escape from the wizards' tower, open a portal to the Feywild, and get the Faerie Dragon safely back to its own plane. Fantasy Premise in Detail What is as rare as a Faerie Dragon's breath? It dazzles, confuses, bewitches, and delights. Some call it Euphoria, and try to befriend one to get a whiff. Some want to call it at will, and seek to dissect one, and have it for themselves. What evil monster would cut apart such a fragile, interesting creature, to steal the gland or organ, the sparkling lung or jeweled throat that creates this magical aerosol concoction? The evil wizards of The Two Moon Magery, that's who. Led by the powerful alchemist Mortigorn the Great, this cabal of wicked mages has captured a dragon, and is now attempting to draw its magic from its body. Unless they can be stopped! Welcome to Prismadia, a land of mystery and wonder, where dolphins become mushroom clouds, and wizards walk on water. Oh the ineffable sweetness of the Faerie Dragon. Oh, the greedy sparkle in the alchemist's eyes. A huge glass orb awaits to receive the extraction. The moons are high. As our adventure begins, The Great Mortigorn is in his laboratory, preparing his arcane knives. But there is a portal to the Feywild that can be found near the tower, deep in the woods. Can the rescuers get the little dragon out of the tower, elude the wizards' guards, and activate the portal to safety? Players can choose to be the Faerie Dragon captive, or another Faerie Dragon, who has gone undercover to save her, polymorphed as a human. Alternatively, players can choose to be a rogue wizard who has decided to disrupt the procedure, or a wizard's assistant. Any of the characters the player does not choose can be used by the GM as helpful NPCs or obstructive enemies. If you would like to peruse the pregens on offer, they are in spoilerbuttons below. If you want to create your own character, don't open them! Unwanted pregens can be adopted by the GM as NPCs or enemies. Be the Fairy Dragon   Buttons Buttons is vain, and funny, and brisk. A skilled performer at mimicry, she used to be the special pet of the human princess of Prismadia. Though Buttons was banished for playing tricks on the palace staff, she remembers fondly her time with the princess, and still loves to eat human food when she can get it. She was caught by the mages on a pan of blackberry cobbler -- embarrassing! A net and a stunning fog later, and now she's in the wizard's lab, looking for a way out of this mess! Skills: Euphoria breath! Makes people act stupidly happy. She specializes in illusion magic, and she can communicate telepathically with other Faerie Dragons nearby. Weakness: Buttons' horn is spiral and sharp, like a unicorn. It's been unscrewed and removed by one of the wizards, so she can't fly. Without it, or a reasonable substitution, she is earthbound. What a drag! Least favorite spell: Invisibility. Stupid spell! Why would she ever want to be invisible? Be the Evil Wizard   The Fey Expert Alphonia Conch When you've studied as much among the fey as Alphonia, you almost have too much knowledge to sit quietly in the room while one is getting consumed for arcane purposes. If her learning had stayed on the page, like many of the other mages here, she could have compartmentalized her work in a box called research, instead of getting to know certain subjects as individuals, even privately, secretly, as friends. As it is, she cannot erase the memory of Jinx the Pixie, who The Great Mortigorn actually ate in one terrific bite, hoping to acquire the ability to fey step. And then there was Booboo the hag, who knit Alphonia an odiferous scarf out of swamp moss. She meant well. Did she deserve what she got? Magic requires sacrifices. But as Alphonia begins this ritual with the Faerie Dragon, she can't help but wonder if the secrets of Euphoria are worth the life of this creature. Skills: Deep knowledge of fey creatures, and a friendship with fey folk in the area who would know how to open the portal. Hobbies: Knitting badly, reading widely, and interior design that "brings the outside in." The Otter Keeper Elgred Erwilliger Somebody's got to mind the otters. To distract folk in the nearby town from their inevitable and inconvenient questions about the evil doings in the laboratory on the top floor of Mortigorn's tower, the wizards have started an otter rescue on the ground floor, and a tea room on the second level. Nothing is more innocent than otters and tea. The otters are meant to be a screen for evil, to project the message: "Nothing going on here! Only little furry creatures, trying to survive!" Elgred is in charge of the otters and he loves them. His peers scorn him for being "such a druid" and spending so much time in the river. He's even been seen crawling and out of the otter burrows, which is what gives his hair its signature frizzle, and his robes their peculiar fragrance. It's true, he has a way with plants and animals. But he's also enchanted some of those otters to be quite large, and taught them how to fight. That's how the screen became the security. Skills: Affinity for plants and animals, and personal connections with some of the otter security staff. Transmutation is his specialty, so he can druidcraft and mend. Weaknesses: For all he's training them to be tough killers, Elgred has a soft spot for all animals. Will that extend to a small, rainbowy, desperate fey creature? Be the Wizard's Assistant   The Scholar Greta Gortimorn A details person, a note-taker, a planner, Greta is trying very hard to be the consummate assistant. She has aspirations, big ones, to become the next "the Great!" and even changed her name from Pia Rothschild to attract the archmage's attention and win his favor. She bought the biggest blank spellbook on offer, with the hopes of filling it with majestic arcane scribbles, but so far she is a bit frustrated with the amount of responsibility she's been given. So many mages, here at the Two Moon Magery. So many assistants clamoring for jobs and power. It might occur to her that it's time to make a move. Maybe an archfey, grateful for the rescue of this dragon, could bestow some magical power that Mortigorn seems to be content with hoarding forever. Skills: Has a plan. Understands how the Magery works. Knows people's secrets. Weakness: Envious. Rash. Will leap from one ship to another during a storm. Might change name to: Rachfey Tatinia The Tearoom Cashier Flipper Moon Flipper is very, very content to do their work in the tea room and avoid notice from any of the important mages. They put a little Prestidigitation on the foam over here, serve with a polite Mage Hand over there, and take the silver pieces back to the till obediently. The only reason they are up in the laboratory at all is that Mortigorn the Great ordered tea and crumpets to go along with his awful ritual, and Flipper lost the bet between the other servers and had to be the one to take up a tray. Could this be the day that Flipper stands up and rocks the boat, for the very first time in their mild, apologetic life? Skills: Flipper is into tarot, has a particular gift for reading people and putting together predictions, and quietly aspires to Divination powers. Favorite show: Dawson's Creek. Be Another Faerie Dragon Undercover   Crispian Crispian is a Faerie Dragon, here to rescue Buttons. Crispian is not good at Polymorph and has awful trouble holding onto his human (ehh? kind of human?) shape. The best way he can concentrate and cover his wobbly spell is to act mad, really mad. He's here ostensibly to deliver some reagents, and has had to argue and fuss his way past security and the lesser mage assistants to get into the laboratory where the action is happening. He claims the box he's holding contains light sensitive chemicals that can dissolve the Faerie Dragon's horn and make it into Fly potions, and has been trying to figure out who has the horn and how to get it from them. Skills: Can telepathically communicate with other Faerie Dragons nearby. Can Polymorph. Can shout convincingly in Common. Motivation: Buttons is a friend. That's it. Just a friend.

