As the title suggests, my party's wizard seems to think they have in some way tamed Venomfang. In reality they agreed to kill Cryovain in exchange for Venomfang not TPKing (a beat I shamelessly stole from someone else). The wizard in particular also made a side deal in which she promised a favor, which is yet to be cashed in.
She mentioned "we have a dragon" to an NPC who is established as being extremely intelligent. He reacted dubiously - "My dear, are you sure it is not he who has you?" So I've done a little foreshadowing of what is to come. The wizard didn't press for any more information on this point, because table quibbling ensued - "God, MOM you're gonna get us killed by a dragon!". The other players are our 14 and 20 year old kids.
Problem is, I'm drawing a blank. How do I now mess with that player in a way that's believable for a devious dragon? How do I make it the wizards fault - but only in retrospect? I want that ill-advised promise to lead to something bad, but looks neutral or at least acceptable. The party has already unintentionally led VF to the forge of spells, so I'm thinking he's made a new lair above it and is soaking up some power to 'age up' to a mature green dragon by the time Cryovain is dispatched. But perhaps he needs the party to obtain some macguffin to regulate this process (again, I found the skeleton of this idea on the web)?
I've also started cautiously sowing a little discord - VF is quite rude to the rest of the group (the halfling is 'half man' and the dragonborn is 'the biggest kobold I've ever seen'), but refers to the wizard as their leader. They don't have a leader, they do everything by committee, so they bristle at this suggestion.
Any ideas? I think this has the makings of an interesting side story for the party. The player in question is growing dissatisfied with their own PC, and has already rolled a new one 'just in case', so the gloves can be off. The end result of this can be anything up to and including death or transition to an evil NPC. Conspiring directly with the PC is an option but not preferred - I'm not sure she can be subtle enough at the table.
I honestly love the idea of Venomfang turning the wizard against the party and into an evil NPC. I think a good option you could use is to slowly corrupt them. Offer them a little power and see if they bite, if they do use that momentum to try and manipulate them into doing increasingly darker deeds to get them to question their morale's and see how dark they are willing to let their character go for the power ALL wizards tend to want. You could pose the beginning of this "corruption arc" as simply trying to get them to kill enemies that don't necessarily need to be killed i.e., surrendered, fleeing, unconscious. If the rest of the party is starting to question the wizards choices or the dragons then try and corrupt them as well, or put the wizard against them using the dragon to manipulate all of them.
I honestly love the idea of Venomfang turning the wizard against the party and into an evil NPC. I think a good option you could use is to slowly corrupt them. Offer them a little power and see if they bite, if they do use that momentum to try and manipulate them into doing increasingly darker deeds to get them to question their morale's and see how dark they are willing to let their character go for the power ALL wizards tend to want. You could pose the beginning of this "corruption arc" as simply trying to get them to kill enemies that don't necessarily need to be killed i.e., surrendered, fleeing, unconscious. If the rest of the party is starting to question the wizards choices or the dragons then try and corrupt them as well, or put the wizard against them using the dragon to manipulate all of them.
I like it. What do you think about VF calling in the favor to simply embed one of his acolytes into the party? It's not easy for a dragon to inconspicuously whisper in the wizard's ear without anyone noticing, so it seems to be the way VF would do things.
Or, even better... I was actually already planning on giving the party a pair of sending stones so they have emergency contact with the rogue when he's off roguing. I was going to do this to group via the TownMaster, but now I could do it directly to the wiz via an acolyte of VF. The catch of course being that these are slight variant sending stones, and VF has a third stone that is also attuned either to one or both of the others.
Then VF could whisper in the wizard's ear from time to time, but it would be presented as urges. A simple message passed across the table - "why do I offer help, when they offer nothing?", "I help and I help, and yet still they are helpless, I am above the squabbles of these pathetic creatures", "talk gets us nowhere, I will show them my power and they will tell us what we need", "I should just kill them, and take what is rightfully mine."
OH dang, but if you get an acolyte into then it would shift the dynamic of the group. It would then feel like the two boys vs VF and the acolyte with the wizard as a floater between the two teams until they decide what they want. So be careful there. But it can add a fun and interesting dynamic to the sessions. If you do add the acolyte try and probably keep the development of VF's plans to a minimum for a couple sessions so the party and adjust and develop an understanding of the new dynamic with VF whispering into the wizards ear. Then when things are going good because the dragon/acolyte are actually helping you unfold the behind the scenes plans they have been plotting without anyone knowing. Like VF could be using the acolyte to syphon off resources from the party to develop that lair above the spell forge.
