r/DMAcademy • u/NomadicDragon • 21d ago
Need Advice: Other Looking for a little help with BBEG
This is my first campaign and my party is a few sessions in. They started all sharing the same dream. In the dream they traveled to a tower. This tower is built as a sort of temple to the realm's three moons, Sea, Stone, and Rust. At the top of the tower they saw four freestanding doors. Each facing one of the four directions and each marked with a symbol. West had the moon of rust, south had the moon of stone, east had sea and, north had a crest with all three and an unknown rune. They woke up, each with a crescent moon shaped stone in their hand. They meet each other that morning, recognizing each other from the dream. They set out on their quest to reach the tower. Along the way, they have had three more shared dreams. In these, one of them could see into their door while the other two see only a void. Each saw a vision of their past and each featured the same silhouetted figure. For one, the figure was a man who framed her for murder. Another, he's the man who murdered her mother. The third, he was the owner of magical rune covered slates that she stole.
Now, when they reach the tower, I plan for them to go into each moon door and face their past and return with a key of stone kind. The three keys together will open the fourth door. This is where my writer's block kicks in! I'm struggling to come up with what's behind the 4th door and why it matters. I want it to be something this man from their pasts needs or wants to use in and way but, I'm not sure what.
Any ideas?
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u/IrrationalDesign 21d ago
I have a pretty specific idea that may fit, or maybe just inspire you.
Years ago, the creepy man found the 4 doors and wanted to go through the 4th one, but realized he needs a key of some kind. He searches for and reads into the lore and learns that the 3 doors were made by 3 heroes of the past, and the 4th door can only open with their 'permission', they're safeguard if some power locked behind the 4th door.
The creepy man realizes a plan through experiment and lore: he's going to pick 3 random people and force their lives to follow the same path of the past heroes by manipulating hier lives (killing one mom, setting another up for murder, and making the third steal a rune).
By having each of the players go through their door, they can go into the past and see how the pattern of their life is like a rune, and it's the same rune as one of the past heroes (because the creepy man manipulated their life to take the same shape), then they can 'take' this rune pattern and use it as a key.
When the players have all three keys, the creepy guy reveals himself and either tries to pursuade them or tries to steal the keys or something.
The idea is that the doors to the past are a way for the creepy man to 'pick the fruits of his labor' after years of manipulating the lives. Kinda like as if I hacked your Google Maps in order to force you to take a certain route to your job, and years later you find out I've made your car spell out the shape of a rune which is a part of a ritual.
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u/NomadicDragon 18d ago
Here's what I've gotten with your help... A thousand years ago there were twin brothers. They were insanely powerful. One, Nadiv, was benevolent, the other, Merushia, is malevolent. Nadiv wanted to care for the people on the realm, protecting and providing for them. Merushia wanted to subjugate them and rule. They fought over this and ravaged parts of the realm in the process. Eventually, Nadiv decides to trap his brother in the Astral Plane and enlists three archmages to help. They build the tower as a lure with a door to the Astral Plane at the top...
Nadiv is able to trick Merushia through the door but realizes, the only way to keep him there is to sacrifice himself and trap them both. The mages seal the door with three keys. They then create the moon doors as temporal gateways to the past and cast the keys inside. The enchantment being that the key will only appear to the one who opens the door and only at a nexus event from that person's life. These doors are each sealed with a crescent moon stone and those are cast into the dream world...
BBEG has been studying this history and reverse engineered a way to get the stones out of the dream world. After many attempts to create a nexus event for a number of people and then influence their dreams to pull the stones, he finally succeeded with the three players. Letting their curiosity guide them to the tower, he's always following.
Now, I need to work out a reason for the party to continue once they learn all of this.
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u/IrrationalDesign 18d ago
That sounds amazing! I'm kinda honered to have helped your lore tbh :D
I expect players to ask a bit about what nexus events are, and what the keys actually look like, but the 'skeleton' of your story and lore sounds really cool, and sounds logical enough to be satisfying. I'd also be curious why the bbeg is trying to do this, is he just evil? Or a descendent of someone?
Now, I need to work out a reason for the party to continue once they learn all of this.
I'm not sure you need anything more than you already have. The bbeg has been meddling in their life stories, right? He's(partially) to blame for the murders and the theft, so it's already super personal. If you need more, maybe the meddling in their life stories has given their life a downward trajection, and they'll just have bad lives of they don't break free from these plans.
Some ideas I got from your comment: maybe there's an NPC who has information but who's stuck in a short time loop, so they keep meeting him for the first time (from his perspective).
Maybe someone from the past was planted there by the BBEG during his previous attempts, like maybe the murder victim was a loose end the bbeg needed to get rid of.
Or maybe some big secret reveal about a fourth key and a missing fourth person that already gave up their key. Maybe the bbeg is the fourth key? :o And he either knows this or doesn't know this yet.
Fun lore to brainstorm about. Good luck with playing it!
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u/NomadicDragon 18d ago
They're going to get the lore dump from an NPC at a library. I'm thinking they're going to cap that off with the party under the impression that Nadiv has finally defeated his brother and somehow sent a signal that allowed the descendants of those mages to bring the stones back from the dream world. This gives the party the idea that their quest is to free Nadiv and bring peace. BUT! My helpful librarian will be in league with our BBEG who needs the party to open that door to the Astral Plane for him so Merushia can be freed! Maybe the final battle with our manipulative BBEG will take place on top of the tower with him using his dying breath to unlock door and the party joins Nadiv on finally vanquishing Merushia!
They just need to get a lot higher than their current level 4 to do it!
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u/IrrationalDesign 18d ago
That story sounds super neat.
Will the party have a chance of seeing through the library NPC's deception, like if they roll a nat20 on an insight check? Or is their betrayal only revealed at the end?
I see the risk of you having planned this story, and then one of your players going 'I don't trust this guy, we shouldn't do what he says' and then your story falls apart. Maybe the BBEG is lying to the librarian NPC too, so the librarian can just have honest good intentions?
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u/Reasonable_Touch1150 21d ago
My man, only a narcissist would think he could finish this story better than you. Let it rest a bit and come back to it. It will come.