For fun, how would you handle this roleplay scenario? :)

[Odessa333]

(Long post ahead!)


So this is a cliffhanger scenario I've run into, that's going to resolve itself next session with possible party fight. I admit I've been so PUMPED for the next scenario I can't stop thinking about it, how it could go. I have a few ideas, yet I thought it might be fun to see what others think of it, what you might do. I don't need 'help' so much, as the players are all cool with whatever happens and we know this could blow up in our faces. Still, we're having fun. Anywho...


The cast:

Mereda, 27 year old human beguiler, and my PC. A poor thief who has sworn to become rich, respected, and have a fancy noble title no matter what the cost. She lies, steals, and sleeps with NPC's to get every gold coin she can get. She's so sure of her eventual noble status she has told the party from day one that she is a noble already, a blatant lie that only one of the party knows...


Zariya, 16 year old human bard. An actual noble who ran away from home to escape a pre-arranged marriage. She has seen through Mereda's antics, but has not called her on it. They have become friends with Mereda trying to be an older mentor figure for the young bard, and they have silly shopping scenes where we charm the heck out of people. Her main motivation is freedom and fun as far as I can tell. Despite Mereda's shady nature, the bard remains....well, noble, and doesn't steal, and is a modal do-gooder. Her big weakness is....

Folkvar, 115 year old Elf Alchemist. The elf left his homeland in exile. His family is well respected, and he is engaged to a elf back home, so he knows his exile is temporarily. Despite his engagement to another, the young bard Zariya is madly infatuated with him, to the point she routinely casts charm spells on him. He protests, but....not strongly, and goes along with her willingly quite often, so the rest of us shrug it off as really weird and let them do their own thing. He is highly motivated by knowledge and learning, and helping people (especially elves). Last is...

Thane, ??? old year dwarf, an ardent mantle. The oldest, but we don't know by how much. Our resident dwarf is a lover of battle, and torturing the heck out of our enemies (something we have to conceal from the do gooder bard). He is good friends with Folkvar, two non-humans in a mostly human nation. Like many a dwarf, he loves his drink and forging weapons. A bit of a loose cannon, it's hard to say how he'll react to any scenario. Out of character, his player and Zariya's player are related, so he tends to give the bard help as needed.



The set up: While in town, we were asked to take care of some bandits in the area (party is level 6). Fighting our way through their numbers, we find they are part of a cult, and their leader is named Luke, and he is the bard's uncle. He plans to kill us so he won't be recognized, yet I manage to use 'charm person' to get him momentarily infatuated with me, giving up his weapons willingly. Taking him prisoner, we bring him to the authorities. While we were gone, another group of the same cult kidnapped some girls in town. We don't know where they went, so we ask the imprisoned Luke, who makes us a deal: he escorts us to the cult's base, and we let him go. With him being a noble, we don't think we can legally hold him for long anyway, so we agree to his terms. Zariya the bard wants a chance to redeem her noble uncle, after all. The elf and dwarf make plans so that he has an 'accident' after we arrive at the cultist's base.



The hitch: Duke Luke, free of all spells, is infatuated with Mereda. Mereda, seeing her chance for a noble title, goes along with it. Suspecting the Duke's days are numbered, Mereda moves for a hasty wedding, paying off some officials to hold a ceremony in the morning, before we set out for the cultist's base. Yet the night before the wedding, things go south.

Our dear bard Zariya is opposed to the wedding, knowing Mereda is not really a noble, and correctly thinks Mereda is using her Uncle. So she insists the bride and groom can't be together before their wedding, and escorts her Uncle to one inn, while the Thane the dwarf escorts Mereda to another. Folkvar, for his part, was at the main temple's library (the temple where we're supposed to get married) doing research.




