Adventure Ideas for newcomers to New Pavis?

[Ian A. Thomson]

Hi Folks

I am about to start writing a new (final) section for what will now be Vol. 01 in the P&BR Companion Director's Cut series. (Probable title: 'New Pavis: City on the Edge of Forever')

This will be a bundle of introductory stuff around Storm-favoring newcomers arriving in New Pavis and settling in

Nothing in the Big Rubble (that will be the next volume)

I won't have time to do much writing for the next week or so as I am packing up my house and then doing a mega round-trip removal delivery 1,100km north and back

So I am reaching out for ideas for scenarios that give the PCs/Players (as low-intermediate level newbies) to New Pavis a chance to experience and explore life and locations in the city

Including a short jaunt into the Rubble (which I am already writing) and one or two trips into Pavis County (which I haven't begun to think about yet), but wanting at least 3 little scenarios and a few scenario ideas for in the city itself. Don't need to be epic, as this is the start of the campaign, and a counterpoint to the unfoldingly more major adventures to follow

Anyway, ideas welcome, or if anyone has already written such adventures or outlines and are willing to share...

Also, I want to provide a list of odd/interesting random encounters and random things witnessed to have available as they explore New Pavis freeform, so ideas there also welcome. Typical and not-so typical scenes

Cheers

 

Edited April 20, 2022 by Ian Thomson

[svensson]

Before I answer, let me make sure I've got your premise straight...

Question 1: Is this for the RQG rules?

Question 2: Is this for your 'Pavis historical' project? The one you were describing where you present Pavis in three different time periods?

[Ian A. Thomson]

5 hours ago, svensson said:

Before I answer, let me make sure I've got your premise straight...

Question 1: Is this for the RQG rules?

Question 2: Is this for your 'Pavis historical' project? The one you were describing where you present Pavis in three different time periods?

Hiya

RQG Rules

I'm not sure I've called it a historical project, and its one main era and one secondary era

Main Campaign (Vols 1 & 2 and 5-10) are 1619-1625 ST

Vol 3 is the Rough Guide to Pavis City (894ST)

Vol 4 is how to turn Rough Guide into a campaign (894-900 ST)

Edited April 21, 2022 by Ian Thomson

[svensson]

12 minutes ago, Ian Thomson said:

Hiya

RQG Rules

I'm not sure I've called it a historical project

Main Campaign (Vols 1 & 2 and 5-10) are 1619-1625 ST

Vol 3 is the Rough Guide to Pavis City (894ST)

Vol 4 is how to turn Rough Guide into a campaign (894-900 ST)

Ah, ok. I don't read every single post of the forum, so I missed some development of the ideas you expressed earlier.

Alright, I would consider writing two background pages. One would be what a native Pavisite knows... NOT adventurers, per se, but the average Pavisite-on-the-street who is just trying to make a living way out here on the edge of nowhere. The second is what those traveling to Pavis might have heard... some truth, some bull-crap, but mostly somewhere in between rumors and gossip.

As far as a new character /getting-to-know-you scenarios,

-Ingilli hiring the PC's to guard a warehouse for a week while most of their hired goons are attending the Zola Fel temple barge on its annual procession down the river and back?

-Krogar Wolfhelm needs sturdy yeomen to accompany a cart-full of Orlanthi ritual goods [nothing rare or expensive, just some aromatic woods, iron rations for the resident priests, candles, maybe some regalia sewn by loyal Orlanthi worshipers, etc.] to Pairing Stone

-The Zola Fel temple barge is willing to initiate hired troops to guard the barge on it's annual pilgrimage free of [monetary] cost... they still need to sacrifice POW however.

[French Desperate WindChild]

- pc meet some children and poor people suffering a lot. they are lunars (not bad guys, just . .lunars) they want to leave this so hostile country but have no money, no food, nothing to travel

- pc (or pc's friend npc) want to obtain an house, how to deal with praxians who don't understand the land property concept - or don't care (not the good words, just the opposition between nomads and cities)

- praxians from different tribes in a city have certainly some "proximity" issues with the other tribes.

