Wanted - Child Care Provider (aka Nannygate)

Background #

Each run was a pretty much self-contained & modular, with three "applicants" or "candidates" for the PC's to go find & kidnap. I expected that the final one may require 2 runs.

The Nanny candidates themselves were:

  1. Miss Joysea, the winner of a beauty contest held in Atlantis City.
  2. Mrs. Helen Fire (Hellfire), proprietor of an Orphanage in Slaughter Beach, DE (a real town, where my parents retired to)
  3. Madame / Empress Woo, a powerful NPC from PrinceCon 15 & 16, who was in "forced retirement" in the LOTBOM (Lions, Tigers, Bears, Oh My!) aka "Kitty-Kitty" Mountains in NJ above the Water Gap.

1st Run #

The first, as were each of the following parties, was told to bring back an "applicant" under pain of death (or worse, for the Undead). Afterall, the Dark Lady is a very busy woman and she needs someone to take care of the four toddlers of the Apocalypse. Other monsters are temporarily baby-sitting in the interim, but hurry anyway. And finally, return the applicant in the form that you would like to be in yourself, in other words, ALIVE and in decent (NO, NOT "indecent"!!) condition.

The party was told that whoever won the beauty contest was the one the Dark Lady wanted retrieved. They were teleported into the Pain Barrens and told that the Joysea Devil knew the lay of the land and he should be able to guide them to Atlantis City. They discovered a huge and somewhat mysterious iron "T" box, which was the now-abandoned lair of the Joysea Devil in the form of one of the ridiculously obnoxious Undead-mammoth-powered giant ballista battlewagons from my PrinceCon X scenario.

The Umber Hulk in the party decided to try to crank up and fire the machine for the Evil chaos of it, launching one of its ~100ft long ballistas several miles in the general direction of "South", where it started a bit of a forest fire. This caused some minor damage to the party when the old mechanisms finally gave way and sent 6 inch diameter metal cable snapping like whips. This giant ballista shot fell short of Kevin's "Hole Sweet Hole" by ~5 miles, but caused a bit of a commotion, so a few of his PC's investigated the impact crater and tracked it back to the battlewagon, gaining a hint that the Joysea Devil was missing.

Stumbling along, the group was drawn to the sound of cats being tortured, which turned out to be the bagpipes of the Dwarfish MacKensey Brother's Circus playing a nighttime serenade. The party's doppleganger discovered the layout of their camp, which included a very old Argus Sphere who was their guard inside the tent. The party listened to the Dwarves complain about how their lame circus wasn't making any money and how their show in Atlantis City was a make-or-break. The Succubus came up with a brilliant plan of turning on her charm for the dwarves with a story of how she captured all of the other partymembers with a "magical" rope (a completely normal rope held by the other partymembers). She told the dwarves that she wanted to join their circus, not for the money (which she had plenty), but for the adventure. Naturally, it only took around 30 seconds for them to privately debate this windfall opportunity before they agreed, and the party joined the circus to ride into town.

Once in town, they discovered that Atlantis City was pretty tightly controlled by Hobbits and that there was a boss named "Mr. B" who everyone was afraid of and they kept on getting confused with a human named Barney who they were calling just "B" while they joked about the prospect of encountering a purple dinosaur and the like (little did they really know!). The party's doppleganger found out a ton of information about the beauty pageant contestants while getting a bit too drunk himself and almost giving himself away with a doppleganger finger manipulation trick. The Succubus became a bit of a lawyer regarding town regulations and so forth and used these to great effect. Her only problem was in going to a GM-run pawnshop with two not-terribly-useful magical items she had stolen from the dwarves' wagons, getting a pair of semi-cursed "Doppleganger Dice" in return.

