Friday Encounter: Mistaken Identity

This encounter can take place when the PCs are traveling on a road in any environment. It may also work in a settlement.

While the party is passing through the area, they are abruptly apprehended by an armored man carrying shackles who points a sword in their direction. Close behind him stand two other lightly-armored men with bows. This man is Leonel Janvier, a bounty hunter tasked with bringing a ruthless band of outlaws to justice - and he believes he's finally found the criminal scum he's after!

By sheer coincidence, the outlaws that Leonel is after just happen to fit the exact same description as the party. If the PCs question the bounty hunter's business, he provides a wanted poster, which depicts the outlaws in question, showing that there are exactly as many as the PCs and that each member resembles their counterpart in the party in appearance, tactics, and equipment carried. They have been charged with raiding caravans passing through the region, and there is a high bounty on their heads - 200 gold coins for each member brought dead or alive - which means that Leonel isn't about to let an opportunity like this slip through his fingers.

If the party protests their innocence, Leonel will prove difficult to convince - he will be quick to assume them of using a false identity or spinning an alibi in order to evade justice; in fact, the more the PCs attempt to make a case for themselves, the more convinced Leonel will be that they are the exact sort of disreputable ruffians who would make such excuses even in the face of inscrutable proof. In effect, he's already made up his mind that the party is guilty, and only clear, indisputable evidence will change his mind - for instance, if the PCs can prove that they were somewhere else at the time of the latest caravan attack (it happened about a week ago), he'll let them go. On the other hand, the upside of Leonel's tendency to judge others is that he has a very black-and-white view of the world, and is quick to make assumptions of one's guilt or innocence based on how consistent he finds it with their character - so, if the PCs can provide proof of them doing a great deed of heroism in the past, he will find it so difficult to reconcile with the notion of them being outlaws that he will assume they can't possibly be the people he's after. After all, an outlaw could never be so honorable!

Perhaps fortunately for the PCs, Leonel will try to bring them back alive if it all possible. If he is able to restrain them, or if they agree to come with him voluntarily, he will lead them to the nearest town (or to the nearest guardhouse or lock-up if already in a town) to hold them until trial can be held. However, he isn't afraid to fight if he must - and if he feels threatened for his life and the PCs show no likelihood of yielding, he won't hesitate to use lethal force. If encountered in a town, and if a fight seems inevitable, he will request to move to somewhere where there will be little risk of the battle endangering any civilians, such as outside the town walls or to an alley that sees little traffic, if possible.

Should combat occur, Leonel has the stats of a knight. He also has two deputies (stats as scouts) at his back who will join in any combat that arises. Leonel won't hesitate to fight to the death if he must, but if he is killed, the PCs might end up with an actual bounty on their heads if his body is discovered. His deputies are more reluctant; if Leonel dies, both deputies must make morale saves (see here), or flee combat. If one deputy dies, the other must also make a morale save, though Leonel himself will be undeterred, thinking he can handle it.

On the other hand, if the PCs can prove their innocence to Leonel, he may request their help in apprehending the brigands. But why is it they seem so similar to the party? Is it a simple coincidence, or are they being framed by impostors or dopplegangers?

Friday Encounter: Fire in the Hole

This encounter may be used in any rural environment, preferably one settled by halflings. As always, feel free to adjust the details or background of this encounter to suit your campaign setting.

The Encounter

As the party comes over the crest of a hill, they notice smoke rising from a nearby field. If they inspect the scene more closely, they will discover that the smoke is billowing from the open door of a halfling burrow, tucked among some fields - and a crackling fire is raging inside!

Shortly thereafter, a rotund halfling farmer, Murdoch Knepp, runs from the door in a panic. It was fortunate that the party happened by just in time - it was only moments ago that a fire spread from the hearth to the rest of the burrow, and in the commotion, Murdoch ran for the door to save himself. He pleads with the PCs for help in retrieving the rest of his family from the fire (alternatively, if you want the PCs to investigate the fire and are not sure they will do so, you can have them run into Murdoch on his way down the road).

