Adventure Hooks

Flashpoints

These are hooks based in major events in the history of the world that would make interesting scenarios to play in. GMs and players can use these hooks to either make history play out as it does in the assumed epochs or change the face of the world for good and strike out their own fate. Some of these will have modules designed for them but they are also good starting places for self-made adventures in the Riddle of Flame setting.

Epoch 1
Nothing Ever Stays Dead The dead rise from the sea in legion to march on Skalovia. You must transport one of the greatest minds of the Epoch of Flame to Fort Geria, the greatest bulwark against them, or risk losing the man who can help free millions again. It is you, what you have on your back, and five hundred miles on foot to the fort with the undead and worst creatures of the night clawing behind you. Survive.
Players in this scenario have a number of choices:
1) They could play the survival scenario straight and lead their ward to the military fort so his designs could save the world from unending death.

2) They could attempt to steal him away and force him to work for their masters or themselves. Magics and bedevilment can break any man.

3) They could be selfish and try to escape alone and earn the ire of a rising military superpower. That nation could or could not be dead, however.

4) They could be evil and give the man over to the Undead Lords and Dracoliches that would see him die and then fight in a campaign to snuff out the living in preparation to fight a greater threat.

Secret (Drag over to see, GMs only) They could have been cornered by the raised corpse of the sire of a hero of the Skalovian Revolution and cursed with a brand to follow a simple command: In 14 days, place their hand upon the sun that sundered their rightful rule over vermin or die. The effect this act will have is a mystery. Either carry the will out of the betrayed, or find a cure among the magicians of the State.
Variable Scenario with this: The opening act follows the escape of the characters from a doomed port. Any who fall during this can still yet live but be branded to carry out this mission.

Break My Chains You are a subhuman bestial. Raised to be chattel in the land of Thrale. Kicked in the dirt. No more. Steal your dignity back from the end of a gun. Kill the slavers, the overseers, and the masters. Be chased by the law and outwit them. Cause so much damage that the institution of slavery is more trouble then its worth and free millions from its yoke.

Players in this scenario have a number of choices:
1) Play the pacifistic route and lead slaves in escape from the nation.

2) Make the hypocrites burn and free your downtrodden Kinds with the raiding of plantations.

3) Receive help, resources, and manpower from outside sources, such as the bestials from the homes of Tarkaria, the Urkain Kingdom of Ruk who would see a rising power humbled, the spy agencies of Skalovia and Wakunan who would work in secret to break the chains of the workers of the world and strike a blow at a rival, the knights of Alaria whose vendetta against the Thralish goes back centuries.

4) Track your progress through the millions of Drosch spent to destroy your uppity insurrection.
5) Possibly deal with supernatural forces to gain an edge at a terrible price.

Only Man You are a rebel. You are a templar prefect. You are a spy. You are an opportunist. You are an idealist. It is you and an archipelago on fire in the fires of revolution. Take part in the second great uprising of the Epoch of Flame, the Chuayco Dominion Overturn. Help, hinder, crush, save, or profit off of the revolution. Fight theocrats and their summoned angyls from their legalistic gods. Kill the blasphemous rabble and root out their cells to cement the dominion of your god. Help the rebellion or hinder it in subterfuge in shadowy methods away from the light. Profit off of the war by going around the island selling weapons and get caught in more than you bargained for. Fight for the freedom of the people and influence the future they will have but be cautious as the revolution is not united and many different agendas are at play.

Players in this scenario have a number of choices:
1) Fight in the revolution as guerillas, saboteurs, assassins or on the front lines on the side of the rebel groups or the holy dominion.

2) Help steer the factions of the war by persuasion, trickery, subterfuge, diplomacy, negotiation, and by pure economiics. Play them against each other.
3) Beseech the nations of the world to help in your cause. Many would see the archipelago nation that takes massive tarriffs from their trade be split asunder.

4) Carve out your own kingdom, work to create a harmonist republic, a people's equitianist state, a pirate kingdom, or your own religious dominion.

5) Get caught between forces of ideology and survive or be blown asunder.