You could even just make it so VF is manipulating the party and using the acolyte ONLY to get his lair set up in the spell forge. And then once it is set up push him up to an adult dragon from time spent during the building process and the absorption of all that magic. Then you can make that the big bad boss again where he has new/larger minions, a new lair, and all the glory of being an adult green dragon that lives in the spell forge as a lair.
I just found Matt Mercer's corruption mechanic. I love it. I think I'm going with the sending stones, but the one the acolyte tells the wizard is for them is straight cursed. Every long rest wearing the sending stone brings corruption along with the aforementioned schizophrenia. The PC will feel the sending stone burrowing ever deeper into their mind with each long rest - but if they try to talk of it, the stone will not allow it. I think I'll incorporate elements of a slow transformation to drow into the physical changes the wizard undergoes. As mentioned, the player doesn't like the character much anymore any way, so I believe she'll lean into it heavily.
When they defeated the black spider a couple sessions ago, I made a point of role playing with his last breaths one side of a conversation with Lolth - a conversation that the players understand did not go well. Obvious foreshadowing of his later reappearance as a drider (not that they know anything of driders... yet). I think maybe I can weave this all together into a particularly nasty end game alliance - the (now evil) wizard, Drider Nezznar, and adult Venomfang. Perhaps with last minute redemption possible for the wiz... IF the party has been smart enough to figure it out and figure out how to fix it.
We're leading this LMOP campaign straight into DOIP, so I think over the course of DOIP, this alliance should be forming, with wiz getting corrupted over a few sessions before dropping to evil NPC and leaving the party. By the end of the combined LMOP/DOIP (thank you Dungeon Master's Guild) they should be level 12, then I'll homebrew a epilogue campaign to bring them to 15, when they'll have a showdown in Wave Echo Cave with my newly created evil trinity.
Best way to screw over someone is to give them opportunities to obtain the promised thing by doing X rather than an outright gift of exactly X. Because X has unintended consequences.
I promised to make you immortal? Here, drink this glass full of red stuff (Vampire blood).
Promised you wealth? Walk through this portal into the king's treasury.
Promised you resurrection of your wife? Just open this egyptian sarcophagus.
You want to be a Wizard? Take this spellbook and start studying.
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As the title suggests, my party's wizard seems to think they have in some way tamed Venomfang. In reality they agreed to kill Cryovain in exchange for Venomfang not TPKing (a beat I shamelessly stole from someone else). The wizard in particular also made a side deal in which she promised a favor, which is yet to be cashed in.
She mentioned "we have a dragon" to an NPC who is established as being extremely intelligent. He reacted dubiously - "My dear, are you sure it is not he who has you?" So I've done a little foreshadowing of what is to come. The wizard didn't press for any more information on this point, because table quibbling ensued - "God, MOM you're gonna get us killed by a dragon!". The other players are our 14 and 20 year old kids.
Problem is, I'm drawing a blank. How do I now mess with that player in a way that's believable for a devious dragon? How do I make it the wizards fault - but only in retrospect? I want that ill-advised promise to lead to something bad, but looks neutral or at least acceptable. The party has already unintentionally led VF to the forge of spells, so I'm thinking he's made a new lair above it and is soaking up some power to 'age up' to a mature green dragon by the time Cryovain is dispatched. But perhaps he needs the party to obtain some macguffin to regulate this process (again, I found the skeleton of this idea on the web)?
I've also started cautiously sowing a little discord - VF is quite rude to the rest of the group (the halfling is 'half man' and the dragonborn is 'the biggest kobold I've ever seen'), but refers to the wizard as their leader. They don't have a leader, they do everything by committee, so they bristle at this suggestion.
Any ideas? I think this has the makings of an interesting side story for the party. The player in question is growing dissatisfied with their own PC, and has already rolled a new one 'just in case', so the gloves can be off. The end result of this can be anything up to and including death or transition to an evil NPC. Conspiring directly with the PC is an option but not preferred - I'm not sure she can be subtle enough at the table.
Let the hive mind do its worse.