The party then proceeded to lose all their money in the Casino's at Shoenfeld's Purple Lounge with that pair of (heh, heh, heh) magical dice. Since they kind of liked their kneecaps the way that they were, they agreed to do a "favor" for the casino operator - track down a certain dead mage named Barney who had seemed to have come back from "lounging with the lizards". They did confirm that the lizards from Scullville had eaten Barney's body in a feast, but they missed noticing that the Hobbit henchmen who had been killed while guarding dead Barney's house had been off'ed by somethin' big and the lizardmen had rumors of a 'great lizard god' in a bay to the north (yes, their jokes were true - Barney was a big dinosaur through a reincarnate spell and he was not happy about it at all).

Returning to town in failure, they had some explaining to do to the Casino boss for coming back empty-handed and they suggested fixing the Beauty contest and placing bets to recoup their debt, which was agreed to, so with a bit of collusion from the crooked casino operator, the already crooked contest was made even more so, with a pretty female dwarf Succubus and a doppleganger celebrity hobbit joining the three other judges. The race was close, but votes were swayed by the Beholder's Telekinesis power during the talent portion of the contest and by some last minute amendments to their votes..."Whew!". Zelda, a highly talented polylinguist auctioneer Dwarf and champion bareback pig rider won. In exchange for re-fixing the fixed competition and coming through with a Trifecta, the casino's Boss let the PC's be the bodyguards at the post-contest party and it was a simple snatch-n-grab and a dash back to Dark Castle with the hostage, er, "applicant".

A successful run.

2nd Run #

Um, well, you see....it was the kids again. Disease and Pestilence told Zelda that she was too fat, so Zelda went on a crash diet and they helped. Well, she died of Anorexia / Bulimia so we need another Nanny. Go bring in another "applicant".

This time, they party was to grab the proprietor of an Orphanage in Slaughter Beach, DE, who was quite successful in keeping nearly 100 kids in line, so she should be strong enough stock. During the first hour of the run, three players literally fell asleep and their characters were deleted from play; this loss of firepower proved to be a major problem later on.

The remaining five monsters, upon approaching a nearby town at night, discovered the locals in an uproar. The doppleganger snuck in and found that "something BIG" had once again attacked a house that night and had carried off a few locals right out of their beds. After hearing the description, they surmised that it must have been the Joysea Devil (it was!). The party accidentally split up, with the Beholder taking a southern route and the rest a northern route to their destination. The beholder found the orphanage early the next evening and settled in to wait for the party to catch up.

The party avoided detection while resting that day they crossed the drawbridge to the north to come into town and proceeded to split up again: the doppleganger took a direct approach (little girl looking for orphanage) and was led by some local Perrin dockbuilders right to the front door while the three remaining partymembers - - all Undead - - tried to "sneak" in their metal armor and whatnot through the marsh that ran along the backside of the very small town, scaring out all of the muskrats, raccoons, skunks, etc, ahead of them. A short while later, the night's routine patrols began with the lighthouse keepers putting out some food for the local critters and the Hermit Cleric casting a Speak with Animals to ask them if there was any new news in the area (response: "um...you mean BESIDES the terror in the marsh?").

Confrontation and combat ensued, with the night sky being first lit up by a fireball cast by the town's defenders. The Undead unwittingly provided a good distraction for the Beholder and Doppleganger who saw the fireworks and made a grab at the applicant inside the orphanage. The Beholder escaped by going out to sea with his prize on a Levitate and was joined by the Vampire who was able to escape. Unable to fly, the doppleganger made his way back to Dark Castle separately and, because of his faster movement rate, reported that the party had been successful (and took credit for a brilliant plan).

Unbeknownst to the Doppleganger and unexpected by me, the Beholder decided that he was going to strip-search the prisoner, just to make sure that there were no holdout weapons (or neat treasure? :-). Unfortunately, it was then that he learned that the Nanny was really the Joysea Devil who was under the effect of a cursed Brooch of Inversion (an item that reverses everything about its wearer) which could only be removed on nights when there was a full moon...which it was...and why there was something running amok in town (hint). After doing some damage, the Joysea Devil flew away, released from the curse now that the Brooch had been passed onto its next victim. They showed up in Dark Castle now empty handed and with some explaining to do. The doppleganger is now wanted for more (ahem) "questioning". The Dark Lady was also quite upset that they didn't do horrendous abominations to an orphanage while they had the chance.