Where we are now:
As Thane the dwarf and my Mereda head to the inn, he suddenly apologies and tries to grapple me. I beat his roll and slip away from him, as he explains Zariya wants to make sure I miss the wedding in the morning. Hurt by this, Mereda casts invisibility and walks away. Not knowing how far the others will go to stop her, she seeks out any mercenaries in town. Dropping several gold coins down, she hires 12 bodyguards to ensure the wedding goes through. Her orders: protect herself and her fiance, who may be kidnapped somewhere in town. She casts an illusion spell to show the mercenaries exactly what her fiance looks like, as well as the three other party members as 'people of interest' in this case. Thane is wandering around the streets at night on his own, the bard is at the inn with her Uncle, the elf is doing research at the temple where the ceremony will be held, and none of them know there are now being sought out. This is where ended the last session





Whew! Long post (told ya). I'm having a blast with this campaign, and I think all of us are anxious to see how this scenario plays out. Out of character, we ideally don't want to split the party, but it's hard to come up with a compromise after the attack rolls have been made. For my part, Mereda's main goal from the start has been a noble title, and she was amused to think she could become actual family with Zariya (her protege in her mind) and is pretty hurt by this turn of events. She is hoping for a peaceful resolution, yet doesn't know if she can trust her friends now. I have no idea how this play out, and I think it will really come down to how the DM has things play out, who finds who first, etc.

Long story short (too late!) I'm wondering what others think of this, and how you'd handle this. I can see this going so many ways, from the mercenaries being too strong and killing off the rest of the party (before or after killing Mereda, of course), or perhaps eloping in the night to try to avoid a fight, or having the marriage stopped and Mereda swearing revenge to become the new BBEG lol. What do you think? :)

[Odessa333]

Hm. I guess this was too long, eh? Oh well.

[Blue Jay]

Well, it sounds like you really enjoyed it, at least. :)

I always enjoy this kind of roleplay-heavy intrigue stuff too, but I always prefer to play people who are pure and nice and honest. My favorite character is a half-nymph healer/diplomancer princess, and I was always fishing for little romance stories to get her into (with minimal success, as it turned out). She inherited the "nymph's curse," which was that she could inspire love and desire in others, but she wasn't able to really fall in love herself. So, she dedicated her life to healing and spreading joy, and is really just continually fighting a battle against depression, because no DM I've played with ever makes his NPCs amenable to that kind of thing: the only way to deal with a bad guy is to kill them.

I tell you that mainly to illustrate that I have no idea how I would roleplay your situation. I would personally like to see a story where Mereda gets her title, but then loses it almost immediately. Perhaps Duke Luke's brother --- let's call him "Duke Bo" --- was lurking around for an opportunity to steal his brother's lands, and an obvious gold-digging strumpet like Mereda is the perfect patsy. Luke is murdered, and Mereda takes the blame; so the good brother Bo steps in to avenge his brother, chase Mereda out and annex Luke's lands and titles into his own. And Mereda and the other PC's are all branded as conspirators against the noble family, and now they've unwittingly aided a corrupt noble in his plot to conquer the entire kingdom, but at least Mereda has her title --- with its questionable legitimacy, of course.

For me, I'd want Mereda to use this as a chance at redemption: she'll try to earn her legitimacy by exposing Bo's machinations and saving the kingdom, all the while fighting the stigma she brought on herself through her own machinations. I'd have to think more on how I'd get the other PCs engaged in this kind of narrative, so it's not just "everything revolves around Mereda."

Of course, that narrative kind of assumes that you're interested in seeing an honorable or righteous end to the story. If you intend Mereda to be Evil or amoral/self-serving, maybe she instead needs to find a way to get in bed with Duke Bo to regain her legitimacy and rise to power.

[Marcotix]

Oh boy we got are selves a barn burning bumlble bomb don't we? Brace for long post - I didn't bother w/ character names.

Based on your post I assume the RL players are ok with whatever happens and are mature enough to keep things cool even if things don't shake out the way they want. I would highly recommend making doubly sure that's the case. If there's any doubt, your adults and your characters are yours to run, so make sure things work out peacefully among the Player's Characters.