Settings for the Game Master You should start your game in the laboratory, and the player's goal should be to get to the portal.   Wizard Tower Two Moon Magery, Tea Room, and Otter Refuge Bottom level: The ground floor of the tower is the Children of the Storm Otter Rescue. You can surrender orphans by placing them in the otter house on the pole, and they will be integrated with the pack by kind animal experts. You can play with the otters during scheduled visits, entering at the small door to the right of the stairs. Second level: Ascend the stairs to reach the Two Moon Tea House, where fey delicacies are faithfully recreated, and can be consumed without that pesky "Don't Eat Anything in the Feywild" rule. Top Floor: Bigger inside than outside, the mage towers appear to be cute and miniature, but in fact are large and forbidding, masked by their innocent lower levels, but chock full of evil laboratories, dark libraries, experimental spaces, extradimensional monstrosities, a dog kennel, and many dusty attics. Wizard Laboratory The Great Mortigorn's Private Laboratory Wizard central is alive with activity tonight as Mortigorn the Great hosts all the most important mages in the order to this special ritual. The large rectangular room has a scuffed wooden floor and blue walls. Bright moonlight pours through the tall windows. Pneumatic tubes run across the ceiling, carrying missives and magic components to other areas of the Two Moon Magery. Wooden cabinets, counters and shelves line the walls, and are strewn with all sorts of alchemical implements: vials of colored liquid, beakers that steam with puffs of smoke, mortar and pestles, and bubbling alembics, all being fussed over and operated by a posse of mages. Their robes are not presentational -- these are work clothes for a serious bit of labor. On the table in the center of a room, a pink Faerie Dragon is pinned by clasps and ropes, and a mage in a pointy blue hat leans over her, holding a scalpel. Above his head, there's a huge glass orb, waiting to receive and preserve whatever organs or fluids the mage extracts. The room is busy with movement and low murmuring, as the assistants clink glass and the wizards chant their awful verses. Wild Woods The Nevergreen Woods Hounds howl, and the two moons shine down throwing competing shadow patterns over the green forest floor. The woods smells of moss, the tang of sweat from forest creatures under strain, a recent rain, and the tantalizing proximity of fey magic. Here, round orange woodmelons grow on raised stalks, each one swaying and shaking, as if to point the way to safety. The path itself becomes a stream, becomes light and shadow, stretches through the woods, bordered with twisting vines and woody tendrils. The trees wriggle and shift, leafless. Fog spreads around the forest and turns the night colder, allowing a hiding place for friends and foes. Portal to the Feywild Portal to Kingdom Come Safety. Sanctuary. The portal to the Feywild opens in huge pink blooms in a lavender haze. Intoxicating to breath it in, when even the air feels bright, and gives a tingle to fingertips, a bounce to every step. Beyond the magical arch that draws itself through the night, there is a world with a purple sky. Here a bright blue light illuminates a delicate tent of gauze and shimmer. Two tall lithe figures wait there, beckoning to the captive to come to their waiting arms. To look into it is almost to be beyond it, but it ripples in space, a rift in time.

