Ok they all at a cursed heart and washed it down with wine.

A bit of background: I'm running the LMOP and ICESPIRE campaigns rn now. The party is roughly almost lvl 5. The are head to axeholm  and stopped by the Tower of Storms on their way there. After defeats all the enemies inside they make their way up to the top to find the heart on the Talos cult guy. He reswapns every 24 hours if the part doesn't kill the heart. And the do kill the heart..... By eating it. Now I did have the all roll for dmg afterward and one of them did faint. Then I ended the session.

So I feel like this setup is a gold mine of ways I can play it out next session. Right off the bat I want them all to roll a sanity check for eating the heart. But after that I wanted to hear what everyone else might do can get some ideas from you ladies and gents. How would you play this out?

So here's what I would do... for what it's worth...

I assume the party ate the cursed heart for dinner, and then took a long rest?

I would open the next session by asking each player to make both a Constitution check AND a Wisdom check. Set whatever DC you want, but I would set the Con DC at 20 and the Wis DC at 15. (These are ability checks, NOT saving throws, so no proficiency added). 

Any character who fails the Con check starts the next day with the poisoned condition, which lasts 24 hours or until it is cured magically. Any character who fails the Wis check has to roll on the temporary insanity table. That lasts until it is cured - typically by a Greater Restoration.

But! BUT!!!  I would also describe to the players in gruesome detail the horrific nightmares that visited them throughout the night. I would describe images of them reliving the fight against the Talos cultist. The specific details of the nightmares will be based on the fight against the Talos cultist. The players have nightmares of losing the fight and seeing the world fall into darkness. They have nightmares of being remembered for all time as the ones who failed to save the world. They have nightmares of being hunted down by the cult. They have nightmares of seeing cultists everywhere they look. They have nightmares of the Talos cultist eating their hearts!

ALSO! Whichever player rolled the LOWEST for their Wisdom check will suffer quite a bit more. That character would feel their alignment slipping toward evil. Hopefully that character is run by a player who you trust and who you can rely on to go along with a narrative without giving up a secret. I would slip that player a note explaining that they occasionally hear a voice in their mind urging them to do evil (like whatever actions the Talos cultist would have wanted done).  Throughout the game over the next few sessions I would occasionally slip that player a note telling them what their character does for their next action. It will be something evil, like kill someone who is surrendering, or like stealing something from a party member while they slept, or whatever specific action might advance the purpose of the Talos cult. 

If that player is a good role player and goes along with your plans, it may take the rest of the party several sessions to realize that their friend, their fellow party member, is possessed by the evil spirit of the Talos cultist! They will try whatever spells they have - cure wounds, lesser restoration, remove curse, etc. None of them will work. They will have to seek out more advanced help, like a temple. That temple can perform a ritual to cleanse the character of the cultist's possession - for a price of course! The party will have to either make a huge donation to cover the costs of the material components for the exorcism, or perform a service (like a side quest) for the temple.

Once the temple has exorcised the possessed character, they may also be able to provide the party with reliable information on the next leg of their journey - such as info on the next BBEG, or whatever arc you are planning next. 

Just my two cents. Have fun! 

I'd actually have an ancient curse without save on those that ate the heart, then create a side quest for them to lift that ancient curse. This ancient curse can not be lifted any other way. If they complete this side quest then everyone gains a random Charm (you can find them in Chapter 7). This would bring some interesting elements of consequence, but also reward them for their ability to think outside the box. I would have the ancient curse have the following properties:

• When you gain this curse you gain a random flaw from the Indefinite Madness table until you lift the curse.
• When you roll a 20 on an Ability Score, Attack Roll, or Saving Throw, you must reroll that die and accept the new result.
• If any creature attempts any effect to access your mind or deals Psychic damage to you, they must make a Wisdom Save (DC 15) or take 1d4 Psychic Damage.

Because of the last effect, some people may argue in favor of keeping the curse, but ultimately the 1st effect will cause social problems and the second effect will deny them criticals, which should motivate them to do something about it. As for the reasons and the nature of the side quest, I'll leave that up to you. You have a better understanding of your players and the campaign.

That sounds Amazing i really dig those ideas thanks for the input!!