Making Murdoch's predicament more complicated is the fact that, like many halflings, his family is a large one - he lives with his elderly mother, his wife, his brother, and their three children (two sons and a daughter). All of them are still inside the burrow, and have succumbed to the smoke. They need to be rescued as soon as possible!

You may want to use Action Time for this encounter. If so, the party has a limited number of rounds in order to save all six halflings from inside, equal to the number of party members times 1.5, rounded down.

For each round a PC spends inside the burning burrow, they must make a DC 12 Constitution save. On a failed save, they will succumb to smoke inhalation and fall unconscious. Use the same rolls as those for retrieving the halflings if the PCs attempt to move their comrades.

Due to the thick smoke billowing through the burrow, a DC 10 Perception check is needed to navigate through its rooms. On a successful check, the PC finds 1d4 halflings that turn. Roll 1d6 on the following table to determine who they find, rerolling halflings already discovered.

1. Adlai, Murdoch's father

2. Ithra, Murdoch's wife

3. Silas, Murdoch's brother

4. Hiram, Murdoch's elder son, age 10

5. Hanan, Murdoch's younger son, age 8

6. Hosana, Murdoch's daughter, age 4

On one turn, a PC can either look for halflings or attempt to carry them outside, but not both. If they know the location of a halfling, they can attempt to carry them outside to safety.

• A medium-sized creature can carry one halfling, two halfling children, or one small-sized party member without penalty. They can carry two halflings, three halfling children, one medium-sized party member, or two small-sized party members in their turn, but must make their Constitution saves against smoke inhalation with disadvantage while doing so.
• A small-sized creature can carry one halfling child without penalty. They can carry one halfling, two halfling children, or one small-sized party member in their turn, but must make their Constitution saves against smoke inhalation with disadvantage while doing so.
• Two party members may choose to work together to transport the same victims, sharing the load. If so, they receive Advantage on their Constitution save against smoke inhalation. Additionally, two small-sized creatures working together can carry as much as one medium-sized creature, with the same rules applying.

PCs who cover their mouth with a damp piece of cloth receive Advantage on their Constitution saves against smoke inhalation. Creatures that do not need to breathe, for whatever reason, automatically pass their saves.

Some players may think outside the box when it comes to solutions for this encounter - for instance, using magic to create water and using that to put out the fire. Use your judgment on whether or not such solutions would be effective.

If the time limit elapses, the inside of the burrow is consumed by the fire and smoke, and all creatures still inside automatically die.

Further Developments

If at least one of Murdoch's family members are retrieved, he thanks the PCs and bids them his eternal gratitude. His family will need to stay at his sister's burrow (in a small village about a mile to the north) while the rest of the community rebuilds the damaged homestead, but the halflings of the village will see the PCs as local heroes, and will allow them to stay at any of their homes free of charge if passing through the area (and will give them plenty of food all the while). You may wish to mark the hex or point this encounter was obtained on, if using such mapping schemes, in case the players want to return to the village.

In addition, Murdoch will reward the party with 10 GP for every family member saved. If all the halflings were saved, he will also give them a cloak of elvenkind - a treasured family heirloom he was able to save from the fire, but one he feels will be in better hands with the party.

However, the halflings will learn to rely on the heroes they know they can trust. The village is in debt to a nearby warband of orcs, which they pay monthly tribute to in exchange for protection - but resources are growing scarce, and many of the villagers are growing restless. They know they could never stand a chance against the orcs themselves, but the PCs might be what they need to tip the scales - and should the PCs return to the village, the halflings will have a task for them...

You're Sleeping On Perytons

In a game with as long a lifespan and as extensive of a bestiary as D&D, you're inevitably going to get some monsters that become instant hits, and some that languish in obscurity. We can't all be beholders. Some of these are real stinkers and have earned their reputation. But there are far more monsters that don't get used a lot, but deserve to.

Take, for instance, the peryton. I love perytons. Murderous deer-bird hybrids who feed on human hearts. It's a batshit insane concept, and it only gets crazier when you consider that by all accounts they were completely made up as a joke by a guy writing a book on mythical creatures, only for everyone to fall for it. But in my book, it's just crazy enough of a concept to work - and if Borges was able to fool so many people into thinking they came from a real Roman legend, he clearly did a good job in capturing the feel of real mythical beasts.

