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[Settembrini]

or Settembrini tell us what situation the characters in his game are in and ask what's the most fucked-up thing that could happen to them right now to make the adventure more inspiring

Right now, I´m DMing a nice weekyl two person Wilderlands of High Fantasy Campaign, with two Gestalt characters.

They have rescued an old geezer Elf guy and he pointed them to a secret treasure place in the  Irminsul forest. When they brought this old tortured geezer-elf back into the Irminsul, he commited elvicide, he vanished in a tainted cloud of soul-smoke, having finally found peace.

The characters investigated, and found the place to be cursed: The old snake mound clearing which was a burial ground got ambushed by Orcs. The ambushing Orcs killed, raped and looted the elves congregating there, and were cursed by a dying high elf sorceress with eternal boredom: Time doesn´t pass for them in a meaningful way, they are sort of living dead. Now the two characters want to get the treasure from the cursed orc guarded mound, but are still unsure how. They will most likely get it, though. As it´s wilderlands, I don´t know what the treasure is!

What kind of cool artefact could I present them?
What would be awesome and mood inspiring thing to find?

Not some lame bonus item or elven chainmail, but something stories and legends evolve around, a thing that will change the path of the characters, makes them targets and chosen at the same time?

I was playing and hinting at some kind of elven alliances and animosities (wood, high, grey, dark elves etc.).


Should I use the old-elf-spirit as an Obi-Wan Kenobi mystical guide, or is that too cliche?

Any ideas?

[Calithena]

Well, there's always good old carbelium arrowheads, though that's a CSWE thing rather than elven in the wilderlands.

The spirit guide has potential but the problem with things like that is how do you get it into the game without jerking them around? Better to give them a compromised resource of some kind I think. That said, if you want to give them a bunch of history and some neat hooks to exploration and treasure, having the guide appear to tell them of the dark past, where the orcs came from, the lost Talisman of Chellereth, whatever, that would be a good scene. And maybe under the right circumstances he could be re-accessed with Speak with Dead.

Tainted elven 'special purpose' weapons seem like a possibility here. More good than bad, but still with some drawbacks. A bow that won't let you put it down until every orc in the opposition has fallen. A sword whose moan sets your teeth on edge and frays your nerves but cuts steel like butter. The soul-deadening theme with the orcs could be expanded to the magic items somehow, great power but also serious limits on overuse.