The Right of Kings and Man You are a kingsman. You are a rebel. You are a mercenary. You are a pure human. You are an ex-slave. You are an opportunist. You fight for justice. You fight for the people. You fight for pay. The Thralish revolution has come. The old Kingdom of Thrale and its many indignities and injustices is to come at an end. This is a war between individual heroes and the people who follow them. Between old regimes and new warlords. Between countrymen. Between master and enslaved. Will you fight for the stability of the old regime which you have only ever known? Will you fight for a new commonwealth that carries with it the voice of the people? Will you fight for gold and glory and meet old enemies and make new ones? Create the new Thrale from the ashes of the old. Will you follow history and make a new powerful republic, or carve out your own fate and change the course of time?

Players in this scenario have a number of choices:

1) Fight on the front lines on multiple fronts with the Royal Thralish Army or the New Thralish Union Army.

2) Fight a secret war for the rebels or for foreign forces or even purely malevolent ones.

3) Beseech help from the outside.

4) Keep the Union unified, or carve out your own kingdom, republic, or state.

5) Decide how to approach the Elakansi that have seen their homes in Mount Thrake conquered in the past few decades. Will they be allies or be swept away in the rest of history.
Epoch 2
The Great Archipelago War
Epoch 3

Thematic Modules

These hooks are based on the smaller stories of the world that still hold within them great repercussion for the kinds within. Rather than taking place within a range of time, they are able to be played within any epoch in any year. These are wars beneath history's gaze but those that write history exist due to the safety granted to them by sacrifice, manipulation, deceit, or blood.

The Unseen Guardians You are a Lusmian. You are a Fleshsworn. You are a defender of the peoples on Tys. You are of the rightful heirs of the planet. You fight in an alliance with benevolent necromancers, dwarven engineers, and mercenaries. You control the minds of biothralls and monsters as a malevolent lieutenant intelligence. Will you stay the course and drive back the entities of the deeps, breakthrough and conquer the topside for the great worm, or perhaps find your own path that could lead you to change sides or find your own way. The War in the Deeps begins again in the Epoch of Flame.

Players in this scenario have a number of choices:

1) Serve as paladins under the exemplars under the watchful eyes of the ancestor spirits, serve as mercenary adventurers biting off more than they could chew, or fight a Fleshsworn of the great worms and lead your forces in a cunning campaign to break to topside.

2) Call for help from the nations of the world and receive it in the form of unique soldiery, cutting edge mundane technology and magitek, and ancient and new magicks.

3) Serve on the front lines as a battlefield commander, a lowly soldier, or a special class of militant.

4) Root out the Worm-Beguiled in Lusmia and on Tys, those that work for the forces of the deeps with or without their knowledge.

5) Actively sabotage the effort to destroy the nations of Lusmia, Kesst, Liresku, and Klastte.

Dwell Within Twilight You are a monster hunter. You are a simple frontiersman. You are an unfortunate expedition member. You are an explorer. You are the monster. You hunt the creatures of the night under the noses of kings and rulers. You live a quiet life that is to become perilous. You are a simple soldier seeing monsters beyond his paygrade. You are a thrill-seeker whose thrills have turned to horror. You are the apex predator, the top of the foodchain, and no Kinds nor gods can stop you. Join hunter leagues or strike out as a small group to hunt the beasts that lurk in the shadows. Escape with your life from death and live to tell the tale. Defend your brothers in arms against creatures malevolent. Kill, slaughter, feast, and rule the world in primality as it ought to be. Brave men and monsters stalk the night. Whom do you hunt?
Players in this type of scenario have a number of choices:
1) Hunt beasts of the night for profit, for glory, for vengeance, for duty, for piety, for sheer primacy or hunt those that would shroud the world in the nonsense of civilization and show them the heart and soul of every being.
2) Flee for your life from threats you cannot handle and hide and using cunning and instinct to survive the day. Hunt down soft prey whose blood will stain your gullet tonight and match their unnecessary difficulties.
3) Make a living off of monster parts and bounties and forge alliances and friendships with those victims and the threatened, or make pacts with forces that see you as nothing but wild animals and indulge their pretension and become stronger by your experiences and scars.
4) Follow simple paths and seemingly cut and dry beasts and attacks and find your way into their dens and legions and realize the threat you face is greater than you imagined. Build up your place in the hierarchy of blood and strength and subdue other monsters to serving you and unleash your nightmarish hordes against those deluded in their false securities.