And yet, I can't remember any times perytons came up in a campaign I was involved with unless I was running it. I suspect that a lot of people even forget they're there. What little discussion on them I can find usually boils down to "what is this, some gryphon variant?" or retreading ages-old jokes about how stupid D&D's C-list monsters are, often unaware of their historical precedent.

Which is a shame - because perytons are metal as fuck.

Lest we forget, these things can tear the heart out of a man's chest and eat it. As a courtship ritual. If that doesn't sound hardcore to you, I don't know what does.

With a lot of "lame" or underused D&D monsters, it isn't the monster itself that's inherently bad - the problem is more that people don't know how to use it. The peryton is a prime example of this. Perytons are terrifying. My players still talk about one peryton encounter that I ran years ago, because the experience of being stalked by a killer heart-eating deerbird was just that nerve-wracking.

If we look deeper into peryton lore, we can find that they've often been depicted as having some rudimentary level of intelligence. Maybe closer to that of an unusually clever animal, but they're much more effective if we assume they're smarter than the average deer. Now, couple that with their dietary habits, and we can see the potential unfold.

If a peryton is a smart predator, it isn't going to lunge for its prey right away. It's going to stalk its targets, making sure they're weak and vulnerable before going in for the kill. It's going to set up ambushes and corner its prey so it has nowhere to run. Remember also that its principle prey - at least a prey species that's very important to its life cycle - is human beings. As humans, our greatest asset for survival is our endurance. We don't need to expend a whole lot of energy to travel long distances. If we want to kill an animal, we're able to track it for long enough so that when it gets tired and has to lay down, we can move in for the kill. Now, imagine a species that hunts creatures that do that - and you have a frighteningly persistent predator that's willing to lie in wait and play the long game if it has to, and that executes its drives with cold, calculated efficiency to minimize the prey's chances of escape.

What doesn't hurt is that the peryton has a few things going for it in terms of stealth. It could easily stay low to the bushes when stalking its prey to hide its avian features, so that an unsuspecting target might think it was just another deer - until it was too late. So too, the fact that they're flyers allows them to gain some altitude on their prey, so they can watch them and track their movements over long distances. One bit of peryton lore from the original Book of Imaginary Beings is that until a peryton has killed a human, its shadow looks like that of a man. I feel this is a nice, creepy detail worth stealing, and it could easily be exploited by a peryton stalking its prey, positioning itself in the path of the sun so that the shadow it casts might be mistaken for that of one of the PCs. That is, until you realize that all the PCs' locations are spoken for - so where is that extra shadow coming from?

There's a couple of things I do differently with perytons to make them easier to swallow. For one, I'd like to give them the forelegs of a deer back - it makes them seem a little more dignified than just birds with deer heads. Then, there's the lore. I feel that most people just go with the "created by the experimentation of a mad wizard" backstory, like so many other monsters consisting of disparate mashed-together animal parts. But there's no reason to do that - look at all the monsters of Greek mythology with similar features, and note that none of them need such explanations. I feel like one reason why so many people mistook the peryton for a real mythical beast is because it feels like one, with the same look and feel as many of the creatures you'd see in Greek myths or medieval bestiaries. We can do better than mad wizards. We can lean into this.

In my setting, the first perytons were the children of Kerne, the god of war and the hunt. It only makes sense, given their propensity for hunting and their gruesome diets, and the fact that Kerne is associated with deer, that they would be linked somehow. Many cults of Kerne consider perytons to be sacred beasts; some temples, including the High Temple in Keldrholt, even keep sacred perytons on the premises, and they are revered for their ruthlessness and their skill in the hunt. Every living thing in the Lunar Lands is sapient (though they communicate and perceive the world in their own ways), and perytons are no exception - they worship Kerne, and honor him as their forefather and master.

Because of this, one who dishonorably kills or harms a peryton may attract the wrath of Kerne. But he is the god of war and the hunt, and he understands that one who serves him well will deal out plenty of death. To that end, one who gives a peryton a fair fight, and proves a worthy foe, may well gain Kerne's favor if they can emerge victorious.