With that out of the way,

Firstly, make sure that the Duke is at least a tolerable person to have a lot of power over you - depending on how close things are to real-world marriage is, he'd basically own you. Assuming a more modern take on the institution (or are ok with them and/ or are able to escape the less pleasant aspects of marriage) make absolutely sure that you tying the knot with they duke is going to result in an pretty hard to get out of lock. If you get found out to be a scrub, does that mean the duke can nullify your marriage? What if the bard spills the beans, or even points out that you used magic on the Duke to charm him? Make sure that you know these things, if its a flimsy marriage then no sense in trying to kill allies that have proven their worth. For that matter, is the duke a real duke? What if the Duke is actually playing you? He probably suspects he's in a lot of trouble. Seducing one of his enemies might be the best ploy here.

Figure out what would get you what you want with the least amount of effort; As far as I can tell the only one with any beef is the bard, she's trying to protect her Uncle, but is she really protecting her uncle?

You, as a 6 level PC are probably about the best thing to happen to him. Even if you are using him for his sweet title, he will be using you for your sweet magics; its a 2 way street.

And it is a two way street if you helping him it helps you, which it does. What if you let the Duke know your a scrub?

If he's a thinking sort he'd at least be tempted to take on the risk when you point out the devastation you could bring to his political adversaries at the next Noble's ball. Find out if he'd be amenable to the idea of marring a scrub w/out letting him know he's marrying a scrub. Let him know of your power. If he seems open to the possibility (and he should be), I'd tell him. If he's not interested I'd seriously consider finding another mark- this one's dumb as bricks and not worth making babies with; though he may make a good cuckold.

If he wants to be with you, despite you being a scrub (and he really really should) you're set! You don't have a terrible secret to keep from your fiance, he can help both immediately and down the road (where is his guard?!) and best of all the bard shouldn't have any problems now - its all on the level.

At worse her issues would stem from a weakening of her family prestige if its found out you're a scrub. Really shouldn't be a problem for any non-lawful character. If its bugging her allay her fears by pointing out that between you and her, this secret is an easy keep (especially if the Duke is in on it) and a minor inconvenience when it compared to the raw power you bring to the family by dent of the magics you wield. By the Eye of Grummsh, she'd be hurting her family by keeping you out!

If it is still a problem with the bard point out that the she could still pull the plug on the whole thing by saying you bewitched him. Now the bard has leverage on you and basically a get out of scandal free card if this arrangement goes belly up, or if she finds you abusing your new found power. Not ideal, but she's, your protege, give her leverage now and either bump her off or turn the tables later.

Your character will have to accept the fact that she's once again 2 or 3 steps ahead of the party, a tiresome but worthwhile problem you've been dealing with awhile. Of course the dwarf resorted to violence. But since he was a bit confused (no doubt because of that awesome protege' who you've taught every thing she knows) he rarely sees an answer beyond brute force and he was at least smart enough to avoid lethal blows, well bringing it up from time to time would be a fitting punishment. Maybe make him the master of ceremonies at the wedding?
And the bard - she's got a lot to learn but is young and still so naive when it comes to how the real world works. Still her sicking the Dwarf on you shows promise, and Lo! She will be your niece! Such a small misunderstanding can be forgiven among family! ( not really but you'll make her pay later ) Who would make a better maiden of honor?

Assuming that the Duke is too stupid to see the light (and its a family trait) and you are committed to going for it anyway then think of all the ways your plan could come to nothing - you could get killed, duke could get turned/ killed, officiators could get turned/ killed. Think like your party- what could they do? What will they do, how far will they go?

Be elaborate and thorough, plan ahead and make contingencies. You have probably the best class for dealing with PC's base, but you also have intimate knowledge of your party so I'd make sure to use that. They've made the first move, you did a good move bringing in some goons, but remember that they can be turned around by money or head magic.