Truth in Cackles and Prayers You are a witch-finder. You are a cultist. You are a hapless victim. You are a charlatan opportunist. You hunt those in the service of the lords of the Tithe Realms for piety, revenge, duty, and profit. You remake the world in your master's image or yours for power, youth, wealth, and immortality. You live and work and are swept up in horrid threats to the soul. You care not for prayers of self-righteous zealots nor malefic chants of pretentious lunatics but will sell weapons, wares, and use them to your advantage at the possible cost of your soul. There is a dark ongoing war beneath the marching soldiers and war machines of the greater nations. Of purity and damnation. Of faith and of horrid truth. Of strong wills and iron hearts. Will you serve the light, cast your soul in the great dice game of the devils, survive another day, or stay just close enough to the edge to prosper but not fall? In the Devils Danse, you carve your own way.
Players in this type of scenario have a number of choices.
1) Play as those who hunt devil worshippers and destroy their works or play as the enlightened who see the truth of the world that fight against the ignorant self-righteous prudes.
2) Stumble into and stop plots by devil and demon worshipper alike or work with great cabals and your patrons to bring the world to your master's heel or your own.
3) Smite those who would raise infernal apostles in the name of the gods with the help of their angyl avatars or smash down the hypocrites and false believers and their pitiful summons with apostles crafted by your masters.
4) Stop the world from becoming infested in mind and soul before it's too late or seize powers in shadows or in pure physicality to shape the world in your image.

Disavowment You are a spy. You are an intelligence gatherer, saboteur, thief, assassin. You are either for hire or claim loyalty to a person, group, or nation. You are silent and subtle, loud and explosive, charming and silver-tongued, intimidating and bloody-fisted, loyal and true, reluctant and forced, idealistic, reasonable, pragmatic, extreme. You have naught but your cunning and a steady weapon hand, the backing of the world's most powerful nations, a personal contact network that gives you just enough, the black market and its seedy dealers. Fight the invisible war. If you lose, you never existed.
1) Infiltrate and act in foreign or hostile nations using quick wits, ingenuity, invention, and your gun, blade, or fist.
2) Root out enemy agents, destroy them outright or cause them to stumble into their graves.
3) Disguise yourself, play your part, wear a million different masks. Lie, seduce, trick, murder, steal, scheme.
4) Use the most advanced gadgets, weapons, and gear of the time along with special unique magitek along with a possible talent for the arcane.
5) Build up a cadre of comrades, a personal contact network, trust no one, be at the leash of a handler, act freely, be loyal, get your own.

Be Gay, Do Crime! You are an officer of the law. You are a criminal. You are a special investigator. You are a high-class assassin. You are a beat cop in way over his head. You are the fall guy who takes the bullets and the jail time. Is criminality an inborn disease in every Kind's soul, a manner of pure greed and vice, or a problem due to societal ills? The question is almost moot in the heat of the moment and the bang of guns and most bobbies and scoundrels don't care to or don't ask that question. You are looking for a score to set you for life and to be honest sometimes cops are about as honest as criminals and intentions of both don't vary that far from each other. Are you honest, pragmatic, or corrupt as the face or hand of the law? Are you honorable, pragmatic, or ruthless as a criminal?
Or, go down the middle and be vigilantes. Are you a violent man with a gun and no impulse control, a masked avenger with ethics (that are murderous to pacifistic), a guy in a t-shirt and a symbol carrying heavy weaponry, or a truly heroic person looking to stand up for his fellow kinds outside of the law.
Choose.
1) Do crimes and make big money or stop crimes (and possibly take the money anyway.)
2) Bust heads of no-good lowlifes and meddling coppers alike.
3) Play honest and by the book, go outside the law as a cowboy cop, or fall to greed and be like any other thug just with the protection of a badge. Only steal from those that can afford the loss, forget about morals and get your own, or gleefully kill and murder your way to riches.
4) Infiltrate syndicates and legal organizations alike, gain their trust and secure yourself influence, or root out corruption and treasonous scumbags.
5) Act for duty, honor, tradition, legacy, greed, avarice, hedonism, or pure chaos on all sides.

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