Campaign Prep: Searching For A Body And A Soul
Posted 2024-05-14 00:09.The first portion of this campaign would be in the Alsatian Mountains, a long mountain range that extends throughout the entirety of the Apgarian province of Alsace. The player characters involved are the following:
- Bartholomew IV Strandiz
- Emily Hazeldine
- Narmaya
- Levallier de la Fouet
These two pairs have separate ultimate goals as they head into the town of Hugo. The former are merely traveling into the Mountains via the doorway that connects it with the Turbiere de Hubar in order to quickly head into Mayonne, where supposedly the soulless body of Matthew V Strandiz is wandering. The latter are in search for another vampire who supposedly once resided in these mountains. Collectively, during the Hugo portion of the campaign, the party would have an average party level of 10, which would be tough to prepare for in a lower magic setting.
To further complicate issues, currently, Bart Strandiz is in the Feywild, and traveling from that plane to Thera causes random temporal shifting to occur. The randomness has to be accounted for, as there are certain world events with fixed dates. As it relates to this particular campaign, Phantasmagoria is set to happen on the 13th day of the 9th month. EV said that in case the rolls were so bad, the other three might want to head to Hugo even before Strandiz would come back from the feywild. This is because Phantasmagoria might be one of the only venues where they could find clues on the vampire they're looking for, and also taking even more time than what has already elapsed since the Free Theater had disposed of Matthew Strandiz' body may decrease the chances that they would be able to find him.
Current State of Things
Hugo
Currently, the Hags of Hama and La Camaraderie jointly hold the "doorway" that connects Raibon Island with Walburton House in Hugo. They routinely ensure that any Reformist agents are not able to retake control and send more people into Raibon Island. There were some Reformist scouts that have been sent to the area recently, who were easily dealt with, and subsequently transformed into Frogmen by members of the Hags of Hama.
But in the run-up to Phantasmagoria, with more people have been entering the area, it is becoming harder to track new arrivals and confirm whether or not they are Reformists. Within the past month, the various inns and taverns, as well as some personal homes, people from various parts of Apgar, Poasah, Mehicania, Tanduaria, Calamutz, Ahuria and even from as far East as Sarebia and Haram. These foreigners and their various motivations and prejudices don't necessarily jive well with each other, and had begun to cause some tensions in the area. Not even to say whether or not some of them may be Reformist agitators.
Factions at play
- La Camaraderie
- Hags of Hama
- Reformists
- The Thirteen
- Devotees of the Angel of Nature
- Vampires of Alsace
La Camaraderie and the Hags of Hama
The fact that Somme Privatea was given an invitation to the auction at Wunderplat Hospital at all was due to rumors that La Camaraderie might have been attempting to bolster their numbers with spellcasters outside of Apgar's official sphere of influence. Iluvia Wunderplat herself knew that Raibon Island might actually be fertile ground for spellcasters to develop, and so wished to see how far along they've gotten, if they have gotten anything at all. being one of Phantasmagoria's largest sponsors, she used a ticket to the secret magical event to probe what they knew at the time.
Sanery
Senera
Motivations
To actually prep for this game, let's dig in to the various motivations that led to the current state the entities involved are in.
- Why was Matthew V Strandiz' soul taken?
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The obvious reason might be to take institutional knowledge of the Apgarian military from a person of such high military rank as him. Being a Major Colonel in charge of magical personnel would potentially leak the means in which Apgar tracks magical individuals.
If it were some kind of magical ability or effect, then capturing his soul would allow them to draw out the power somehow. If it were an artifact, they could use his knowledge to find and retrieve said artifact.
But why separate his body from his soul at all? Well, he's a high-level caster and was causing them trouble. Separating body from soul would remove that as an issue... So maybe Matthew delved into divination despite Bart IV's misgivings about that branch of magic? Maybe he'd found the way to cast scrying. I think this is what I prefer as a reason. He'd finally cracked one of the ultimate in detection spells. Or perhaps he has a spell called mass scrying that would be beyond his spell level, but he might have had access to enhancer orbs that would have allowed him to cast it.
- Why was his body dumped in Mayonne? Why might it actually still be there?
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As his soul has been collected for whatever reason, his body may have had its value, but Andre Delarde had some beef with the man and wanted to basically desecrate his body. Placing some kind of enchantment and illusion spell on Matthew Strandiz' body as it meanders in Mayonne's city streets as some kind of cruel punishment.
It's been a while at this point, so the body has likely been collected. I haven't decided who yet... I do have time until we get to Mayonne tho, and I do want to get to that location for sure. We do have some options on what has been done to the man's body tho.
Option 1: It's been taken by the Poasans to use as a spy.
Option 2: Some internal faction ahd used his body to further their goals
Option 3: Reformists use his body for breeding purposes. His soul might be absent, but his body definitely has those magical Strandiz genes.
- Why do they actually want to go to Phantasmagoria?
- Originally, Hedwig, Cotto and the others want to go to Phantasmagoria for the simple reason that the occult interests them greatly. Though they still have great interest in the occult, they've since grown to face the responsibilities that they've been bestowed. The date of Phantasmagoria is too close to the execution of the crew of the [Principium](@/vehicles/principium.md) for them to have the time to join. Since Narmaya wants to learn about the other known vampire though, Phantasmagoria may be the best chance for just that.
Other notes
- Can one detect that a different "soul" is in someone else's body?
- The locate creature may be confused when trying to locate a specific creature if its original "soul" was removed from it. If the spell is used to specifically find the creature's body, roll a DC 15 intelligence ability check, on a success you may be directed toward the creature's body. If not, the spell will attempt to find the location of the soul.
- What is a "soul" anyway>
- Even the most ardently atheist magic user in the world of Thera would have to concede that a *soul* exists within every creature of the world, as a number of spells and magic artifacts are capable of manipulating them, or outright pulling them out from a body. Prevailing non-secular thought would define a soul as an imprint of a person's identity, or ego, which resides within their mind.