Missed it by that much, guys.

3rd Run #

Well, a demonic being isn't a mortal, so they wouldn't have done the job anyway. This time, Auguries were used to find the absolutely best candidate and they indicated that we should send you North, to the LOTBOM Mountains, escorted by the 27th Legion (Orcs, of course) in case you have any problems with the Leo's up there.

En route, the party used their own spellcasters to do many more Auguries and discovered that they were to bring back Woo, a former powerhouse from PrinceCon 14 & 15, although some answers they got back seemed confusing, but it was clear that she was much more powerful than the MU-12/Cleric-8 that she was before she ran a kingdom for two years ("and gaining EP from all of the taxes collected") and that due to the power of a Thrice Ring, there were actually three of her in existence.

One of the things that they forgot to ask was how well protected her fortress was, which proved rather fatal later on. They confronted the Red Swords, lost 99 of their legion of Orcs (Sarnak the Orc survived and he was sent home) and among the loot, found a Chime of Time which may have been useful later on. Approaching the area that they were to search, they spotted a watchtower from a good distance off and immediately found a good place to hide instead of searching any further. Finding a small, damp, cloudy and foggy valley, they decided to cover their backtrail, search a perimeter and camp until the next day.

They were soon to find out that they had accidentally camped on the front door step of Woo's Tower, as all of these solo monsters were in turn ambushed by an invisible creature with a cloak, a coldcone wand and no apparent head. No one died, but it burned up party healing resources. The third and last of these encounters happened just as one partymember found the tower. The party all collected there together and agreed that not separating from each other was a good idea.

Soon thereafter, they set off the magical traps on the front doorstep, a minor inconvenience, but a warning that they didn't pay enough attention to - it was but a movement Slow spell, a Heat Object on the front step and a Damp Teleport. They tried to slide a Djinn down the chimney, but he was unwilling to take even a point of damage to get through a magically heated section which would have otherwise provided access. They also didn't realize that if the Wizard Eye that was watching them could go down the chimney, maybe they could cast a Wizard Eye too.

So they hit the front door with their Cyclops and everyone started making lots of saving throws as a baker's dozen of magical traps made things interesting. Three died and the Cyclops was missing (he had been teleported 50 miles away and was one of the few to survive). The next round, everyone ran away, as the Firestorm continued; fortunately, the blinded Sphinx guessed right and flew the correct direction. Awhile later, they regrouped after the shorter duration spells had run their course and looked at the door again. It was still there, or so it appeared.

They figured out that there was an illusion of the stone door now in place, backed by a real wooden door which had been created by shaping. They proceeded into the foyer. As they explored the room, the Succubus became stuck on a rug of demon trapping, which the party properly recognized for what it was, but forgot how to release her, so they tied the rug to the back of the Drake, putting the Succubus "permanently in the saddle". They then talked the Djinn into casting a knock spell on the next door, while the Sphinx hovered above the heated stone front doorstep (one of the first traps). That triggered the next set of traps and nuked the Djinn. Fortunately, the Sphinx survived the Cold Cone, but was Feared and Blinded, so he proceeded to try to get away as fast as possible.

Unfortunately, the survivors - the Drake and the Succubus on his back - forgot about that nasty thing that attacks people when they're out there all alone ("with friends like these"). They went in while the Sphinx was being killed. Unfortunately, they found that they couldn't fit inside the inner door and left, making up a good story for the Dark Lady to explain what happened on their flight home.

Five hours later, the Cyclops finally runs back onto the scene, finds five dead bodies and he has no idea what happened. He decides it might finally be a good time to return home.

Nearly half the party thought it was a success!

