Wedding Hijinks

[Democritus]

Alright, in return for your ideas and inspiration, let me share the sessions experiences with you. Beware, it might be a bit lengthy.

I started the session a week before by asking my players for two "things" to supply as inspiration. If I would get to include them, they'd get one Style Point in the moment they appeared. "Things" means anything from ideas for NPCs to Locations, setpieces, twists. Everything. All I knew before I started is that it's going to be a wedding. What I got is below and in my account below I'll bold their appearances:

Dream
Fire
Thunderstorm
Black Moon
Tears in Rain
A hunting estate in the woods at the shore of a lake
Betrayal
Spell circle
Edelweiss (the flower)

The player characters, all members of the secret fraternity "Order of the veiled Leaves" met up with their "countess" in a small shrine in prefecture. Here she told them that she had a prophetic Dream in which Manna Renay, Suaven of Hospitality, showed her that a certain Marriage has to happen. So now she instructed the PCs to help her in doing so. They had already gotten the invitations just shortly before.

A few weeks later they show up at the Ceremony, which is being held at a remote hunting estate, only to (and that was a nice one from my players) dissuade one from the guests, allergic to the region's trees, from coming without not inviting her. Now there they started to make their (more or less) favorable impressions with presents, catched up with some old aquaintances - and unwelcome family members. A hunt for a large group of black boars was held and art was shown until the warm summer's evening came and people sat together for the last day's meal before the festivities would conclude in the marriage ceremony the day after.

During the dinner the guests noted how the full moon was changing and turning into a Black Moon. This incredibly rare but dark omen touched everyone at the gathering though only few - the serpent of the PCs and possibly also Count Kether among them - understand what it means: When the eye that watches the world turns black, then it is said that Ikhalu himself is watching. The night will last for 24 hours and will only end if one revenge finds conclusion. If this does not happen, then everyone will die. It is rumored to be a great miracle of Ikhalu, only seen once in a decade, nay a century.

With such a bad omen looming over them the party retreated into the house just as a Thunderstorm broke and drenched the remains of the feast in water, washing away the wine and carefully arranged flowers.

And that's where we ended the night. Now the players are suspecting that someone's out for the bride and/or groom and they are trying hard to keep an eye on them, unfortunately bringing some suspicion on themselves. They plan on figuring out who's out for blood and then either furthering or preventing that - based on the target. And if that fails, they will lie, steal and cheat to incite a revenge and get someone killed - preferably someone they don't like. Preferably by someone they don't like either.

While I myself don't really know what's going on yet - we'll find that out the next time we play, I do know that this Black Moon is the result of multiple cold revenges coming together in this night. I have the following in mind - changes possible as the session develops:

1. Revenge for the dead brother
The bride, a summer fox widow, has a long standing on/off again liasion/love affair with SOMEONE (who might well be the sister of the husband or something). The big reveal here is that this someone is a woman as well. And it is full well possible that this woman has conspired to get rid of summer's previous husband. She has no current desire to destroy her husband-to-be but she wouldn't mind the marriage not happening. HOWEVER the brother of the old husband knows of the fact that she had an affair - yet he suspects it was a man. And he is convinced that this person is responsible for the death of his brother. His best guess is that it's the new husband but some of the players' characters have shown up on his radar through their actions.

2. Revenge for the loss of face
In our first adventure, one of my players killed another baroness (incidentially the romance/liasion of Count Kether - unknown to him). He managed to get the other one take the blame (by using his arrows) while he got some of her lands. The blamed baron lost his lands and his title but was not senteced to death because the evidence was not conclusive enough. Still he has lost much and desires revenge for the one who has taken so much from him. Seeing as the two people who gained from the Death are Duke Dannin Steel and one of the PCs he approached and convinced Count Kether and struck a bargain with him. He is a falcon and is currently hiding out in the woods around the house, while Count Kether will try to figure out who of the two is responsible, signaling it to the wronged who will then strike. Note that Count Kether himself is not fueled by a desire for revenge - it's more that he wants to him who took away his toy.