I honestly love the idea of Venomfang turning the wizard against the party and into an evil NPC. I think a good option you could use is to slowly corrupt them. Offer them a little power and see if they bite, if they do use that momentum to try and manipulate them into doing increasingly darker deeds to get them to question their morale's and see how dark they are willing to let their character go for the power ALL wizards tend to want. You could pose the beginning of this "corruption arc" as simply trying to get them to kill enemies that don't necessarily need to be killed i.e., surrendered, fleeing, unconscious. If the rest of the party is starting to question the wizards choices or the dragons then try and corrupt them as well, or put the wizard against them using the dragon to manipulate all of them.
I like it. What do you think about VF calling in the favor to simply embed one of his acolytes into the party? It's not easy for a dragon to inconspicuously whisper in the wizard's ear without anyone noticing, so it seems to be the way VF would do things.
Or, even better... I was actually already planning on giving the party a pair of sending stones so they have emergency contact with the rogue when he's off roguing. I was going to do this to group via the TownMaster, but now I could do it directly to the wiz via an acolyte of VF. The catch of course being that these are slight variant sending stones, and VF has a third stone that is also attuned either to one or both of the others.
Then VF could whisper in the wizard's ear from time to time, but it would be presented as urges. A simple message passed across the table - "why do I offer help, when they offer nothing?", "I help and I help, and yet still they are helpless, I am above the squabbles of these pathetic creatures", "talk gets us nowhere, I will show them my power and they will tell us what we need", "I should just kill them, and take what is rightfully mine."
OH dang, but if you get an acolyte into then it would shift the dynamic of the group. It would then feel like the two boys vs VF and the acolyte with the wizard as a floater between the two teams until they decide what they want. So be careful there. But it can add a fun and interesting dynamic to the sessions. If you do add the acolyte try and probably keep the development of VF's plans to a minimum for a couple sessions so the party and adjust and develop an understanding of the new dynamic with VF whispering into the wizards ear. Then when things are going good because the dragon/acolyte are actually helping you unfold the behind the scenes plans they have been plotting without anyone knowing. Like VF could be using the acolyte to syphon off resources from the party to develop that lair above the spell forge.
You could even just make it so VF is manipulating the party and using the acolyte ONLY to get his lair set up in the spell forge. And then once it is set up push him up to an adult dragon from time spent during the building process and the absorption of all that magic. Then you can make that the big bad boss again where he has new/larger minions, a new lair, and all the glory of being an adult green dragon that lives in the spell forge as a lair.
I just found Matt Mercer's corruption mechanic. I love it. I think I'm going with the sending stones, but the one the acolyte tells the wizard is for them is straight cursed. Every long rest wearing the sending stone brings corruption along with the aforementioned schizophrenia. The PC will feel the sending stone burrowing ever deeper into their mind with each long rest - but if they try to talk of it, the stone will not allow it. I think I'll incorporate elements of a slow transformation to drow into the physical changes the wizard undergoes. As mentioned, the player doesn't like the character much anymore any way, so I believe she'll lean into it heavily.
When they defeated the black spider a couple sessions ago, I made a point of role playing with his last breaths one side of a conversation with Lolth - a conversation that the players understand did not go well. Obvious foreshadowing of his later reappearance as a drider (not that they know anything of driders... yet). I think maybe I can weave this all together into a particularly nasty end game alliance - the (now evil) wizard, Drider Nezznar, and adult Venomfang. Perhaps with last minute redemption possible for the wiz... IF the party has been smart enough to figure it out and figure out how to fix it.
We're leading this LMOP campaign straight into DOIP, so I think over the course of DOIP, this alliance should be forming, with wiz getting corrupted over a few sessions before dropping to evil NPC and leaving the party. By the end of the combined LMOP/DOIP (thank you Dungeon Master's Guild) they should be level 12, then I'll homebrew a epilogue campaign to bring them to 15, when they'll have a showdown in Wave Echo Cave with my newly created evil trinity.
Oh the evil - I love it!
That sounds like an amazing plan!
Best way to screw over someone is to give them opportunities to obtain the promised thing by doing X rather than an outright gift of exactly X. Because X has unintended consequences.
I promised to make you immortal? Here, drink this glass full of red stuff (Vampire blood).
Promised you wealth? Walk through this portal into the king's treasury.
Promised you resurrection of your wife? Just open this egyptian sarcophagus.
You want to be a Wizard? Take this spellbook and start studying.