4th Run #

This party builds upon the prior group's "trap-clearing success" (so they called it) and arrives uneventfully at the tower which has now a 100ft radius burnt-out dead zone around it and they start to gingerly poke around. They knock on the door and are ignored. They shout and are ignored. They get generally frustrated...and get ignored. During a break, they see the invisible "something" run across the clearing and in through the door. No one tries to follow or open the door, which had absolutely no traps on it, other than being that plain old wooden door hidden by the illusionary stone door. They decide upon a "lets harass her until she pays attention to us" strategy and go off to camp for the day.

Meantime, a Vaikral on the roof uses some oil of etherrealness and slips into the tower to start exploring, room by room, its three levels. He first finds a woman studying a magical book of a tower security report written by Green Torbat Security Services and chooses to remain hidden from her view (which is quite easy to do when you realize that its just a programmed illusion). Moving on to lower levels, he gets attacked by the guardian (who must have been extra-dimensional to hit him) from which he runs away. He repeats this exploration process a few more times, running away when confronted, a few times until he has decided he has mapped enough or taken enough damage (probably the latter).

As the group goes to camp for the day, most of them decide to check out the previously mentioned 'watchtower' before resting and actually discover the rest of the scenario.

They see a duplicate tower in the next valley, standing in the middle of an open field and watch a cart make a furniture delivery (Woo had made a large, secret loan to the Elven King in Philaelfia and he was paying it back in fine goods and magic items).

They decide to descend on this tower, figuring someone MUST be home here and finally make contact. Woo also ESP's some partymembers and makes them an offer they think they can't refuse: to SELL OUT. Six of the partymembers accept and they are teleported to new homes far out of reach of the Dark Lord - the doppleganger went to San Francisco, the Werewolf to Kobold Island (PrinceCon 21), the Drake to caverns inside the Chipwich (PrinceCon 18) and the Lich and two other Undead were teleported to the moon.

The next day, the two remaining partymembers, a Vaikral and a Drake, approach the tower and immediately get a telepathic "(sigh) what do YOU want?", followed by a request to drop saves for an ESP, which they did. Much to my surprise, the Vaikral proceeds to make an eloquent appeal to Woo about how each of the Apocalyptic children's attributes have a good and an evil side to them and that it would be a personal challenge for Woo to raise them and teach them the "good" in things (Wars for the right reasons, etc).

Woo is actually impressed with this speech, but finds the Undead Cleric's arguments for why Death can be a good thing to be theologically at odds with his own religion and finally agrees that if the Vaikral were to become one of the living again, she would do it. Much discussion followed on how to do this and the Drake suggested a "Summon Bob West" for getting some answers, which Woo agreed would be a good idea. Upon finding that a high level Sphinx was the only creature who could cast such a spell, Woo cast a True Shapechange on one of her selves, who then cast the spell.

Fortunately, Bob was in a good mood and amused the party by staying to answer the question. He cast the appropriate spells to convert, preserve, kill and resurrect the Undead Vaikral back into human form. As the party with Woo made their way to the Dark Castle to begin to baby-sit, the question came up - "if Bob cast a CONVERT on me, what religion am I now?"

Thus was begun the Cult of Bobweston, with its first priest and first follower...oh no!!!

The Players' Perspective, Reported by the dragon Sharenth: #

The party for the 4th run gathered, and were ordered by the representatives of the Dark Couple to retrieve a nanny for the children. Not just any nanny, but the legendary Madame/Empress/Lady Woo. Intelligence from the previous run led us to believe that a heavily trapped tower might be the place to search. We went to the tower.

As we approached, there were signs of stress developing in the party. In particular, Murkatos Darkenwing, the Fey in our group, wanted to approach the tower frontally, and knock on the door. The vaikral decided that a recon mission would be a better way. One of the party's 2 dragons and the Vaikral Brunhilda landed on the tower roof, and the Vaikral used her oil of etherealness to explore the tower.

