I was a big WoW player back in the day and one of my favorite zones was Duskwood. I especially liked the quest line where you unwittingly helped an NPC construct a flesh golem (basically) to attack the town. My group is currently in Ravenloft and I am trying to recreate that quest. I am going with the idea that this NPC is trying to convince them he could open a portal for them to get back home. Do any of you have suggestions/ideas on how to do that and what type of reagents they would need to acquire for this NPC. Thanks for any suggestions, they are much appreciated.
Have you looked at the various Kresk storylines? In any case, the major ingredient for a flesh golem is dead bodies (which the PCs will likely be suspicious about), but you could go send them off on some weird quest like trying to capture a will-o-wisp.
The PCs can be aware that the flesh golem is being built, but not that it is going to attack the town. The NPC could say that, in return for having the portal opened for them, the party needs to help them build a flesh golem to defend the town, be sold or granted to some good adventurers far away, or something else. Then, the NPC surprises them by sending the golem to attack and then fleeing or something.
As for quests related to building the golem, I can think of a few:
Collect magical components! Besides dead bodies, the party could try to acquire some magical thread from a hag or yugoloth, find some necessary magical tools in a dungeon, or even recover a stolen page from a Manual of Flesh Golems to fill in some missing information about how one goes about building a golem.
A golem canonically requires an earth elemental spirit to animate. Try sending them on a quest to find a trapped elemental spirit (or to trap an elemental and then infuse the golem with its spirit) to animate the construct.
Finding materials isn't the only thing necessary to help build the golem. Disrupting a rival's plans to sabotage the building of the golem, for example, could be just as interesting. It could also allow for the possibility that, if captured or confronted nonviolently, said rival could explain the evil nature of the golem and its builder to the party. You can look at the "crafting magic items" complications table in XGtE for more ideas for things that could go wrong.
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Panda-wat (I hate my username) is somehow convinced that he is objectively right about everything D&D related even though he obviously is not. Considering that, he'd probably make a great D&D youtuber.
"If I die, I can live with that." ~Luke Hart, the DM lair
I was a big WoW player back in the day and one of my favorite zones was Duskwood. I especially liked the quest line where you unwittingly helped an NPC construct a flesh golem (basically) to attack the town. My group is currently in Ravenloft and I am trying to recreate that quest. I am going with the idea that this NPC is trying to convince them he could open a portal for them to get back home. Do any of you have suggestions/ideas on how to do that and what type of reagents they would need to acquire for this NPC. Thanks for any suggestions, they are much appreciated.
Have you looked at the various Kresk storylines? In any case, the major ingredient for a flesh golem is dead bodies (which the PCs will likely be suspicious about), but you could go send them off on some weird quest like trying to capture a will-o-wisp.
The PCs can be aware that the flesh golem is being built, but not that it is going to attack the town. The NPC could say that, in return for having the portal opened for them, the party needs to help them build a flesh golem to defend the town, be sold or granted to some good adventurers far away, or something else. Then, the NPC surprises them by sending the golem to attack and then fleeing or something.
As for quests related to building the golem, I can think of a few:
Panda-wat (I hate my username) is somehow convinced that he is objectively right about everything D&D related even though he obviously is not. Considering that, he'd probably make a great D&D youtuber.
"If I die, I can live with that." ~Luke Hart, the DM lair
Thank you both for the suggestions. I think I can work in some ideas from both.