Once that's squared away figure out how far your character would go to achieve her goals. I'd Use your guile to turn the whole town against them, focusing first on either the Bard or the wizard, though if anyone makes themselves vulnerable, they need to be taken out. Of course they may use that as a trap so be cautious. Killing them might not be the be best, murder usually has its own ramifications and keeping potential allies allies usually requires that they keep breathing. Incapacitating is likely the best since once its done its done, you should be able to settle feathers after the fact. Oh yeah the bard is a special case because she's family with the guy your marrying. Don't kill her w/out making sure you get away with it.

Finally, do you want just the Dukes name or do you want to keep him around awhile? My guess is that your party is going to bump him off at the wedding, probably in an indiscriminate explosive way, so keep that in mind too.

[Blu]

From what i read it seems your group has a very healthy dynamic and no hard feelings will happen.
I honestly envy that dynamic.

Mereda, 27 year old human beguiler, and my PC. A poor thief who has sworn to become rich, respected, and have a fancy noble title no matter what the cost. She lies, steals, and sleeps with NPC's to get every gold coin she can get. She's so sure of her eventual noble status she has told the party from day one that she is a noble already, a blatant lie that only one of the party knows...

From such a vague idea i have of your character's story, maybe you put yourself against a wall with such a dark and heavy background. Characters need some lightness about them, even if it is a little.

Maybe this is an opportunity to present/shoehorn a new aspect of Mereda's personality, schemes are not only her modus operandi, but her life style is the intrigue's game, and boy she loves that game. She takes the challenge like a champ, and rejoices the fact that her protege already progressed so far as to challenge her in her turf.
Now this becomes and interesting scenario where Mereda's won't have any hard feelings should she lose, it is part of the game, and should she win, the victory becomes that much more tasteful since adversity is the seasoning of life.
And now it could develop in two kind of situations that can be turned into more character development:

A) Mereda's wins, get's her so desired tittle and starts to plan out her next move;

B) Mereda's is proud of her protege, since she is already capable of challenging her and now might even start to become a rival. She gets a bit upset by not winning her noble tittle but it is offset by her pride.

[tadkins]

This was a good read, I enjoyed it. I hope you'll come back later and describe what ends up happening. xD

What would I do? It probably depends on the character. I would likely be the kind of person trying to convince Mereda that titles and nobility are really not all they're cracked up to be, and that she possesses the skill and power to do so much more. I'd also be more than a little concerned that we have a 16 year old adventuring with us.

[Odessa333]

Well, the story is still on going, though we made some progress in today's session.

Our party (Mereda, Zariya, Thane, Folkvar) are still split up as started up. Folkvar gets wrapped up tending to the sick at the temple (there is a sickness going around, and he is working at being a doctor). Thane, while looking for Mereda, gets wrapped up in a subplot/quest with some goblins sneaking into town with explosives. Mereda, uses 'locate object' to track down the bard first, assuming if her fiance is still alive, he's with her. Zariya is at the inn getting her Uncle so drunk he will miss the wedding, and her plan takes a HUGE dark turn. Once drunk, Uncle Luke rambles on about how she looks just like her mother, and tries to force himself on his much younger niece. Zariya fights him off, and he runs for the back door as Mereda enters from the front with her guards. Zariya is in hysterics, and runs to Mereda, giving her a hug, sobbing about how horrible her Uncle is.

Mereda is stunned speechless, and helps calm down the young bard. She uses a silent image spell to make a neon sign in the sky to get the party's attention, asking for the team to meet up at an NPC friend's house. Mereda sends two of her guards to escort the now terrified bard to the friend's house, and the elf meets our bard there. Mereda and her remaining guards now track my fiance with her spell, and find him still drunk in the poor/slum area of town. He lies about Zariya poisoning his drink, and says she is lying about everything; lies which I see through. Mereda doesn't know what he tried to do, but knows something is up, that he did something so bad that Zariya turned on him and he is now lying about. Not knowing the details, she tells him to calm down, and escorts him to the small base of the mercenaries she hired, so they can get some sleep before the wedding.

