Quote from: Blusponge;831289Well, those spells aren't really an option.  So putting the beast on ice is going to be tricky.

Depends on what kind of beast it is. In the recent Wolf of Soissons adventure set in 1624, the PCs  encountered a loup garou (werewolf). They didn't have silver weapons or anything that would permanently harm a loup garou. They cut, shot, and stabbed it to 'death' which caused the creature to seem dead though a werewolf cannot be killed that way. They put the beast in the cage. At dawn the 'dead' beast turned into a sleeping man who had no recollection of how he came to be naked in a cage. They took the man to the Governor who had the man chained up with silver manacles while waiting for moon rise so he could observe the metamorphosis. I might have mentioned that the Governor is a mad scientist (alchemist, surgeon, and scholar of the occult).

Depending on what the beast is there are several methods they might use.

• Physical: net, rope, trap, wrestle, or club the beast unconscious.
  

• Scientific: an alchemist, apothecary, or natural philosopher might be able to create some sort of potion or drug to render the beast unconscious.
  

• Supernatural: even if the PCs don't have magic, they may be able to find some weakness or bane that affects the creature and that might be used to weaken the beast or render it unconscious so that it can be captured, e.g. wolfs bane, hemlock, holy water, garlic, etc.
  

As for using the beast as a weapon of war, I saw that in Glen Cook's Black Company. The evil Queen used a bunch of Forvalaka as a war weapon. The Forvalaka (kind of like a big really, really tough werewolf) was a monster the protagonists fought, then later the Queen who was their new boss, used the monsters at a big battle. The Forvalaka were buried in individual pit cages built into a defensive earthen wall. The pits were opened as the attackers reached that part of the siege lines. Mayhem ensued.

Quote from: pbj44;831293And have your players take turns controlling any NPC that the monster attacks. Great for getting some dice rolls going at the table, and to get some tension brewing!

Yes. That follows the feel of a monster film where we get initial victims while making the kill more visceral than it would be if you just told the players "You find a dead militia man with his throat torn out and eviscerated.

In Honor+Intrigue I use players controlling NPCs a lot. Sometimes they control their allies. Sometimes they control enemies that are fighting or contesting with a different player's PC.

I hadn't really planned on an NPC entourage, though I don't know why.  That's something my players are sure to try to rally.  Better be prepared.

Quote from: Bren;831297Depends on what kind of beast it is.

Oh, something vaguely like the second of these two critters.  (Not the spiderling.)



I'm not saying they won't be able to capture it.  But that's something they'll have to come up with.  

Quote from: Blusponge;831299Oh, something vaguely like the second of these two critters.  (Not the spiderling.)



I'm not saying they won't be able to capture it.  But that's something they'll have to come up with.  

Yowch!:

• :eek: I'd say wrestling is right out.
• Nets and ropes would need to be specially made and might need wire reinforcing which I think would be not easily available or cheap in the late 17th century.
• Cage or a pit trap with a lid look promising.
• Some research would seem necessary to find some sort of drug or gas to affect the thing.
• I wonder if it can swim? Maybe water (canals and locks?) could be used to trap it.

So what do you guys n gals think is a good time limit for the hunt?

A few details:
The beast is only active at night
The hunting ground is roughly about 30 square miles
The opposition doesn't want the PCs to find the critter in the allotted time
There is logic in the deadline: the observance of a holy day when a rite must be observed to have power
It isn't a hard deadline, but things will get more complicated if the rite is performed

Right now, I'm thinking 2 days/48 hours, with the ritual being performed in the evening of the second day.  Or I could go for the jugular and give them 1 day to deliver evidence of the beast's death.  

Thoughts?

I don't know if you are a minis guy but Reaper makes a miniature of that beastie. Plop that on the table and watch your players poop their pants!

Mashaaf the Great Old One.

Here is a post of a painted one:

http://forum.reapermini.com/index.php?/topic/61671-fitzbones-ii-77375-mashaaf/

I still have mine unassembled from the Bones II KS. Can't wait to get it together.

Isn't the number of game sessions more important than the In Game time?

I would think that you would want an Introduction, How Things Go Badly and then a Resolution followed by a Wrap-up.
=

Some thoughts.

• Hunting at night is tough for humans and other diurnal beings. If they can track the beast to its lair in the day time, the PCs will be happier and more effective.

• Hunting a scary monster at in the dark is scarier and makes for a better scene.

• If the creature lairs inside a cave complex you potentially get the best of both worlds, plus that thing looks like it can climb vertical walls and probably run across ceilings. Heck it may even sleep upside-down. A cave turns the battle into a 3D fight in the dark which will be tough, but memorable.

• A hunting ground of 30 square miles makes it sound reasonable to track the creature down in a couple of days. (Of course I’m not hunter nor a tracker so what do I really know.)

• Two days gives them a little time to prepare things like pit traps or cages and it also gives them time to work a grid search pattern in the area or set out bait and traps before the deadline, and a chance for an encounter with the bad guys before finding the creature.