Friday Encounter: The Fairy Feast

This encounter will suit any environment suitably isolated from civilization - a clearing in the woods, a cave in a mountainside, or even in a dungeon. It will perhaps have the most impact if used at a time the PCs are low on resources.

In the middle of nowhere, the PCs come upon some sort of relatively enclosed space - a cave, a room in a dungeon, or a cover of trees, for instance - in the shade of which is set a large banquet table laden with all sorts of fine foods, attended to by beautiful maidens and youths who are laughing and drinking merrily from jeweled cups. The smell of roasting meat, expertly seasoned with herbs and spices, and the sounds of laughter can be noticed from a distance leading up to the site of the banquet. Upon the arrival of the PCs, if none of them are obviously wearing or carrying weapons or armor made of iron, the banquet guests will invite them to join in the festivities - and, conveniently, there just so happens to be enough free space at the table to fit the entire party.

Many PCs may be wary of such an encounter, and not without reason. These revelers are of the fair folk, and the banquet is actually a pocket in which the realm of Faerie bleeds into reality. If any PCs sit at the banquet table, they may notice (DC 12 Perception check, made with Disadvantage if they have eaten, drank, or engaged in more than fleeting conversation while seated) that the area outside of the enclosure seems superficially different than it did before they sat down, but never in a way that couldn't potentially be explained as them overlooking certain details - for instance, there may be flowers sprouting from the branches of the trees, regardless of the season, or the cave walls may suddenly be covered in moss.

The fair folk are not liars, and they will answer truthfully any questions asked of them; although they will try to answer circuitously as much as they can get away with it to hide their true nature, they will not say anything that is not in some way a true statement. For instance, if asked if they have any intention of harming the party, they adamantly deny it and insist they only want to have a bit of fun. This is true, but the fairies have very different ideas of fun than mortals.

It is well known that mortals who eat the fairy food are subject to their magic, and this is no exception. If any PCs join in the feast, they will find the food, drink, and company to be among the best they've ever had, but the time is fleeting, and before they know it, the food has been eaten and the table is being cleared. The fairies thank any participating PCs for their company, and bid them their best wishes, but as soon as they leave the PCs' sight, they disappear without a trace; only the table, now bare of any plates, dishes, or cutlery, remains.

Furthermore, a random enchantment will be placed over any PCs who partook in the feast. Based on the results of some of these, you may wish to have the same effect apply to all participating PCs.

Fairy Food Enchantments (d20 or choose from the list):

1. Time passes differently in the fey realms, and what seemed like only a few moments to mortal eyes was years to the fairies. In that time, the affected PCs had many adventures that they have no memories of. They have all aged 1d10 years.

2. Any PCs that partook in the feast are transformed into woodland animals as soon as they return to the Mortal Realm. Roll 1d8 for all affected PCs: 1. rabbit; 2. deer; 3. squirrel; 4. boar; 5. bird; 6. hedgehog; 7. toad; 8. fox. A remove curse or similar spell, or convincing a fey being to lift the spell, is required to change them back.

3. Any PC that partook in the feast has their head transformed into that of an ass as soon as they return to the Mortal Realm. A remove curse or similar spell, or convincing a fey being to lift the spell, is required to change them back.

4. Leaving the table didn't return the affected PCs to the Mortal Realm at all. For each bite of food they consumed (roll 2d20), they are trapped for one day in the lands of Faerie. When the duration ends, they find themselves at the site of the table in the Mortal Realm at sunrise the next day.

5. For every PC who partook in the feast, a sprite has decided to tag along with the party to the Mortal Realm. The creature will sing loud songs (regardless of if it's safe to do so), pull pranks on its new "friends" when they aren't looking, hide their items in inconvenient places, and generally be a nuisance. If killed, the sprite will reappear perfectly healthy 1d12 hours later. An offering of food or clothing, or invoking the fairy's true name (which it will do anything in its power to not reveal) is needed to rid the party of their uninvited guest.

6. All food or other perishable items carried by the affected PCs has suddenly spoiled as soon as they return to the Mortal Realm.

7. Half of the treasure carried by the affected PCs, according to GP value rounded up, has suddenly vanished as soon as they return to the Mortal Realm. In its place, their coin purses contain seeds and pebbles.