Monsters for the Game Master Note: These enemies may appear separately or all together, and your player doesn't need to encounter all of them, unless time permits.   Monster: Otter Security Force The Loyal Rescue Otter These otters have no idea that there's anything untoward going on upstairs. They just know they were rescued as orphans, experimented on to make them larger and more deadly, and honestly that's all they have the will or the remaining mental capacity to know. In the otter hierarchy, mightier makes rightier, and these adorably vicious creatures are led by Womper and Guts, the two biggest otters of all. Who's bigger -- Womper or Guts? They measure it out on the daily, but so far neither has been able to definitively claim supremacy. Combat: Loyal to the pack and to their wizard patrons (captors? ehhh...) they hunt in groups and swarm their enemies with bites and scratches. Special Skills: They can hold their breath underwater for a ridiculous amount of time, and have been known to hurl rocks and bric-a-brac from the laboratory garbage chute. Minion: Beautiful Blonde Rogue Marty Throon This rapier's for hire. Known to those who fear her as The Golden Rogue, those who write her checks as Marty Throon, and those who love her as Dear Mare, this mercenary halfling rogue is paid by the Two Moon Magery to defend its assets. She doesn't live in the tower, she doesn't like tea, and she has more love for the Hounder Hounds than the otter foundlings. Combat: She's very sneaky, can hide behind a willow twig, and throws daggers in rapid fire. Special Skills: She doesn't make herself visible around the actual tower at all, but she has ways of keeping surveillance live, and makes it her business to know who's coming and going. BBEG: The Water Wizard Mortigorn the Great Mortigorn the Great was fathered by a water genie, but his mother is an Eladrin. Naturally ungifted, bitter, and argumentative, this wizard has wrestled his powers from the world by any means necessary. In a way, he's proof that you can get ahead in this life by eating pixies and drinking hag blood. In another way, it's lonely at the top of the mage tower, and he doesn't make a practice of paying attention to his minions, or even associating much with his peers. Combat: He controls water and fights with ice. When things get gritty, he's likely to just try to eat his enemies. Special Skills: Mortigorn is actually an amazing chef, and a little known fact is that many of the pastries and delicate sandwiches available in the tea room are his own recipe and design. He relieves stress by creating in the kitchen, as his Eladrin mother taught him to do.

Table for Plot Twists Roll a d6 after post #12. This plot twist can be introduced at any time, even right at the end. 1. Which Way?! The PC loses the Faerie Dragon. If they are playing the Faerie Dragon, then one of the NPCs gets lost. 2. Romance Strikes! The Faerie Dragon falls in love with the PC. If they are the Faerie Dragon, then one of the NPCs falls in love with them. This romance can be intense platonic affection. 3. Alignment Surprise! The Faerie Dragon is actually evil! If they are the Faerie Dragon, then one of the wizards is revealed to have the opposite alignment than the one they're presenting. 4. Change the Goal Posts! The portal to the Feywild is not actually compromised somehow. Not safe. Gotta make a new plan. 5. Tear-jerker Finale! In order to save the Faerie Dragon, one of the rescuers must be sacrificed. If the player is the Faerie Dragon, then one of the NPCs must die to save them. If they are not the Faerie Dragon, then their PC must die. If this noble sacrifice is made before 47 posts have been written, the player can take over another character. 6. Dad? Is that you? The Faerie Dragon is connected in some unexpected way with the PC's backstory. If they are the Faerie Dragon, then they are connected in some unexpected way with one of the NPCs.

Table for Complications Roll a d6 after post #24. This complication can be introduced at any time, even right at the end. 1. The Smile Remains There's a grinning cat up in a tree, striped purple and black. 2. Chasms Aweigh! A deep cave suddenly yawns in the woods. 3. This is Exactly What I Was Looking For! A mysterious key is found. 4. Suddenly Seymour A strange plant grows unexpectedly large. 5. Wake Up, Mr. Frodo! Sam Gamgee arrives for a cameo. 6. Blow Winds, Crack Your Cheeks! A sudden thunderstorm breaks its fury in the night.