• Twenty-four hours gives them little time to do anything else except frantically look for the creature. Making the most use of time is also where NPCs can help since local peasants can dig pit traps while the blacksmith creates a cage from metal stock or scavenged wrought iron fencing around the cemetery.

• Do the PCs know about the holy day and ritual and thus about the deadline? The answer matters. I once had a group of PCs in Call of Cthulhu miss the bad guy’s ritual because they didn’t realize there was a deadline and that it was critical to stop the ritual that night. Cut to the entire San Francisco area turning into Dawn of the Dead as every skeleton or corpse in the entire Bay Area clawed its way out of the grave to kill the living.

You know your group better than we do.

• Will they find the shorter deadline challenging and energizing?

• Can they generate and execute plans quickly while under time pressure or does to much time pressure make the game unfun for the group as they play out plans that make them think they and their PCs are morons?

• Do you feel like taking a chance on greater time pressure being exciting and memorable?

• Are your players OK with PC failure and death? (Because the former sounds quite possible with a short deadline and the latter looks possible based on that scary frickin monster.)

Quote from: Greentongue;831451Isn't the number of game sessions more important than the In Game time?

I would think that you would want an Introduction, How Things Go Badly and then a Resolution followed by a Wrap-up.

Good point. You may want to figure out a way to tie in game and out of game time together. One way would be to say that every 1 hour of real time is roughly 4 hours of real time. Clearly you can't be exact with the time equivalence but something like this may emphasize the time pressure for the players.

Holy crap! That's awesome, though not...quite...accurate either. Besides, we play online over Roll20.  STILL I may have to make a token out of that and "accidentally" leave it laying around just to agitate the players.

Quote from: Exploderwizard;831448Mashaaf the Great Old One.

Here is a post of a painted one:

http://forum.reapermini.com/index.php?/topic/61671-fitzbones-ii-77375-mashaaf/

Chevalier Guy de Bourges: "Mother of God, I'm not capturing that Satan spawned blasphemy. I say we get 10 kegs filled with gunpowder and nails and blow that thrice damned abomination back to whatever hell it crawled out of. Gaston, can you get us into the armory?"

Captain Gaston Thibeault: "I say we use twenty kegs. It's the only way to be sure."

Monster hunts can be tremendously fun.  Especially if for some reason the hunters suddenly find themselves becoming the hunted.

Why not use a real small-scale wilderness map for the hunt? Run the wilderness hunt as a dungeon, like the Fighting Fantasy gamebook Forest of Doom, or the wilderness map tiles in Descent 2. An actual map with cramped and narrow trails, cold streams, slippery fords, exposed and lifeless fields, scratching brambles, sucking pits, broken wagons, dangerous wildlife (wolf) & farm animals (bull, pig, rabid dog) etc. Make the mundane strange and scary.

Quote from: S'mon;831988Why not use a real small-scale wilderness map for the hunt? Run the wilderness hunt as a dungeon, like the Fighting Fantasy gamebook Forest of Doom, or the wilderness map tiles in Descent 2. An actual map with cramped and narrow trails, cold streams, slippery fords, exposed and lifeless fields, scratching brambles, sucking pits, broken wagons, dangerous wildlife (wolf) & farm animals (bull, pig, rabid dog) etc. Make the mundane strange and scary.

My plan was to do something more like a point-crawl, which could easily accommodate this.

But I've been all over the map on this, looking to do something that feels thematically and dramatically appropriate. I've gone from a  "chase" with each "tracking" roll determining the nature of the "encounter" (kill site, tracks, remains, surprise encounters, etc) to something more traditional with more opportunities for roleplaying. As to the poster above who suggested I consider how many sessions I want this to eat up, that is absolutely a consideration. I do not want it to drag on forever. Two sessions feels about right. Maybe three if the roleplaying gets thick and heavy (and it could). But I want the actual hunt to go quickly in the dramatic sense. The hunt lasting one session with a cliffhanger encounter with the beast would be ideal.

A couple of other points: no, other than one or two of the players, I wouldn't expect them to know of the holy day for the rite. The deadline would be presented up front, as in, "the ritual will be performed on the second sundown unless you bring us proof of the beast's death."  The timing of the rite has no effect on the beast. But it will complicate things outside of the hunt.

Hunting at night vs day: I'll trust the players to weigh the modifiers and difficulty. There will be clues to the beast 's movement, suggesting it is active after dark. No one in the group can see in the dark, so that would also be a consideration.

Two days vs 24 hour strategy: exactly my thinking. I want to give the players a chance to be creative. Not just charge blindly after the most recent trail.

So we'll see what they do. I discovered a slight error in my thinking which should allow me for some extra prep time.  But we shall see. Don't be too surprised if a few of you get PMs from me tomorrow with a bit more detailed look at the scenario.

Tom