8. The next time they take a long rest, each affected PC has a strange vision in which the fairies from the banquet appear to give them a quest. Until this quest is completed, they obtain the benefits of a short rest from any long rests they take.

9. Eating the fairy food signed over the affected PCs' souls, and the fairies have already promised them to Death for a hefty bargain. The next time any affected PC hits 0 HP, they have Disadvantage on all their death saves.

10. The affected PCs lose all their memories and don't remember who they or their companions are. A remove curse or similar spell, or convincing a fey being to lift the spell, is required to restore their memories.

11. Nothing seems to be amiss when the PCs return to the Mortal Realm, but take any players whose characters took part in the feast aside and tell them that their characters have been trapped in the Lands of Faerie and replaced with changelings. They are not allowed to share this information with the rest of the party, but they should be encouraged to have their characters betray the rest of the party when an opportunity presents itself. A journey into the Fey Realm, or bargaining with the fair folk, is required to free the trapped PCs.

12. The affected PCs' weapons have been replaced with sticks and branches (count as improvised weapons). Weapons made of iron will not be tampered with.

13. The affected PCs are stricken by a plague of bad luck. They have Disadvantage on all rolls until their next long rest.

14. The affected PCs are incapable of lying as soon as they return to the Mortal Realm. A remove curse or similar spell, or convincing a fey being to lift the spell, is required to lift this ailment.

15. Any footwear worn by the affected PCs has been switched around to sit on the wrong feet. Until this is fixed, they have Disadvantage on any rolls that require balance (such as crossing a rickety bridge) and must make a DC 9 Dexterity saving throw when moving in combat or fall prone.

16. The affected PCs experience a profound sense of longing for the Lands of Faerie as soon as they return to the Mortal Realm and will make any attempt to return. This effect wears off in 1d4 weeks.

17. Each PC that partook in the feast learn the languages of a different class of animals (roll 1d4: 1. birds; 2. mammals; 3. fish; 4. reptiles and amphibians) and can communicate with them at will. This effect is permanent.

18. Each of the affected PCs has befriended a fey spirit who will intervene on their behalf the next time they are threatened by the Fair Folk.

19. The affected PCs are granted good fortune. They have Advantage on all rolls until their next long rest.

20. The affected PCs have been granted the gift of prophecy. They can cast the divination spell without requiring a ritual once per day. This effect is permanent.

If the PCs refuse to join the feast, the fairies bid them on their way and wish them luck. The next time the party returns to this location, the table and all the revelers have vanished, with no sign they were ever there to begin with.

Playing With Power

In my earliest days as a DM, the sourcebook I got the most out of wasn't published by Wizards of the Coast. Or even by TSR. It wasn't made for the current edition of D&D at the time, or any edition for that matter. Nor was it made for any TRPG at all.

The sourcebook I got the most out of as a DM was the Prima strategy guide for Dragon Quest III.

I had the game - technically, it was Dragon Warrior III; the trademark for "Dragon Quest" in the West was taken at the time (by a TRPG, funnily enough) - on my Game Boy Advance back then. I was probably 10, at the oldest. I never finished the game, but when I look back, I'm still honestly amazed at the technical achievement that it took to create it.

With Dragon Quest being a considerably more obscure series here than it is in Japan (where so many people skipped work to wait in line for new releases that the government had to issue a law that new entries in the series had to be released on weekends - yes, really!), I'm not sure how many of my readers have played it or even heard of it. I've seen some people online call III the foundational JRPG that defined the subgenre, but really, it plays much closer to a western RPG, with a party of fully customizable characters, a plot mostly consisting of "your father was killed by an evil wizard, go get revenge" and a vast open world full of unique locations, dungeons, and sidequests that can be explored in any order the player wishes (though some areas require quests to open up). It's basically a top-down Elder Scrolls game with turn-based combat, and yet its world is more detailed and full of things to do than any Bethesda title in recent memory. And my GBA copy was a port. All of this fit on an NES cartridge.

There's a lot I could say about Dragon Quest III. It'll probably get its own post at some point. But this post is not about Dragon Quest III. This post is about the Dragon Quest III strategy guide.