Duuuuude thats intense i love it!! and i totally works out for my next session to. i got a player that wont be able to make it  so i just finished a oneshot for her to finish up before she rejoins the party. so i could set the one shot for her as her nightmare and i can just describe the night mare for the session shes not in. ooooo the pain and misery im about to inflict whahahahahahahahahahahahahahahah

"Always play with their minds." - Lucas, (Empire Records) 

Quote from TaynOfDarkwood >>

 

I would open the next session by asking each player to make both a Constitution check AND a Wisdom check. Set whatever DC you want, but I would set the Con DC at 20 and the Wis DC at 15. (These are ability checks, NOT saving throws, so no proficiency added). 

Any character who fails the Con check starts the next day with the poisoned condition, which lasts 24 hours or until it is cured magically. Any character who fails the Wis check has to roll on the temporary insanity table. That lasts until it is cured - typically by a Greater Restoration. 

Just for curiosity's sake - why make this an ability check instead of a saving throw? The result and cause both sound like they would call for saving throws. If the goal is to artificially raise the DC, why not just raise the DC directly? Mostly just curious if I've been misusing/under-using straight ability checks. :p

@Beowulfe - I would ask for checks rather than saving throws because I would WANT most of the party to fail at least one if not both of those rolls. Saving throws are easier to pass than checks, because of the added proficiency for some. That's also why I set high DC's for the checks. 

They ate a mummy's heart! That's a superbly dumb thing to do. I would think the average human or demihuman digestive system is probably not equipped for such an unholy delicacy. Heck, my tummy rumbles when I eat anything spicier than Doritos. How spicy is a MUMMY HEART?!? 

The session would serve two purposes:

First, it would provide a really cool bit of gothic horror to the narrative, as I would describe their nightmares in absolutely grizzly detail. If the Wis check is too easy to pass, too many would not get to partake of that horror, and the entire mis-en-scene would be lost. I want a statement, not a footnote!

Second, it would serve as a lesson that you shouldn't go around eating the heart of every Tom, Dick, and Mummy that you kill. If the Con check were too easy to pass, they might not learn that lesson. The next time the party kills some cool, creepy, powerful creature, I would want the ONE character who passed the Con check to say "Hey, guys... wanna eat its heart?" and have the rest of the party immediately get the vurps and say "What? No! Those things are poisonous, you twit!"

So I've actually got the out line for next session and I'm really looking forward to it. Took alot of what you recommend tayn. Add a few scenes from the movie "the ritual", changed  the wisdom check to a sanity check( it gets them rping alot better). And then just gonna send them on their way to axeholm. Which they got the moral choose to either give it to orcs to live in or capture it for the town to flee too.

If the are fool Hardy enough to actually sleep in the light house through the night they're all gonna wake up away from where they fell asleep. The lowest sanity check is gonna wake up naked in front of the chair Moesko dead body is lumped over in. and they're gonna be on yheit knees Praying to it. They have no memory of doing such a thing. Theyll  be corrupted by talos for now.

They're all wake from a gruesome nighare after that. Which fits well. One of my players will be gone for the session so I wrote her a one shot to play through the actual nightmare.

What makes all this extra fun is they have an orc in the party fighting against the half orc Talos cult. Plus they're heading to the players tribe to help take axeholm for them. A double agent of talso is gonna be great for these next few sessions

So I ran with the nightmare idea for session. The party really loved it. The actual all rolled pretty high for their con check and pretty well for the sanity check but they also all have some stupid high wisdom. One crit failed though so he's the double agent already started to lean into it pretty hard it was great.

But I had one character that didn't make it so I wrote her a one shot that she played last night. She basically played through the nightmare I described to the party this session with a few differences. One she survived it unlike the others of the nightmare. Second I changed the Talos shrine to a shrine of a kraken( she was bummed out about missing it and loves Lovecraft so) anyways she actually ended up worshipping the kraken thinking it might help get her out of the nightmare. I'm thinking it probably did. Sooo now I got a whole new fun thing to tease suggestions?

Also I think my party is actually a bunch of villain's in denial lol

That sounds awesome! I'm glad it worked out for you. 

:-)