Table for Encounters Roll a d6 after post #36. This enemy can be encountered at any time, even right at the end. 1. Hounder Hounds 2. Root Walkers 3. Rogue Mud Golem 4. Bat-Eared Devil Dealer 5. Neuleth Alembera'el, Eladrin Bard 6. Fey Flower Elemental   1 - Hounder Hounds Hounder Hounds Mortigorn the Great is evil enough to subvert dogs! These hounds track the fairy relentlessly, and on a one roll, the pack catches up. The PC can fight them or cleverly use a high pitched frequency or another creative solution to drive them away. The wizard is unkind, and one dog can be befriended on a successful animal handling roll, made with advantage if the PC thinks to offer food. The newly loyal dog will drive thee other two away and travel with the PC. Root Walkers Root Walkers Some of the wizard's life-stealing endeavers have caused large populations of plant life to die off. Some of those animated as undead and have ripped themselves up by the roots with an insatiable hunger for warm-blooded creatures. With a movement speed of 15 feet, it is easy to outrun them, however, they present as a blighted field of wilted plants and only open their lookers and attack when the PC is in grappling range. The PC can be alerted to the danger with a successful, specific perception check or nature check on these plants. If they fail, the Root Walkers allow them to get into the field, then they animate and try to grapple the PC and eat them alive. 3 - Rogue Mud Golem Rogue Mud Golem Created by the wizard for manual labor, this Mud Golem interacted with fey magic and became self-aware. It ran away from the evil wizard and now haunts the wilds around the tower. Do its callous ill-treatment at the hands of the wizard, it is afraid of people and can be aggressive and threatening, but can also be befriended. It may have relevant information about the wizard or the wilds or the portal, but with no mouth, the PC will need to find a creative way to communicate with it. Adorable Devil Dealer Devil Dealer Small, smiley, bat-eared, and innocuous, this little fiend has a magical staff that lets them port to people in dire need. They will appear at a time when the PC feels desperate or cornered, offering help for a price. The offered deal should be genuinely helpful for the immediate situation, but have a monkey's paw component, and the PC would be wise to read the fine print. 5 - Neuleth Alembera'el, Eladrin Bard Neuleth Alombera'el, Eladrin Bard Neuleth may be exactly what he or she seems---a curious and adventuresome fey elf who found the portal from the other side and decided to go walk-about on the Prime Material. Mercurial as any fey, charming but also proud, he/she can be a great help or a hindrance depending on their mood and how the PC chooses to interact with him/her. At the DM's discretion, he or she might also be a secret ally of the wizard out to trick them or a love interest for the PC. Fey Flower Elemental Fey Flower Elemental This creature has come through the portal from the other side. It exudes an intoxicating scent! On a failed charisma save, the PC experiences a euphoric high and is subject to hallucinations at random, inopportune moments. At the DMs discretion, these visions can be genuinely prescient. This effect can be removed by the Fairy once the portal is reached, or the PC can decide to keep it, retaining the ability to see glimpses of the future.

[rhaiber]

rolling for a post 12 plot twist:

Dice Let's see what we get:

1d6

3

[lostcheerio]

[rhaiber]

Oooh, now I'm really excited that I've only described Mortigorn vaguely and from a distance. I get to do a double alignment switch where the BBEG was actually a good guy trying to save the world from that dastardly faerie dragon.

Oh, my player is gonna be so pissed when he finds out.

[lostcheerio]

I cannot believe how kind the dice just were to me -- I rolled a 4 on the last obstacle table. My player is a celestial warlock who somehow has an imp as a familiar. I was hoping for a 4, and I got a 4. I am in shock.

[rhaiber]

That's fantastic!!

Now it's time for me to roll BD's post 24 complication (as if we haven't made that game complicated enough already)

Dice No whammy, no whammy, STOP!:

1d6

5

[lostcheerio]

Omg, how many streams can you cross!?

[rhaiber]

It's perfect! If he ends up leaving badger's game and I don't have another thread lined up for him to jump into yet, I can send him into an LOTR parody.

OR

Since he has decided that his character is collapsing and unable to move for ... reasons?... I could have Samwise appear right now with a rousing speech that ends with "But I can carry you!"

[rhaiber]

Time for the post 36 twist:

Dice who will it be?:

1d6

4

Oooooooooh, devil-dealer. YES!

[lostcheerio]

Yah, best roll!

[Fillyjonk]

I am very lonely in STEAMPUNK GMs so I am invading

[lostcheerio]

Welcome!

[lostcheerio]

I just wrote my last post as a GM!