Those of you who read the post The Edge of Night ideas might recall that I'd made the mysterious 'F' (Dr Festus) the main nemesis of this part of my campaign, and the PCs have followed his dastardly plans from Horror at Hugeldal to Edge of Night (where he is responsible for the plan to corrupt the masquerade ball with doses of Green Pox).

This evening the PCs are entering the sewers of Ubersreik where they'll find his abandoned lair (not to mention a Beast of Nurgle and an insane, diseased watchman out of whom will explode nurglings, but that's another story...)

The only thing I'm stuck on at the moment is how to get the PCs, after this adventure is finished, to Faulgimere and the start of The Witch's Song, where I might run the final confrontation with F (or not ...) I need to leave some kind of clue to prompt them in that direction. I already mentioned the Cursed Marshes in th note to Dr Verfullen in Hugeldal, and the PCs will meet Matthia Kruger the witch hunter in the market square of Ubersreik (after they've chased the nurglings out of the sewers into the square, where they cause a mass panic and a mob forms to march on the von Bruner mansion, but that's another story ...), but I'm lacking some good thematic link to explain why Dr Festus nicks off to Fauligmere, and to get the PCs twigged onto following him.

Any brilliant ideas folks?

Should he leave Ubersreik when the ball begins, with his plans in the hands of underlings, to return to his main lair outside of Fauligmere? Or should the PCs somehow get to meet him during or after the ball (he must escape however).

Oh, here's the main lynchpin to it all by the way, which I'm quite chuffed about. Dr Festus is Noseless Brandt, the sewerjack. He's actually leading them into the sewers so they can find his old lair; not to mention so he can get to know his PC nemeses. It's the perfect cover - he's smelly, 'orrible looking, hangs around in the sewers all the time, and the PCs would never suspect him as a cult leader mastermind.

Witch's Song does go on and on about the marshes and possible spots that are heavily corrupting.

I believe the Witch's hut is built against crumbled ruins that have a 3d corruption check if you spend too much time there.

Those ruins could be anything you want them to be.

Or you might change the part about some villagers mutating into something more Nurgle-related, giving F a possible link with the Witch and a reason to visit there.

Consider that Dr. Festus was using Hugeldal and Ubersreik as basically a testing ground, but his real plot is to corrupt Marienburg both from within and also start a tide of corruption comming from the cursed marches. (There is mention of corruption there anyway). Maybe they can find some clues pointing in that dirction and either confront Doktor Festus in Marienburg or in the swamp.

You can also use the witch in relation to that. Maybe if they get some clues linking Festus to Marienburg, they will assume that the witch is doctor festus and maybe work together with the witch hunter for a bit.

In my own campaign, they defeated Verfullen in Hugeldal and found out he was to meet with F at the ball in Ubersreirk. Verfullen was supposed to dress like a clown and with everyone in disguises at the ball, I managed to get F to talk to one of the PCs while the others were distracted looking for skavens.

This part was hugely fun since they spend a lot of time planning for the ball, perfecting their costumes and arguing who could pose as Dr. Verfullen in a clowns costume the best!

Thinking the PC was dr. verfullen, F asked him to head north to obtain the spear of destiny and then meet him in Marienburg to help him complete his work on a major plague there. After completing Crimson rain, they went for Marienburg where they used a session to track down Festus and kill him. But then putting them right next to the cursed marches and ready for a new major plotline.

Perhaps bog octopus is considered a rare ingredient in some cure/cause of disease. Infect the players. Much motivation to seek out a cure then.

Maybe Baron Eldred knew the Doc from the time he spent away from Fauligmere. Perhaps the doc considers Fauligmere a nice out of the way bolt hole. Perhaps Baroness W. is a sufferer of some disease and the Doc has 'treated' her in the past. Everyone knows pigeons carry disease, perhaps the good Baron will sing the praises of the fine travelling doctore who visits the villiage now and then, how he is an expert on pigeons, and helps out the baron by taking some of his pigeons off on his travells and releases them from distant locations to train them to be homing pidgeons. But in trueth the doc's grand plan is to use them as flying vectors for spreading disease. Think avian bird flu.

bWhy does Doc nemesis have to appear in every adventure? Maybe the absence of his influence for a few sessions will make his return grander?

A light touch relies only on fact that to get drawn into Witch's Song heroes only need to meet the priest going for help, somewhere up the Reik, and be inclined to answer call for help.

Use chasing the villain to get them to the right spot and have the priest be useful/incur a favour owed by chance etc.

This fits with the "why does Doc appear in every adventure" theme.

Though you can circle back around to it with the smuggling via Fauligmere and maybe Doc has links to smugglers and finding their leader helps find Doc. That way you have a "non Doc adventure" that still "advances the main plot a bit".

Many thanks for those suggestions lads. I like the idea of the Cursed Marshes being a bolt hole for him after the PCs have thwarted his plans in Ubersreik. Still not quite sure how I'm going to get the PCs from Ubersreik to there, but hopefully I use either Matthias Kriger, or another clue somewhere. Or perhaps they can follow a fleeing important cult member, I've never run a 'long-range chase' before.

In any case, some good inspiration, cheers!