On the way, Mereda runs into the dwarf/Thane who just finished his solo quest by bringing a captured goblin to the guards. She gives him a stiff greeting, confident that her fiance is with her and she is surrounded by guards. Thane sheepsidly asks where Zariya is (he had been inside and missing the neon sign I made) and I use the message spell to tell him my suspicions, asking him to go check on her. Relieved we're not fighting, Thane tells me to get some rest before my wedding, and then heads to meet up with the others where they compare notes, and get some rest themselves.


With all the PC's asleep, we ended the session there as the DM had an appointment to make. After he left, all of us agreed out of character that Luke's days hours are numbered. The current plan is to let the wedding happen, get his title, and then make sure he has an 'accident' in the next battle. Not sure if it will work out that way, or if the title will lose power if he dies, and who knows what else could go wrong.... but I'll have to wait until next week to find out.



I think it was Blu who said there little to go on for my character, so allow me to expand a bit. While her motives are quite materialistic, she has a very cheerful personality, and will smile to your face as she picks your pocket. She's a professional con woman, not so much a grim rogue. She sings and dances often with the bard, drinks with the dwarf (to comical effects) and talks magic/lore with the alchemist. She has a vestment of many styles, dressing in overly elaborate/colorful clothing and acting as the most stereotypical posh noble she can while in public, yet often gives her stolen gold to the poor, gets drunk with the dwarf, and 'behaves in a manner unbecoming of nobility" as the bard calls her sleeping around. Her short backstory is she is from a poor fishing village, where her parents and two older brothers struggle to make a living. When she was found to be born with strong magic powers, the village poured it's few resources together to send her to a mage school, in the hopes she could learn spells to benefit the entire village. Only she flunked out. She's ashamed of her failure, and is doing the 'fake it until I make it' routine so she can help her village.... at least, it's how she started. She enjoys the game, the art of the con, and she has moments where she loses herself in the thrill of the life of an adventurer. In this arc, she's had some 'how did I get here?" moments where she is getting married without her family present.

Anywho, I don't want to ramble too long, but hopefully that helps explain her more. I don't want to give anyone the impression that she's 'dark.' If there's interest, I'll update next week (ideally) after the wedding ;)

[Blu]

Anywho, I don't want to ramble too long, but hopefully that helps explain her more. I don't want to give anyone the impression that she's 'dark.' If there's interest, I'll update next week (ideally) after the wedding ;)

Totally out of my idea for the character, thanks for explaining it. Otherwise seems everything went decently for your character. Hope to see the next update.

[Blue Jay]

With all the PC's asleep, we ended the session there as the DM had an appointment to make. After he left, all of us agreed out of character that Luke's days hours are numbered. The current plan is to let the wedding happen, get his title, and then make sure he has an 'accident' in the next battle. Not sure if it will work out that way, or if the title will lose power if he dies, and who knows what else could go wrong.... but I'll have to wait until next week to find out.

I like this ending (assuming it happens this way): I mean, you're basically killing a guy to take his title, but the guy apparently needs to be dealt with. I feel like killing him is a bit extreme, and I'd probably be playing the person who would demand more justification than this. Still, the moral ambiguity of this situation leaves open a lot of different story possibilities.

Your group sounds pretty cool, Odessa.

