Quests Wanted: what to do in town

inspiration
#1

This year I am trying to keep things a little more personal with the parties and I want to have them primarily operate within town so I am looking for any fun encounters and interactions you may have had while in a town setting. I will be using the “Beat Down Brothers” from the EZD6 quests for inspiration and I have a few things written down but I’d love to hear about any other ideas or fond memories of in town shenanigans.

Find who’s been stealing from the shops, catch the vandals, help find lost villagers, find out what’s causing the noise in the basement, stop the zombies from rising in the cemetery- stuff like that!

as always, thanks in advance!

#2

I love the idea of a town-centered campaign!

You could turn the old evil-cult trope on its head, and have a secretive cult getting harassed out of a misunderstanding over their secrecy. Criminal shenanigans around something like a footrace or festival also seem like they could bear fruitful inspiration.

#3

Speaking generally or in broad strokes, as I don’t have EZD6, I think it depends on how large the town/village is and what kinds of environments are near the town/village.

○Thorp (town of 10 or less) Adventures

•Stop the (Insert Name) brothers from resorting to yet another tavern fight.

•Help Farmer (Insert Name) Wrangle his herd of (Insert beasts).

•Investigate the old mill and determine why it is not in use anymore.

•!!FIRE!! Join the Fireline and pail water or search the buildings for survivors.

•Bandits threaten to starve out the thorp preventing much-needed supplies from reaching the townsfolk; Sneak past and secretly retrieve the supplies or crack some bandit skulls are but two possibilities.

•(Insert Name) needs a rare herb that grows in (Insert place) but can get it themselves for (Insert reason). OR (Insert Name) needs a rare herb that grows in (Insert place) and left to get it themself but has not returned.

○A town Like a Thorp will have many of the above options but possibly more as the types of buildings, townsfolk, and needs are likely more plentiful and diverse.

•Rival shopkeepers have been locked into a price war for some time, while the townsfolk have benefited taxes are coming due for the town and the shopkeepers are both in jeopardy of defaulting on their taxes. Who do you help and why?

•A gang of Roughriders have recently come to town while the town is happy to accept their coin the chaos has been more than just disruptive can anyone convince them that it is time to move on?

•(Insert Name) the (Insert Profession [something critical to town function]) has need of (Insert Item), but it is very expensive and can not be found locally, (Insert Name) needs someone to retrieve the item from (Insert place) and bring it to them.

•Strange sounds have been coming from the local graveyard at night, the guards don’t seem to keen on investigating but the local holy person (Insert Name) wants someone to investigate. (is it Undead, Graverobers, or a Mad Scientist making an abomination of flesh)

○Cities and Metropolises can have adventures like the tiny thorps and slightly larger villages, but here is where the diversity becomes more apparent as specific streets or districts may be ruled from the shadows through criminal organizations or through specific political parties.

•Rumors are spreading about a black market where demi-humans are traded or enslaved.

•A local known crime lord is mostly untouchable but recently several of their lieutenants have been targeted and brutally slain, the crime lord is not willing to expose his ventures to the local constabulary and wants to hire a third party to handle the issue.

•Someone pulled off an impossible second story job on (Insert Name) a local (Insert important position in the city), while the local guards are looking into the theft (Insert Name) wants more hands on the issue.

•Noises can be heard from under the streets in the dead quiet of night, what could be making those noises; rats, alligators in the sewers, young rouge turtle demi-humans or something else.

•Just as the party was leaving the town the kingdom knights rode up on the city and demanded that the gates be closed and all within the city remain in the city for the time being. That was a week ago, and people are getting sick.

#4

Sweet! this will fuel a lot of adventures! We are doing a small town but most of these can fit into that.

#5

Oh I like that a lot, they will probably be really receptive to that idea.