Remember how I said I never beat the game as a kid? Well, this was around the time that video game strategy guides were big, and every book store carried racks upon racks of them. Hoping to figure out how to progress, I picked up the Prima guide from the same Borders my parents got me the D&D 3E starter set from. Maybe that was a stroke of fate, because I used that book for TRPGs much more than I did for a computer RPG.

The strategy guide for DQ3 is one I have fond memories of. It has a full walkthrough of every town, dungeon, and quest in the game, with detailed maps, and I ran my players through plenty of those dungeons and even lifted a few NPCs and quests that stuck with me. It has a list of every single item in the game, from your basic consumables to legendary artifacts and quest items - each of them illustrated! - which gave me plenty of fodder for some of my first homebrew magic items. It has every encounterable monster statted out, summarizing the attacks and strategies of each, and I copied the radar chart format they used to represent the stats of each enemy for many of the crude RPG bestiaries - yes, plural - I made with pens and notebook paper in my youth.

Anyway, as I discovered when looking for images, it turns out the whole thing is on the Internet Archive. Take a look if you want some game material.

If you're looking for inspirational material for TRPG campaigns, I highly recommend getting your hands on video game strategy guides. Even if you have no interest in playing the actual games. I don't know if they're still making them now that GameFAQs took over the internet, but if you can find some at a reasonable price, definitely pick them up. You'll find plenty of dungeon maps you can adapt to your campaigns, and plenty of quests laid out with in-depth information on what paths you can take and where they lead, which are ripe to be adapted into a tabletop adventure. Even if you just want to flip through and look at the concept art they used for filler illustrations - something I'm not ashamed to admit I did plenty of times - you just might find something to inspire you.

Dave Hargrave, creator of the Arduin Grimoire, was a firm believer that his work would benefit DMs even if they didn't use the same system he did, because "the numbers don't matter; only the ideas." Even before I knew anything about Arduin or heard that quote, I agreed wholeheartedly with the sentiment. I've used plenty of books for RPG systems I wasn't running just because I liked the ideas they had. And some of those RPGs weren't even made for the tabletop.

Friday Encounter: The Ghost at the Gallows

This encounter can take place on a road or in an urban environment, preferably one the PCs are unfamiliar with. Ideally, it should be utilized at night.

Background

Antonio di Vacchi was a spiteful and covetous man who had nothing but jealousy for his neighbor, Bertoldo Fonte. Bertoldo was handsome, a successful merchant, and beloved by women, while Antonio was plagued by misfortune, unable to secure a business, and scorned by all he met (in no small part due to his unpleasant attitude, though he would never admit as much). To make matters worse, Antonio was born with a club foot that left him lame, preventing him from doing menial work or joining a militia company. All he could hope for was his family's trading business, and with Bertoldo managing to outcompete him, his funds dwindled and dwindled until he was left penniless. Desperate, Antonio attempted to murder his rival by inviting him to his house in celebration of a journey he was about to embark upon and getting him drunk until he fell asleep. There, Antonio prepared to stab him with a dagger, right when his plan was foiled by Bertoldo's wife, Miriam, and he was apprehended by the town guard and hanged from the gallows.

However, like many who died with unfinished business, Antonio's soul lingered. Even if his aims were born of malice, they still tethered him to the Mortal Realm. And he vowed that he would not be able to rest until the business of Bertoldo's murder was completed!

The Encounter

When alone at a crossroads, or in a town square, the PCs come across a gallows, its rope still dangling in the wind. If they investigate it closer, the spectral form of a man dangling from the rope manifests before them, calling out to them (alternatively, you can have them hear a voice calling from the distance, which leads them to the gallows before the spirit manifests).

This is the ghost of Antonio di Vacchi - who feels the PCs, as hopefully gullible strangers, will be all he needs to implement his scheme. He claims that he cannot pass on to the Land of the Dead as long as his business on this world goes unfinished, and implores the party for aid. This part is true - but Antonio will not speak the truth about the nature of his business.