I think it was Blu who said there little to go on for my character, so allow me to expand a bit. While her motives are quite materialistic, she has a very cheerful personality, and will smile to your face as she picks your pocket. She's a professional con woman, not so much a grim rogue. She sings and dances often with the bard, drinks with the dwarf (to comical effects) and talks magic/lore with the alchemist. She has a vestment of many styles, dressing in overly elaborate/colorful clothing and acting as the most stereotypical posh noble she can while in public, yet often gives her stolen gold to the poor, gets drunk with the dwarf, and 'behaves in a manner unbecoming of nobility" as the bard calls her sleeping around. Her short backstory is she is from a poor fishing village, where her parents and two older brothers struggle to make a living. When she was found to be born with strong magic powers, the village poured it's few resources together to send her to a mage school, in the hopes she could learn spells to benefit the entire village. Only she flunked out. She's ashamed of her failure, and is doing the 'fake it until I make it' routine so she can help her village.... at least, it's how she started. She enjoys the game, the art of the con, and she has moments where she loses herself in the thrill of the life of an adventurer. In this arc, she's had some 'how did I get here?" moments where she is getting married without her family present.

Oh, that's a great character background. Thinking as a DM, there are a lot of things I could work with there.

[Odessa333]

So this is a bit of a late update (our session was cancelled one week) but I did promise to update when things resolved, so here I am.

My character, Mereda, had her guards escort her fiance (The Duke/Uncle) and herself to the wedding, tossing coins to passerby's and inviting all to join in (getting the public support, which proved to be useful). The rest of the party arrived and waited, watching the ceremony unfold. The DM gave them a 'speak now or forever hold your peace' moment, where the bard jumped up on a table to object. As she did so, I tried to cast silence (with concealed spellcasting) to silence her protest: she failed the save, and I admit I was laughing that it actually worked. The dwarf passed though, and he used dispel magic to give her back her voice (I tried again on my next turn as she spoke, but failed). On the table, the bard used her fascinate ability to get all eyes on her, and told them 'the truth of his evilness' which was my main advantage in this contest of wills: while she had the higher CHA, she relied on roll play and didn't act out what she wanted to say in character, and I had no problem getting into my role.

The DM says she goes on for about a minute giving her speech, with eyes all on her, fascinated (myself included, as I failed my save). I pointed out while we watched her with fascination, it was not mind control and we didn't suddenly believe she was right (as the bard's player seemed to think). As she spoke, I used message to tell the dwarf to stop this, to get her out of here, as I could not let her stop the wedding. After that, I cast glibness. As she finished (with no action by the dwarf) I walked up to her, stepped up to the table, and slapped her (combat ending her fascination effect). I then used my +42 bluff (thank you, glibness) to convince everyone in town she was lying, laying it on thick (the table had a lot of 'damn, that is cold' type of comments). Humiliated, I asked my guards to escort her from the grounds, but she ran off with the party in tow. The wedding proceeded without any more problems, and I secured the title my character was eager to obtain.


I had to sweet talk the guards about her criminal charges against my fiance, but it was no problem for my beguiler. With the wedding over, we were to head out with some volunteers from the town guard to wipe out some cultist/bandits in the area, though the bard didn't want to travel with me or my fiance (who long story short, was the only person who knew the layout of the area having been there before). As a compromise, I extended the contract on my bodyguards from the wedding, and brought them with me up to the bandit/cultist's base; my guards, my fiance, and I would take the lead, while the party and the town guard volunteers followed about 100 feet behind (within range of the message spell). There's a literal visible divide in the party at the moment between myself and the bard, though out of character we are hoping to give the characters space for now, and try to work in a reconciliation scene.


So short version, I fended off the party's attempts to stop my wedding and gained a horrible husband and his sweet noble title. I'm not out of the woods yet, as the bard did write a scathing letter to her brother about all of this, and he outranks all of us. Not sure how it will play out, but that's a tale for another session.

Thank you for reading, and I hope you enjoyed :)

[TheBrassDuke]

Patiently waiting to hear what happened. :P

[martixy]

This took a very soap opera turn very quickly. Not that there's anything bad with that. I just tend to look at things in a more practical view.

The linchpin of the whole turn of events is obviously the wedding between Mereda and the uncle. So I wonder what impression of the long-term results of the wedding would be. To me the politics here seem like the wedding is not worth the effort by far.