- big rubble, how to deal with the new rules ? is there any rule ?

- rumors about some lunar assassins presence sent to kill Argrath / or other leaders. could be true, could be assassins sent by one local leader to kill a "friend", or just paranoia. Would pc be hired as body guards, as investigators or be seen as suspects ?

- this slave is not a lunar, she is my sister !  ... no no no you cannot conclude that ! don't touch me ! I M NOT LUNAR !!!

- new opportunities to travel with a caravan, to trade or to send furniture and gears to fighters far in the west / south... Lunars are not here any more to secure some road

- new opportunities to attack a caravan... Lunars are not here any more to secure some road !

Edited April 21, 2022 by French Desperate WindChild

[French Desperate WindChild]

1 hour ago, French Desperate WindChild said:

pc meet some children && poor people

whooo not good to answer when programming software 😛

 

[Rob Darvall]

An introduction to gang turf issues. They walk down the wrong street...
I used the gangs as opponents, allies, employers, and minions. Gang signs were everywhere. Along with Praxian "graffiti" defining a second layer of overlapping territories.

[Ian A. Thomson]

15 hours ago, Rob Darvall said:

An introduction to gang turf issues. They walk down the wrong street...
I used the gangs as opponents, allies, employers, and minions. Gang signs were everywhere. Along with Praxian "graffiti" defining a second layer of overlapping territories.

Absolutelydootly! :)

[Darius West]

On 4/21/2022 at 9:32 AM, Ian Thomson said:

This will be a bundle of introductory stuff around Storm-favoring newcomers arriving in New Pavis and settling in

Infiltrate Badside. This is a job for newcomers only.  The White Bulls know there are clandestine Lunars operating in the Big Rubble much as the Orlanthi used to.  While this knowledge meant that most Orlanthi rebels and bandits did a good job of stopping this, some Lunars managed to slip through.  Evidence suggests that they are now using elements in Badside as their intermediaries.  As the players are newcomers, and not well known, if they can slum it in Badside until they can find out who the lunars are, they will be guaranteed access to a rental property in New Pavis, and a year's rent free.

Catch Rubble Runners.  Cock-fights, cat fights, dog fights, fish fights, the folk of New Pavis have an appetite for betting on animals fighting each other.  The problem is that someone always takes issue with them.  The latest version however has the nay-sayers beaten, as no cult protects or cares about rubble-runners, and getting them to fight to the death is now a somewhat lucrative business.  Interested parties are prepared to pay 1L per SIZE point of live rubble runner, for as many as you can catch, as supplies of the creatures are low, and New Pavic bloodlust is high.  Where do you catch the biggest rubble runners if not in the Big Rubble?

Wanted Dead or Alive.  A series of mysterious crimes have been taking place in New Pavis.  Sometimes striking the wealthy, other times the poor, but often striking criminals or suspected criminals.  Nobody knows who the perpetrator is, save that they seem to be of no known species,

Spoiler

It's a duck trickster who has lost all her feathers in a bizarre electrolysis accident

and their crimes are always audacious, outrageous, incriminating to the victim and humiliating.  Their crimes are often sealed with a bat marked in red sealing wax.  What sort of maniac could be behind these deranged crimes?

Infamous shit-hole needs new goons.   The Reed Inn (D15) is in trouble.  It has always been in trouble but now it is slightly worse.  Its owner Bagzaga Rag is a Dark Troll of Argan Argar who runs the bottom-of-the-bottom lowest quality drinking hole in New Pavis, that makes Loud Lilina's look like a palace.  Bagzaga used to pay kick-backs to the "Red Bastards" street gang when the Lunars were running the city, but now the God's Own gang from Sunside is looking to run her out of town, if not kill her.  The place is terrible.  The beds are piles of tied reeds, as is the furniture.  Much of it is riddled with various form of insect life which Bagzaga insists are free and tasty treats for her guests.  The alcohol is barely drinkable, but will get you buzzed, but makes prison "toilet wine" look classy.  Its clientelle are also disreputable low-lifes despised by the rest of Pavic society.  Many locals want to get rid of this weeping sore in an otherwise respectable district.  For all this, somehow, Bagzaga manages to run a profit, and she is prepared to pay for protection.  Will the players consider this unusual offer?

