Hey!

So I am going to be running Damned Cities- or an expanded version of it- but I am still wondering to do with this body in the alley. It seems particularly revealing- especially so early during the adventure…

Unless I outright lie to the players about its nature or stay vague, despite their question- and I mean regular, description question that they could get from Medicae Tests (and a Tech-priest on the Team), I don't see how I could pass this thing off for anything other than a zombie.

Whereas I would like to maybe pass it off as a potential servitor- or a man ravaged by strange drugs- and perhaps, that way, enhance the "Red Herring" Link to the Logicians, which (thanks to the Logicians previous involvement in the campaign), is going to lead to an encounter with Amicus Tole and his Sinophian Tech-witches.

For those people that ran this game- how did you players react when finding the corpse? Did they Immediately scream ZOMBIES and WARPCRAFT!? or was there a period of doubt as to the nature of what was going on?

Thanks!

I WILL BE SPOILING FROM HERE TO THE END OF ALL DAYS; SO GO AWAY ALL YOU PLAYERS!!!!

Saldre said:

Never did, but you mentioned a good point. Selling this corpse as a Servitor should be impossible. There are no non-organic parts in this one.

But then again….

Even IF the PC are able to tell that this reeks of the warp and of possessed/animated bodies…so what? I think it only underpins that this situation really needs the attention of the Inquisition AND it might point the PC far away from the real culprit. You can even mislead the PC further by having a ready-made handout of suiting cults that were uncovered in the recent history of the city

"The NIght Cult" has been operating out of the area around saints wash
A certain nobleman is rumoured to be a warp dabler (make him a victim, he had one of the shards)
Tech-Witch-Cults where creating servitors from dead bodies, animating them with unholy help

Since you WANT them to go in some different directions (as mentioned in your post) this part of the starting scene might actually be more help then harm to you

ALL THE SPOILERS.

I have run this twice and it was very different both times.

First time the PCs were much more advanced and firstly the psyker grabbed the red cloth in the room and did a power that gave away its history… They also had an adept with sorcery and naugthy knowledge so he was able to tell it was a zombie by the runes carved into it. This wasn't really a problem in the story tbh as they still didn't know who was actually sending them and indeed dutifully took it back to the folly where further investigation could be mediated by the Biologis techpriest and Skarmen…

Second group were only rank 2 at the time and immediately assumed it was something to do with the empty men. I think it is all about how you describe the body. There is a difference between "The body has sorcerous markings carved into his chest" and "The body has strange shapes carved into his chest". Post mortem wounds are obvious but play up the slum the scene is in, maybe the PCs hear gunshots in the general vicinity all through the scene? These things happen all the time in the slums, maybe a drunk guy pumped two into it just to make sure before rifling the pockets? There are a number of conclusions that can be drawn depending on the mindset and type of PCs you have.

The most important thing IMO is that they shouldn't easily find out that the body came from the arbites morgue. Records have to have gone missing otherwise the whole story is blwon wide open too fast.

Hey!

Thanks for the Advice- and after reading the Tech-witches Entry again (and again), you're both quite right in that this body can easily be attributed to the cult as long as the players know these guys exist.

As it is, its surprising that no one in the Adventure proposes that possibility- what with Amicus Tole being described as the man behind the man, pulling the strings in Sinophia (before being driven to Cyclopea by Felroth Geth).

Just by describing in a particular fashion, and pushing to the front the surgical aspects, chemicals and all that- I love the idea of the group finding a Drunk Guy nearby with a weapon (Who could have shot it again!)

I can already pictures the players now, wandering trough an abandoned Manufactorium with Amicus' voice echoing on Voxes in the background, edging them on, until they stumble upon a ritual- and he offers them his aid in exchange for a small favor: "There's a small box which rightfully belongs to me in an old, decrepit office in the Quorum… manned by "The Sagacity"- Bring it to me, and you will be surely rewarded…" Or some such exchange.

In any case- back to writing that part of the adventure!

Thanks for the help.

Just curious, but can you tell me where it is written that Felroth Geth drowe Amicus Tole of Sinophia???

"From the Journals of Felroth Gelt, 780M41"- On page 198 of the Radical's Handbook, when they talk about Prognosticaon, there's a small box where Felroth talks about his failure.

Though it seems as if he's talking about Sinophia, because the description and the state of things is virtually the same as described in both Damned Cities AND Creature's Anathema, he's actually talking about Cyclopea [The Nearby Forgeworld] as he himself likes to remind us.

Gelt doesn't tell us exactly what happened- he, most of the time, stays vague- but at the end of the day, Amicus has been driven back to Cyclopea and forced to remain there. None will take direct action against the man- and Gelt's attempt at destroying him have failed time and time again.

Obviously, as Creature's Anathema likes to remind us- Tole can still pull strings in the Periphery. As such, it wouldn't be too surprising to find that he's somehow traveled to Sinophia or at least to manage to send a Hologram of himself there.