[Adventure Seeds] Bears

[Dalin]

Originally Posted by Black Leviathan

The PCs find that an unsettling creature has broken into their homes, eaten they're food, worn their clothes and slept in their beds. Investigation shows that the monster just seems to be looking for a comfortable safe place. The players can guess where the monster will break-in next, will they show her mercy? Or team up and destroy her.

Lol. This makes me think of a Traveller game I played a long time ago where there was some alien race that was screwing things up. It was a straight, serious game, with high stakes. At the end, the GM revealed that the whole plot was based on Goldilocks. Once he told us, it was apparent, but we had no clue throughout the campaign.

[martinl]

Does Anyone Smell ... Smoke? In a certain dungeon, every time someone starts lighting a fire or casting a fire spell a large humanoid bear in a hat appears and beats them down with a shovel.

PCs may be a little ... put out by this, but if they manage to slay said bear (should be hard) they discover that the entire dungeon, which appears to be made of the standard large unmortared stone blocks, is highly flammable as it burns down around them.

Ancient Enmity. PCs are hired to clear a forest of owlbears by powerful logging magnate who wants to harvest the timber. They meet the first owlbear and it is an adorable 4" tall critter that lives in a small hole under a tree. It and ~10,000 of its friends form into a huge burrowing owlbear swarm that either kicks the PCs butts or hires them to clean the logging magnates out of Town.

Barbearian Invasion This might be bear barbarians, regular barbarians mounted on bears, ice weasel adventurers on polar bear based fighting platforms, or a horde of 10,000 burrowing owlbears who are feeling extra fighty now that their natural enemy the loggers have been put down.

[DouglasCole]

Originally Posted by Dalin

I had Nordlond in mind as a possible backdrop for both "Uneasy Slumber" and "The Bear Myth." For the latter, I've been meaning to reread the grappling rules in HoJ (or, better yet, the updated and expanded set) to see how a delver might fare against a bear if they couldn't use weapons. The more I've been mulling it over, the more I like the idea of arriving in the underworld without gear. (Should have called the scenario "Bear Naked.") Fits the whole bear myth theme of rebirth, too. As partial compensation—and to explain plausible victory in a wrestling match with the king of the bears—ability scores could be boosted: your spirit body isn't burdened with imperfect mortal flesh . . . Or the questors might get the equivalent of Heroic Grace, Might, and/or Vitality. Good scenario design would also have other options (tricking or avoiding the bear, making use of terrain features for weapons, etc.), but it feels very DF to have some badass, blood-soaked barbarian manage to strangle a humongous bear.

Fun to playtest.

For what it's worth, the Wrestling Master pre-gen character from Hall of Judgment has an effective grappling ST of 28. So . . . I suspect that you won't need too much more help.