There is a third revenge but I don't yet know why or how. I just know that either bride or groom are the target. Preferably the groom, a quiet and stoic bear. (Valin Burghe by the way) Someone my players have found a liking to. Ideas?

[Democritus]

I know I'm impatient... but no Feedback? Come on guys, I need some ideas for at least one more hate.

[TheDuchess]

Oh wow! Black moon is wonderful...And three is a magic number....lets see. Valin as we met him in the game Wick ran as the playtest was the sole survivor of a spectre that killed his family. He went away and later came back with a sword that he could use to kill the spectre (a sorcerous blood sword of course).
While he may not be the same in your game because I do not know what your barons have made true of him....using a spectre is a good start in any case. Perhaps a spectre did get loose in his childhood and killed a parent if not both. Perhaps he has declared revenge on who ever let it into the castle but has never found out who it was.
This of course could lead a lot of places, in that the players can decide if it was intentionally let into the castle or not and who did it and maybe even where the spectre is now (nothing says Valin killed it in your part of Shanri).

Does that help, dearie?
Please ask away for more fun, I am done with school for a bit and will be on the forums more.

[Democritus]

About Valin:

I'm definitely keeping the Spectre killer bit and the Orichalcum sword but it's pretty low key. The players didn't really bother with Valin much and he's no advertising things so they didn't find this out nor defined this. However they defined another neat and awesome little fact for the wedding that I used:

The wedding is happening in the woods because one of the invited guests is allergic to a rare tree type there. To discourage her the location was chosen. The guest is in fact Shara Yvarai for whom Valin feels more than just friendship but while he has no problem confronting orks, he never mentioned. He's pretty sure it's one-sided since she's such a bold flirt and often hangs around older, more powerful ven. So he obviously didn't want his love to be around when he married another woman to join their lands.

She still showed up and she's hating it. There's little of her usual flirtation as she's constantly reaching for a handkerchief.


Now in regards to the Revenge:

Using the spectres would be a possibility. I've hinted at a spectre but made them fear it but there was none in the end. I want to keep the fear of Spectres even higher so when I suddenly and without warning show one, they have heard enough stories to be afraid, very afraid. So no spectre appearance in any way. Also the third revenge should kinda endanger either the bride or groom, otherwise the players' mission isn't in jeopardy. Granted Valin going for a real dangerous opponent (an old wolf) would be dangerous and it would be from an unexpected angle, with Valin not the target but the cause. But who could be responsible for this?

[TheDuchess]

Yes spectres should be pretty creepy/scary/and such so using them sparingly I can completely understand.

You were thinking of Valin being the cause of the third revenge? He loves Sharra? Hell, have him tell her of his feelings maybe and she also likes him a bit, or at least enough to mess around with for awhile. Then Sharra will keep trying to get the bride to insult her so Sharra can declare revenge on the bride and wound her enough that the wedding is delayed, not kill her after all that would be only in cases of really bad insult. But Valin keeps getting in the way, after all marriages are political issues in ven culture and one can't be offending the bridal party......This gives the players the choice of helping Sharra get the insult from the bride or help Valin prevent the insult.
And when I say Sharra is trying to get the bride to insult her, you could also say the Sharra is going out of her way to be insulting to the bride so maybe the bride will declare revenge. Insulting could be breaking stuff, kiling servants (which is like breaking someone's furniture in ven culture) saying mean thigns and being utterly outrageous come naturally to the npc Sharra that Wick runs so this whole insult thing should not be hard. And if she hates the trees maybe there is even something along the lines of her getting the wedding moved just for her sake. Now I am laughing at the thought of Sharra as the worst wedding guest ever. Make it subtle even, "oh well I threw away all those boquets not because the color offended me, I was just thinking of how they would look with your complexion. You really want to look your best on your special day"...