Just go and take a look.  A local Lhankor Mhy sage and a Daughter of Pavis are pooling their resources to uncover a mystery, or so they say.  They seem to think that there are a system of 8 fountains across the Big Rubble, one in each of the main districts, that don't fit.  They are supposed to be from the founding of the city, but depict Pavis as a deity, which is chronologically impossible.  There may even be a ninth fountain in the Puzzle Canal.  The learned folk want the players to go to the supposed locations, and note whatever they can about the fountains, confirming their existence or not, and to take rubbings or make sketches if possible.  Pay is surprisingly good for what should be an easy job with no fighting.  Nothing is every what it seems in the Big Rubble though.

 

Edited April 27, 2022 by Darius West

[Ian A. Thomson]

On 4/27/2022 at 11:19 PM, Darius West said:

Infiltrate Badside. ...

 

Love it!!! :)

[Joerg]

Pavis factional and family politics, and spill-over into adventuring or even mugging rubble explorers. I used the Wind Words episode "Scenes from a Market" scenario seeds as the starting point for my "reform the Pavis Royal Guard from Hargran the Dirty's thugs into the elite cavalry unit in the board game" starting point, but over-eager and way too straight-laced player characters soon pushed themselves into a greater mess when they sped up the burial of Hargran to within two hours after successfully ambushing him after merely two weeks serving at Zebra Fort. As a result, other than fending off some chaos snakes out of the Chaos Playground disturbing the excavations below Yelmalio Hlll I haven't had the chance to playtest my rough notes to turn these into RQG adventures yet.

[Graeme P]

I also started my Real City game adapting Scenes from a Market.  I was much less ambitious than Joerg - I used it merely to introduce Real City and its key locations and to get across the sense that outside the walls of Real City is a dangerous place to be.  As new members of the Real City Watch trying to make sure that hte market ran smoothly the players were very interested in each stall and who was running it.  

It led nicely into Rough Business from P:GtA.  That intrduced Hagran's crew (or at least part of it) and gave them an understanding that the Pavis Royal Guard was not on the same page as Real City

I have a mix of experienced players and a couple of 'new to Glorantha' folks as well.  To make the game accessible, the theory was start with one location (Real City), then have them do a brief trip into the Rubble (so expanding the horizon) and in Rough Business introduce New Pavis, Badside and the nomads.

 

Edited May 8, 2022 by Graeme P

[Ian A. Thomson]

Can anyone message me with the basic RQ mechanics of the Troll Drinks (from Trollpack?) or if simple enough, just post them here? I am working on adapting John Hutchinson's excellent article contribution 'Dwarf Drinks' to the Companion series, and we only have HQ stats from the original publication. Much appreciation in advance. [EDIT - Information Received!] :)

Edited May 31, 2022 by Ian Thomson

[Ian A. Thomson]

One day, making tracks

In the Prairie of Prax,

Came a North-Going Zax

And a South-Going Zax

One carried a Sword, and the other an Axe
 

And it happened that both of them came to a place

Where they bumped. There they stood.

Foot to foot. Face to face.
 

"Look here, now!" the North-Going Zax said, "I say!

You are blocking my path. You are right in my way.

I'm a North-Going Zax and I always proceed.

Out of my way, or my sword makes you bleed."
 

"Who's in whose way?" snapped the South-Going Zax.

"I always go south, making south-going tracks.

So you're in MY way! And my axe says to move

If you don’t budge, I’ll carve you a groove.
 