Instead, he will claim that he was falsely accused and condemned for a crime he didn't commit. Taking a turn for the dramatic (peppered liberally with his own wishful thinking), Antonio will spin a story about how Miriam was actually in love with him, but Bertoldo wickedly coerced her into marrying him by threatening to buy her family home and forcing her parents to be evicted if she did not comply. In Antonio's story, it was Bertoldo who attempted to poison Antonio's wine during the party, but Antonio could taste that something was off. When Antonio confronted him about the poison, Bertoldo tried to stab him, with Antonio knocking him out and stealing the dagger from him in the resulting brawl, only to be caught by Miriam. Alas, Miriam believed Antonio was the culprit and called for the guards, leading to Antonio's arrest and execution.

There are a few factors that will lend some credence to Antonio's story. While Miriam never loved Antonio, she also had no affection for Bertoldo, and only married him so that she could support her family with his money, which she will confess if approached privately. Unlike in Antonio's story, however, she was never coerced to do so. If confronted, she will insist that she always felt Antonio to be an unpleasant man, but she knows of the rivalry between him and Bertoldo and will not doubt that Bertoldo could have wanted to kill him.

Furthermore, in life Antonio wore heavy boots to conceal his club foot. Although he limped at the walk, his deformity was all but invisible while he was standing still - and with his ghost bound to the gallows he died on, he remains still and dangling from the rope at all times, making it impossible to determine his lameness.

Antonio knows that he needs to build the trust of the PCs. Rather than tasking them with killing Bertoldo right away, he first asks them to return a goblet Bertoldo has in his possession, which he (falsely) claims was in fact stolen from his family, claiming that he believes this will lay him to rest. The ghost will manifest again at midnight each night for four hours at a time so that the PCs can consult with him (he should tell the party this).

Bertoldo keeps the goblet displayed in a locked glass case (a DC 12 DEX check using theives' tools is necessary to pick the lock) in the living room of his townhouse in the wealthier part of his hometown (the same town as the gallows if using this encounter in town, or the town to the west if using this encounter at a crossroads). The goblet is covered in gold leaf and is inset with rubies, and is worth 250 GP. In truth, it was a masterpiece that Bertoldo's great-grandfather, a jeweler, made for the local guild. Bertoldo insists it is a priceless family heirloom and refuses to part with it - which Antonio insists is a lie to cover his tracks.

If the PCs approach the jewelers' guild about the goblet, they will need to consult their records in order to determine if they have any record of the goblet being made under their governance. They are, unfortunately, busy at the time, and it will take 1d4+1 days for them to look through their records and come back with an answer. If they are presented with the goblet, they will recognize it as their own by a makers' mark on the inside of the cup - and immediately suspect that the PCs have stolen it, reporting them to the guards.

If the PCs manage to obtain the goblet and return it to the gallows in the night, Antonio's ghost will tell them that it must be buried with him, and that he is buried beneath the gallows. There are indeed skeletons buried under the gallows, but Antonio's bones are actually housed in the temple of Morthanos (or another god of death, if using this encounter in a different setting) in town. Antonio actually believes that if the goblet is buried beneath the gallows, he may be able to take it into the Land of the Dead when he passes on.

Digging underneath the gallows requires 4 man-hours. If multiple PCs work together, they will complete this goal in a fraction of the time accordingly. For each hour the PCs spend digging, make a Perception check against the lowest Stealth check of all PCs involved in digging to determine if the town guards are alerted to the noise. This process will reveal the skeleton of a criminal hanged at the gallows long ago. Notably, unlike Antonio's actual skeleton at the temple of Morthanos (should the PCs convince the priests there to let them see it), the skeleton under the gallows does not have a club foot, contradicting any descriptions of Antonio they may receive from those who knew him in life.

Of course, when "returning" the goblet inevitably fails to put Antonio's spirit at rest, he will tell the PCs that something else must be done - and that he must have them kill Bertoldo to "avenge" his death, or else have them convince the authorities of his guilt. He warns, of course, that the guards are in his pocket and will claim Bertoldo was innocent. But he hopes by this point, the PCs will be convinced of his honesty. If they need convincing, he will claim he knows where a hoard of treasure is buried and will disclose it if laid to rest (a lie).