Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[HammerHand]

I've been wracking my brain over this for a week and have come up pretty dry.  Seeing as I've seen other D&D-related topics in this part of the forum, I figured I'd toss one out and see if the collective community can do any better (I'm sure you can).

Okay, here's the deal:  I'm running a D&D game.  4th Edition, going for a Greek Epic kind of feel - think a cross between The Iliad and Jason & the Argonauts.  With Dwarves and Elves and Dragon-men and all that other junk that comes with playing D&D.

In this, their third adventure, the heroes are looking for a specific, legendary inventor to build them a series of special boxes.  He's going to send them on some sub-quests to gather the necessarily epic materials for these boxes, but that's not the point.

The inventor is a changeling, and lots of people are looking for him.  He does not wish to be found.

How the hell do I give my players the appropriate clues to find a man person who is hiding in a big city and can change its face, hair, clothes, gender, name, and voice on a whim?  While it's certainly okay with me if they have a hard time of it, I have to make certain that I know of several valid clues to throw at them.

If you were a changeling attempting to uphold one identity, but make sure nobody found out it was YOU, how would you hide yourself, and how could that strategy be defeated by resourceful heroes?

[qwertyuiopas]

(From a non D&D player)

Well, can he change clothes at will? Assuming not, I would say that he would have at least 30 hidden caches of clothes, and occasionally go to one, change appearance and clothes, and slip out as another person.

He would likely keep a constant appearance for most clothes, excepting a "generic stranger" set.

At least one set would be more common than the rest, that he would use for standard interaction(buying a house, and so on)


What the players need is a slight clue that reveals one stash of not-quite-common clothes, and then later seeing glimpses of people wearing them, with maybe one in ten being the person they are looking for. With great effort, they might track down a second stash, and eventually find one containing the clothes of a sommon face they have met earlier, possibly invited to stay with for a meal or something, that would reveal the house of their target. This would give the advantage of the players already being on friendly terms with their target, and also them knowing a good "secret" meeting place, where they can talk to him the first time without letting others learn the secret.

Oh, wait, just saw the "One Identity" part. Really, in such a situation, they WOULD have stashes of useful alternate identity sets, for emergencies or where they don't want to be associated. Having the players unknowingly meet the target on their way in, and seeing him slip into a secluded spot and "disapear"(did not walk out, but not there) might work. And it could even lead them on a false quest to get into the nonexistant "secret tunnel network" until they discover the true meaning of it.

[mendonca]

Just offering some thoughts out on this one, excuse the rambling, however I thought I would have a go at offering some thoughts about how I might approach this one : -


I think if he really didn't want to be found, and that was his absolute primary goal, he could probably remain that way indefinitely.

I would suggest the way you would find someone like this would be on his unique character flaws or traits. What motivates him? Why does he even stand a chance of being found out?

He is (as you state) a legendary inventor. If he has reached the absolute zenith of inventing-dom, that urge which took him there would still burn on.  He must therefore have some unearthly drive to create things of an unusual bent.

He would probably be doing that still, in some way. This I suppose would give you a potential 'trail of crumbs'.

I suppose this is fairly obvious, and therefore he would probably realise this and being of the cunning type (and knowing that he is well sought after), he may leave a few red-herrings lying about. Perhaps an obvious route would lead to a trap type scenario.

There might therefore be a number of these types of contraptions lying about, which have seemingly obvious functions. Follow these at your peril.

I suppose the real clues would be the things that are really personal to him. Maybe he has an inner circle of confidants, all who bear a small mechanical Borgle on there lapels. The changeling grew up by a wetland filled with Borgles / had a pet Borgle. Perhaps he likes to give gifts, and he likes Borgle's. Not sure how this clue could be presented in a non-obvious, interesting way (inquisitive character notices Borgle winking on a lapel?)

You double cross a changeling at your peril, so I suppose his confidants would behave fairly stoically in the face of torture or similar. Gaining the confidence of these people would probably be a route in to a potential meeting with the guy, not sure how that is handled.

Maybe you would initially get thrown in a prison in the first instance, then judged by the Changeling in to whether he meets you.

Visits via this unknown prison may be how you communicate? Get put to sleep or bag on head/back of wagon, wake up in prison in unknown location.

Talk to changeling, receive quest, bag on head/back of wagon, dumped in side street.

After you have got him the parts for a new Box, he may even start to trust you ... ?

Some thoughts anyway! This is a fun thinking exercise ...

