I’ve reached the double digits!
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ADVENTURE HOOK 010
Location:
A large (for a village) fishing village on the coast (of an ocean or a lake) in a temperate region of the world in which your PCs reside.
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Situation:
One week ago, the last major storm system of the season hit the coast. Since then, the fisher-people of the village haven’t been able to catch a single fish, of any kind. The fish are simply gone.
Problem:
1) The village is a primary supplier (of fish and other water-bourne delicacies) to the capital city of the region. Without being able to catch fish, the village’s economy will collapse and the prices in the capital will go out of whack
2) There are no longer any fish in the largest lake of the continent (or in a large region of the sea/ocean if it’s a coastal village). This could have serious ecological impacts.
3) Alternatively, this could be a set of islands that make up the region. If the islands rely upon fishing as their main source of food, and as their main type of exportable goods, this could be a further crisis among all of the islands. There would be bigger implications for an island economy for sure.
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Tasks:
The players need to
1) Determine if the fish really have gone away
2) Try and get the fish back
3) Barring the completion of number 2, the party may have to try and reconstruct the economy of the village with different goods
4) The party will also have to deal with getting a new primary supplier of sea-goods to sell their wares to the capital
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Things to explore:
1) Where have the fish gone? Is it a magical spell? Is there a prophecy that says all of the fish go to some underwater nirvana every 100 years (which turns out to be true)? Has there been a toxic infestation that killed off all the fish? Has some giant sea-beast come and decimated the fish population in the area?
2) Perhaps one of the PCs hails from this village, or has a relative that lives there. This may give the party some insight into what the villagers are doing about the problem.
3) Perhaps one of the PCs works for the nobles in the capital and must come to investigate the villager’s inability to deliver fish per the contract. Or perhaps the whole party has been hired to find out the circumstances in the village.
4) Perhaps a town upstream of the village has polluted the coast in some way – perhaps putting mining waste into the water. Or perhaps it is an evil alchemist that has a small workshop just north of the village – perhaps he has been putting his waste chemicals into the water and driving the fish away (or killing them).
5) Perhaps the fish aren’t really gone, but maybe a band of pirates has taken over the fishing boats, or has commandeered them after each fishing expedition, stealing the catch.
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Suggestions:
There are many things going on in this scenario. You can press many angles to get your players involved. The cause of the fish disappearance can be anything from magical in nature, to natural migration patterning, to pollution or pirate raids. It could also be due to something as mundane as: the villagers are upset with the amount of taxes they must pay to the capital and are showing their displeasure by not providing fish to the capital anymore. The missing fish was a rumor started by a worried or meddlesome merchant and has no basis in truth. Have fun with it – paranormal, supernatural, or mundane, it doesn’t matter which you choose as long as you have fun.
That’s the end of Adventure Hook 010!
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I hope you are enjoying this series – post a comment and let me know what you think of them! Are they helpful? Is there something you wish I would address?
By the way, my blog will be moving web-hosting services in the next week or two. I will retain the wordpress shell, so not much will change, but the bookmark you use may need to be updated. I’ll keep you posted!
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Until next time, I wish you good gaming!
~DM Samuel