Then the North-Going Zax puffed his chest up with pride.

"I never," he said, "take a step to one side.

To argue on this is a clear waste of breath

So I challenge you now to a duel to the death!"
 

"And I'll prove to YOU," yelled the South-Going Zax,

"that I can fight here in the Prairie of Prax

I’ll kick your ass! For I live by my pride

And there is no way that I will stand aside.

 

 

So these two Zax came to a flurry of blows

One sliced in the ear, one smashed in the nose…

So noisy were they, that broo came to see

What was the racket, what on earth could it be?

 

 

Let’s wind up this tale, as the ending is gruesome

No honorable finale for this arguing twosome

The moral to learn is as plain as the day

Prax needs more signage for clear rights of way!

 

 

Edited June 2, 2022 by Ian Thomson

[Baron Wulfraed]

Well... It's not a port of the Kilkenny Cats... 😱 Nor the one that starts "One fine day, in the middle of the night; two dead boys got up to a fight; back to back they faced each other..."

 

[EricW]

What about "The Garden"? 

An idea I had on another thread, in which when a group of people sleep near or in the ancient ruins of an old Earth temple, one of them wakes up and find themselves in a vision of Genert's garden. None of their companions can see the garden, but as proof the affected party member can pick fruit from the garden nobody else can see, and hand it to their companions. 

But there is a terrible price for remaining in the vision of the garden - people who choose the illusion of the garden over the reality of the Prax wasteland cannot see or defend themselves against chaos. They also sometimes trip over things they can't see (hint). Since they are still part of the real world this makes them terribly vulnerable. People can leave the garden by an effort of will. The choice to reject the intoxicating vision of the garden and embrace the wasteland is the red pill decision to accept reality, and the need to fight chaos. 

Those who cannot bring themselves to reject the beauty of the garden eventually share its fate.

Edited June 7, 2022 by EricW

[g33k]

On 6/6/2022 at 11:32 PM, EricW said:

What about "The Garden"? 

An idea I had on another thread, in which when a group of people sleep near or in the ancient ruins of an old Earth temple, one of them wakes up and find themselves in a vision of Genert's garden. None of their companions can see the garden, but as proof the affected party member can pick fruit from the garden nobody else can see, and hand it to their companions. 

But there is a terrible price for remaining in the vision of the garden - people who choose the illusion of the garden over the reality of the Prax wasteland cannot see or defend themselves against chaos. They also sometimes trip over things they can't see (hint). Since they are still part of the real world this makes them terribly vulnerable. People can leave the garden by an effort of will. The choice to reject the intoxicating vision of the garden and embrace the wasteland is the red pill decision to accept reality, and the need to fight chaos. 

Those who cannot bring themselves to reject the beauty of the garden eventually share its fate.

<yoink>
Fabulous idea.
Related, it seems, to the "Hidden Greens."

Consider the idea stolen, now it's part of My Glorantha!

(n.b. I don't see it as an "adventure" per se, more like an "encounter."  It's just a feature of Prax & the Wastes (and Old Pavis).)

Edited June 8, 2022 by g33k

[soltakss]

35 minutes ago, g33k said:

<yoink>
Fabulous idea.
Related, it seems, to the "Hidden Greens."

That would be a Hidden Field, in my Glorantha.

[Darius West]

I have a scenario which I have been writing where you play New Pavic kids in 1612.  They are siblings and their daddy was melted defending the walls from the Lunars, while their mother has been struggling to make ends meet by taking in laundry and occasionally becoming a "proto-ulerian encounter" at night.  The kids have jobs they need to do to help out, but they are low paying and exploitative.  Then their mother takes ill and is bed-bound.

The problem is that the Chalana Arroys have all fled to Horn Gate, so there is no easy solution.  The kids have a series of difficult choices to make about how to save their mum.