#6

It can be fun to play a game of “assassin” or have a similar analogous ongoing mystery in the party’s home town/base of operations. Session-to-session “B” plots like this can take on many forms and many different levels of peril…

• An NPC antagonist is methodically going around the town stealing items of arcane or spiritual significance, which (the party can discover) while of appreciable power and value individually, could be assembled to create a “super-artifact” with dangerous synergy—not necessarily something that will end the world, but something significantly dangerous that the party and the owners of the components wouldn’t want out in the wind…
• An NPC antagonist is a werewolf, vampire, cult leader, etc. and each session a victim NPC known to the party is either taken out or turned to the “dark side”; slowly, session by session, the town becomes enveigled by this escalating threat.
• The party is tricked or coerced to do the bidding of some mysterious mastermind under credible threat to the town, having to complete tasks session by session that stave off the threat to the people but advance the ultimate plan of the villain. Additionally, a timer/deadline—either stage by stage or for the whole series of tasks—can be implemented to heighten and maintain the tension. The PCs can work to uncover the mystery of the villain’s identity and plan as they carry out their assignments.

I have run all three of these types of campaign arc to excellent effect. Maybe one of them might work for you, revised and done your way.

#7

looks great! I’ve been wanting to run a werewolf for a while so I might seed that in…but the magical weapon idea sounds great too.

#8

You can also place little bread crumbs to coming adventures in the ones the players are currently experiencing. Say in some antagonists lair they find a small jeweler’s workshop, obviously used recently, with the corpse of a jeweler - not local, but from very far away. Then an adventure or two later they discover the corpse of someone in the livery of the Duke’s house, but the corpse has been decapitated. A commoner child who discovered the body has a signet ring taken from the body. If acquired from him, the party discovers it is magical. Then, finally the duke visits town to celebrate the party’s exploits. They recognize the ring on the duke’s hand. It matches the one they found…

#9

A cadre of rival necromancers have come in search of the missing piece to securing immortality, they have no qualms about slaughtering those who get in their way but will not stay in any fight that could lead to their premature death. Instead, they use the bodies of the dead to defend them as they flee. Only days remain until the veil between worlds is thin enough for the restless spirits to pass through to the mortal realm. Can you stop the individual necromancers before one of them becomes the next god of death?

If you read Jim Butch you already know where I drew inspiration from.

#10

ohhhhhhh I love that!

#11

I dig it. It ups the game for any zombie/skeleton attack.

#12

Town under construction.

I’m not sure who I got the idea from, but here’s how I did it with my kids:

At the very start of the campaign their town was mostly destroyed by a volcanic eruption. Everyone escapes into the nearby dwarven mine.

Most of the beginning of the campaign was about sorting through the remains, finding what could be salvaged and helping the town start to rebuild.

Then they had to deal with all sorts of supply problems; food shortages, where to get building supplies, fights over old property boundaries, etc.

My kids got really attached to the town and the people because they helped build it. It was a fun way to build investment.

There’s lots of ways to play it out too: refugees in tents outside a main cities walls; settlers rebuilding after the orcs have been pushed back; etc.

#13

That’s rad! I can see how that naturally leads to a lot of comradery for the town. Plus the mine can have so many fun interactions and adventures in itself. Thanks a bunch!

#14

It doesn’t even have to be a whole town the way I did.

The players ride into town looking for a place to rest, only to find a band of brigands has just set fire to the only inn/tavern & stollen all the kegs of beer.

The players ride after the wagons, overtake & defeat the brigands & return to town. The town managed to get the fire out, but much of the tavern/inn has been lost.

The innkeeper jumps up on a wagon & yells to everyone: “tonight we drink & tomorrow we rebuild!”

Players spend the night drinking & chatting with various townsfolk. In the morning the players start helping rebuild the inn.

You’d better believe that will become the player’s favorite place to stop on their future adventures!!

#15

Also, a bunch of humans suddenly stuck in a dwarven mine had a ton of interactions and adventures connected to it! Grumpy dwarves, kids getting lost, monsters fought in the dark… it was fun!