Story Work: The Aboleth Cult
I will open this with an admission: I have a problem.
Wizkids makes these blind boxes of miniatures you can buy - they're usually $20-25 a pop, retail, and have three medium and one large (or larger) mini per. (These are D&D mini sizes, I'll point out.) They're one of those things that're super easy to do, and they make it easy to make sure I'm not leaving my LGS empty-handed.
Consequently, I have *a lot* of minis.
The most recent set, though... has Aboleths. That's right. These fucking things:
This leads me to wanting to use them in a story, and thus did I start work on how I want things to work. Enter... the Aboleth cult.
Aboleths big thing is mind control/fuckery, so let's play with that. What might it look like if an Aboleth has had plenty of time to run rampant in an area populated by humans, but wants to play it at least a little subtle? I cooked on the idea, and came to the conclusion: What if Aboleth cult?
These aren't quite Aboleth worshippers per se. These are villagers, townsfolk who've had their minds wiped, filled with nothing but the Aboleth's purposes, with a 'cult' as the forefront to hide what it's doing similar to, say, Warhammer's genestealer cults, but with some particularly fun practices.
Anointing from a chalice of Aboleth Mucus, before a pool that leads down, down, down to the creature's lair? Hell yes.
The might even seem warm at the outset. Friendly. We're all here for the same thing, of course. We've come together to worship the Cleanser of Minds, Devourer of all that brings sadness. Join with us in glorious, peaceful purpose! All are welcome!
This all meant to creep the heroes out, of course. :D
I want to do this over three sessions, delivered each as a one-shot, but part of a series...
Session One (The Unhallowed Blessing):
The players first encounter the cult proper. They've probably built (or taken over) somewhere unlikely to use as a place of worship. Think lots of candles, silk, all the holy trappings. At its head, the leader, one of the first cultists. (Side note: There's a very good chance most of those there aren't actually in the aboleth's sway - they just know these folk talk a good game and hey, they *did* help us.)
Nothing's gonna get weird until we start talking about elevating one of our own to go down into the Holy Waters and be cleansed by him. This water, of course, has a layer of Aboleth Mucus overtop. Those who go down are only rarely seen again.
Assuming the players intercede, I want the climax of this to be with the Aboleth itself speaking to the players through the head priest. It refuses to explain its motives, of course. This is only session one of three. We're introducing the baddies, making it clear innocent lives are at stake, that kind of thing. Hooking them for the next two sessions.
I also want to introduce a pair of NPCs I think - the players will first see them at the start, being 'anointed' with the Mucus before seeing them dive into the water. This is a hook for session two.
Session Two (A Blessing Abominable):
We're going down into the crypts beneath the chapel - except these aren't crypts.
Here we find one of those NPCs from session 1, desperate to survive and fleeing from the Aboleth's mind-controlled masses. They're building something down here, using the creature's Mucus and, just for good measure, its blood. Unleashing it upon the city will taint the entirety of the water supply, cursing them with the effects of the creature's mucus, forcing them all to the waters, and feeding them to the Aboleths' grip.
Wait. Was that 'aboleths' plural? :D
Session Three (The Blessed Abhorrent):
The cult has largely been stopped - but the sources have yet to be dealt with.
Deeper we go, down beyond where the sewers were built by the hand of man and elf and dwarf, into the caves where the Aboleths dwell. I'm very strongly considering working up some rules for underwater combat, but the problem I'm having here is that underwater combat comes with... complications. To wit:
Fireballs become depth charges, which all the good and bad that comes with it.
Lightning bolts become ways to flash fry the party.
I'm still cooking on how I want the fight to go, here. Maybe the NPC from session one and two offers to sacrifice himself to let the players get a better shot? Will the players take the offer? I don't know. A lot of this depends on how sessions one and two go.
This is about where my session planning hits its stop, here. Session planning is a lot like weather prediction - you know what's going to happen in the immediacy, but the further out you go, the less it becomes a prediction and more a set of possibilities...