[EricW]

On 6/9/2022 at 7:15 PM, Darius West said:

I have a scenario which I have been writing where you play New Pavic kids in 1612.  They are siblings and their daddy was melted defending the walls from the Lunars, while their mother has been struggling to make ends meet by taking in laundry and occasionally becoming a "proto-ulerian encounter" at night.  The kids have jobs they need to do to help out, but they are low paying and exploitative.  Then their mother takes ill and is bed-bound.

The problem is that the Chalana Arroys have all fled to Horn Gate, so there is no easy solution.  The kids have a series of difficult choices to make about how to save their mum.

The Lunars will help - all you need to do is become a Seven Mothers trainee initiate...

[Darius West]

19 minutes ago, EricW said:

The Lunars will help - all you need to do is become a Seven Mothers trainee initiate...

Correct...  Let's just say there are options available and that is certainly one of them.  On the other hand, Teelo Nori is all about running food relief and shelter for the poor.  Medical aid is potentially available from them.

Edited June 12, 2022 by Darius West

[g33k]

On 4/20/2022 at 4:32 PM, Ian Thomson said:

...

This will be a bundle of introductory stuff around Storm-favoring newcomers arriving in New Pavis and settling in

...

I'd suggest you make this more-general, not "Storm-favoring."

Plenty of players like to run Lunar PC's, or an Earth-centric bunch of Esrolians, etc.  The other obvious one is a bunch of Praxians, who may be Tribe exiles or otherwise citybound for some reason.

[Ian A. Thomson]

30 minutes ago, g33k said:

I'd suggest you make this more-general, not "Storm-favoring."

Plenty of players like to run Lunar PC's, or an Earth-centric bunch of Esrolians, etc.  The other obvious one is a bunch of Praxians, who may be Tribe exiles or otherwise citybound for some reason.

In general I totally agree. For a campaign that is fundamentally all about kicking the ass of the Lunars the fk out of Pavis, not so much :)

Some PCs can be neutral of course, and when I say 'storm favouring' I include the majority of Old Pavic folk (who in this campaign are desiring - led by their cult's inspiration - an independent free newly arising Pavis City).

Not ruled by Dorasings either, but at least the Dorasings accepted Pavis as a valued member of the pantheon, with respect, whereas (in the eyes of the majority of the Old Pavics in my Glorantha) the Lunar Empire basically wants to absorb Pavis into a pantheon that embraces chaos and denies individuality. No way Jose (they say)

1 or 2 Praxians who are OK with the city are of course no problem to include in a PC party

Edited June 13, 2022 by Ian Thomson

[Pentallion]

Well, since it's the "City on the Edge of Forever", I guess "Griselda has to die...or millions will die who didn't die before." Says the pointy eared elf time traveler to the PC who has passion Love Griselda.

[JRE]

Sometimes the classics work best, specially with new players. 

Treasure Trove Hurbi is being harassed by trolls / Lunars / Orlanthi, depending who could make the players intervene. If they intervene, the other faction postures and menaces but will not do anything rash in the New city. Hurbi gives them a map he cannot read as a grateful gift. If they do not intervene, the scroll lies on the street when they manhandle Hurbi towards a suitable drinking establishment.

The local gang sells the news of the map to all factions, so the characters get lots of people wishing to become their friends, which lets you introduce the movers and shakers in a relatively friendly fashion. Meetings in bars, meetings in eateries, and even meeting in Humakt's temple. The players cannot read the map or identify what is represented there, though they can always research it. Ideally whoever they sell the map will be able to read it but will offer to hire them as extra support. That lets you do a rubble run with low risk, and show the main landmarks, the typical procedure of the Lunars, and maybe make some friends.

In my game the map is an Ogre marker in code, where a couple of prisoners are kept near ogre island. That also allows exposure to some chaos with little risk. They sold it to Krogar Wolfhelm as the humakti duck wants to become a weapon trainer. Depending how they fight and who you place as prisoners, they may make several interesting contacts in the city. I had a Lunar clerk and a Pavis initiate, so that opened some extra doors.