Meanwhile, the Murkatos was knocking on the tower door, sending message spells, etc....all without any response. When the guardian showed up, the Brunhilda allowed herself to be attacked once or twice in an attempt to gauge a potential foes power (the previous party's write up had made this creature seem much more powerful then it actually was).

When the oil of etherealness wore off. Brunhilda and the dragon Sharenth rejoined the rest of the party. The Murkatos began to rage at the Brunhilda, blaming the non- success of the Fey's plan on the Vaikral's intrusion into the tower. Murkatos even threw a supposedly magically trapped sack at Brunhilda, in an attempt to attack her. This failed due to a misunderstanding in how the spell was designed to be used. It was here that the party broke into 2 groups. One followed Murkatos off to explore other towers that had been seen. This included all of the party but for Brunhilda the vaikral and Sheranth the dragon.

The larger group explored one or two towers, then came upon one that contained the real Lady Woo. Here they were made an offer by Woo. Give up their following of the Dark Couple, and she would send them to a safe haven. Fearing her great powers, and having been given the choice by the powers of Darkness to succeed or else, they sold out. All the undead (OddE the lich, Moritanius the vampire, Kralian the specter) were sent to the moon. Murkatos the Fey went to San Francisco (PC version). The werewolf Anais Rouge to Kobold Island of SeaCon. Wintervax the White, the other Drake to some huge caverns of the Chipwich con.

The remaining two players debated as to what to do next. Returning seemed suicidal, as did storming any of the possible locations of Woo with a party of two. Various plans on how to lure Woo out into the open were discussed and rejected. These included commerce raiding, etc. Finally, it was decided to appeal to Lady Woo's practical side. We would present her a 'pitch' that the Dark Couples children were necessary evils, and that one of her three selves might be able to influence War, Famine, Pestilence, and Death in such a way as to limit the amount of harm they caused.

Under a white flag, we approached a tower where we had observed some trade being conducted. We were allowed to speak with Lady Woo, and were able to convince her of our idea's merit. The only catch was that Brunhilda the vaikral is an undead priest and was trying to sell the idea that death could be a good thing! Lady Woo wanted an explanation of how the Vaikral's theology could allow this. Brunhilda explained that she had become an undead, in part due to her anger at dying unfairly at a young age. (I believe she was about to have her head crushed on a battlefield, when she called out to the powers of darkness to preserve her existence). Here Lady Woo asked the Vaikral if she would like to resume her life if given the chance. To show sincerity (and perhaps even being sincere), Brunhilda responded positively.

Much reviewing of magic was done by Woo in an attempt to restore the vaikral to life. She finally concluded there might only be one way: she transformed herself into a sphinx, and proceeded to summon one of the most powerful beings of the PrinceCon universe: BOB WEST. Bob appeared, and after a brief (for the legendary Bob that is) discussion with Woo, cast a strange and powerful series of spells on the vaikral. These included Conversion, Cause Wounds to the Infinite Power, and Restore Life. The vaikral became a human female, and Bob then departed.

However, the ex-Vaikral was far from being the person she once was. The conversion made a very unique alteration on her theological beliefs. She became the High Priestess of the Cult of Bob West. The powers of Bob had their effect on the dragon also. Seeing such great power put to the advantage of a mortal being, as opposed to the Dark' Powers do or suffer policy, Sheranth immediately dropped his allegiance to the Dark Powers and became the first follower of the new cult. Sheranth would later convert a manticore in Hireling Hole also.

Lady Woo was presented to the Dark Lady's handmaiden, along with a report on the rest of the parties betrayal. A human and a dragon accomplishing the mission were not expected, and we were given many suspicious looks. The dragon and human concluded after their meeting with the Dark Lady's handmaiden that perhaps it might be wise to leave quickly and quietly from the presence of evil creatures that served forces we no longer had any allegiance to.

PrinceCon 23 Summaries & Run Recaps: #

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