[Mr Tk]

The changeling pretends to be his own servant running errands for his 'master.' That way he judge the people first hand.

[Pillow_Killer]

He sure can change his look, but He cant change his "mind", can he? Give him some habits, like visiting fun houses to have fun with specific persons, or health drinking places, et cetera.

[Cthulhu]

Does true sight work on Changelings?

[Sappho]

Robin Hood was a sly and cunning thief, ever evading the attempts by Prince John and the Sheriff of Nottingham to capture him and his band of oddly merry men.  It may have been possible that he would never have been caught, but the evil Prince and Sheriff thought of an idea: he was renowned as the best archer in all the land, and so at the next fair they offered the hand of the princess in marriage as the prize for the archery contest.  Unable to resist but knowing he would be arrested if discovered, Robin showed up in disguise, but as he easily won the contest, the Sheriff recognized him and had him taken away.

[sonerohi]

So an inventioning contest?

[Sappho]

Might do the trick.  Make some sort of contest that only he could win with a prize he couldn't resist.  Rumors and legends might supply the identity of the thing he can't resist.

Of course, that might be up to the players to figure out.  Depends on how much you want to guide them.

[HammerHand]

First off, thanks for the help, everyone!  I'm already impressed.      Since you've all been quite cooperative and helpful, but I could still use a little help with specifics, I figured I'd be less vague.

The changeling's inventor-personality name is "Argus" (no relation to the Argus of Jason & the Argonauts), and his inventions pretty much run in the same vein as Daedalus - labyrinths, wings, that sort of thing.  Now that he has a name, it'll be a bit easier to talk about him.

Argus wants to keep "Argus" around, but since he's currently wanted by local crime lords, the local king, the representatives of a foreign army (and most every resident army), and almost every person who has misused his inventions and blamed their failures on him, he tries to be hard to find.  He's currently hiding as a wine-maker, because while it's good not to be found, it's also good to have a steady income, and the personality has worked for him for a while.


Changeling Rules - They can change their body, but not their clothes, so he probably does have clothing stashes all over the place for quick getaways.  If he doesn't have these stashes, then he is surely working on making them.  True Sight will quickly reveal a changeling's true nature, but my players (and everyone else after him) does not have access to True Sight... yet.

 Playing the apprentice running errands for the master is a brilliant idea.  I had toyed with Argus being Human with a changeling apprentice, and later decided Argus was the changeling.  It somehow did not occur to me that he might also be the apprentice/outside contact.  This is exactly why I needed help.   
 
 On Inventions:  I had also toyed with the idea of a marker on each of his inventions, and like this as an alternate way to find him (I always like to plan multiple possibilities, particularly when they make sense).  But what might he have invented that I could put around the town?  I'm not much of an inventor myself, so all I've been able to think of so far have been Daedalus's notable inventions (the labyrinth and artificial wings), a wind-powered automatic wine-press, and "some practical joke junk" like novelty chattering teeth and such.  Any ideas here?

When I get around to running this, of course, I'll fill everyone in on how it goes.      I'm not looking for everyone to write the game for me (that would be difficult and accomplish nothing!), but I also know that if I don't start looking outside my group for inspiration, they'll start to expect everything I throw at them.

[sonerohi]

Is tech level low? If they have even the beginnings of a periodic table, he could put down the abbreviation for Argon, or something similair, as his invention marker.

He could have invented a primitive train, with the stations being large gears, with a properly toothed chain running between them. The passenger part could be a circle, with a metal chair on it, with a gear around the circle part. Kind of like a ball bearing with a seat, where the outside can rotate while the inside is stationary.

[HammerHand]

I'd consider the tech level "Low, but surprisingly insightful."  Meaning that, if anything, he invents the equivalent of the periodic table.

After all, the Greco-Roman feel of it would be fairly dashed by steam power, electricity, or even chemistry as we know it.  It's already been dashed by the unfortunate D&D by-products of common magic (see Clerics, Warlocks, Wizards, and enchanted items everywhere) and creatures (see Dwarves, Elves, and Dragons), so I'd like to keep the tech level feeling Greco-Roman.  Aqueducts, windmills, rudimentary napalm, that sort of thing.  Yet as great as "Argus" here may be, I don't want him to be the inventor of everything, either.  Leaves little room for inspired PCs.   

[sonerohi]

Look up DaVincis journal and steal some of those ideas. Like the horse drawn battle-field-blender.