How would you dm this situation?

[IamTheTest]

Suppose the party passes through a room with an unhallowed alter that casts Bestow Curse on all good creatures. Allowing a will saving throw, all good creatures happen to fail. How would you pick the ability score penalty? Would you pick one ability and stick with it, pick an ability drop for each PC, or randomly select an ability for each PC? Also, how would you describe the situation? I cant seem to figure out how to give the party enough information so that they can figure out a solution but not so much information that they automatically know the solution. Thanks.

 

[Crothian]

I'd pick the ability score, it would be the same for all good characters that fail. Depending what else was in the temple and the background; that would determine what score would go down. For instance if it was a place of disease and pestilance the Con score would be effective. If it was a place a evil knowlge, intelligence would be effected. I'd describe the effect over the top with evil music being played tas the character roll their saves and mysterious lights shining from the alter.

 

[lukelightning]

I believe a spellcraft check should identify the curse; the DC would be 20+spell level ("Identify a spell that's already in place and in effect. You must be able to see or detect the effects of the spell. No action required. No retry."). I'd have one check for the bestow curse, one for the unhallow.

I think the curse should depend on the deity. Some evil deity of war might penalize strength, a deity of death might penalize con, a deity of magic intelligence, etc. You may even say that the curse strikes the character's highest stat, though if I did this I might reduce the penalty to -2. I think random is perfectly acceptable; simply roll a D6.

They'd definitely feel the effect of the curse: "when you're in the center of the room you feel a hot flash and then suffer a severe cold sweat; your mind is full of doubts in your own ability and worth" (loss of charisma). That sort of thing.

I'd use this as a chance for the characters to use knowledge (religion). They get cursed, then check out the idol. A DC 12 check reveals it to be an idol to Binky, God of Evil Unicorns. A further knowledge check (DC 15, perhaps) and someone recalls that Binky is a very jealous and vain deity who despises others' value (so would be likely to curse their charisma).

p.s. What's the point of cursing people without gloating about it? If I was an evil altar and cursed someone I'd be like "tremble before my might, pitiful mortals! you are naught but worms beneath me, and like worms you will crawl on your bellies for the rest of your miserable lives! bwahahahahahaha!"

 

[Li Shenron]

I'd probably consider it a mass version of Bestow Curse so that it would be cast as a single spell, and therefore I'd make it the same ability score to everyone. This means that someone is going to be more "hurt" than the others.

But I don't dislike the random idea at all, it would make a nice option for a temple of a god of bad luck or some other entropy-keen deity.

 

[DragonLancer]

Suppose the party passes through a room with an unhallowed alter that casts Bestow Curse on all good creatures. Allowing a will saving throw, all good creatures happen to fail. How would you pick the ability score penalty? Would you pick one ability and stick with it, pick an ability drop for each PC, or randomly select an ability for each PC? Also, how would you describe the situation? I cant seem to figure out how to give the party enough information so that they can figure out a solution but not so much information that they automatically know the solution. Thanks.

Given that situation, and if they all failed, then I would roll a D6 to determine which stat was affected but I would roll seperately for each character.

 

[Herobizkit]

Based on the fact that Unhallow and Bestow Curse are priest spells, and it's likely that the Evil priesthood has Good enemies, I'd go ahead and put the penalty on Wisdom.

* Clerics suffer the loss of bonus spells. (Alternately, if you have Undead in store for the PC's, a drain to Charisma would severly limit the Cleric's turning ability).
* Rogues suffer a loss of Spot checks
* Wizards get a dent put in their Will scores.
* Ditto the Fighters, who probably already have low Wisdom scores to begin with.

It's nasty, and it may drive your players crazy.

Also, important to note that Bestow Curse, according to RAW, is not a legally useable spell if you're planning on tying in the spells together:

From d20srd.org:
Finally, you may choose to fix a single spell effect to the unhallowed site. [...] Spell effects that may be tied to an unhallowed site include aid, bane, bless, cause fear, darkness, daylight, death ward, deeper darkness, detect magic, detect good, dimensional anchor, discern lies, dispel magic, endure elements, freedom of movement, invisibility purge, protection from energy, remove fear, resist energy, silence, tongues, and zone of truth.

 

[Mark CMG]

Have the altar pulsate and inflict two points of temporary Constitution damage each hour until some goal is met (riddle/task appears on altar mocking Good?) or until the curse is removed. They'll all know what is happening, what caused it, and after and hour they'll also know how long they have (simple math in regard to the afflicted with the lowest Constitution score).

 

[Psychic Warrior]

Suppose the party passes through a room with an unhallowed alter that casts Bestow Curse on all good creatures. Allowing a will saving throw, all good creatures happen to fail. How would you pick the ability score penalty? Would you pick one ability and stick with it, pick an ability drop for each PC, or randomly select an ability for each PC? Also, how would you describe the situation? I cant seem to figure out how to give the party enough information so that they can figure out a solution but not so much information that they automatically know the solution. Thanks.

I would roll the stat randomly but (since it is only one spell affecting the whole party) have it be the same for every PC. I would describe it as a feeling of malice and contempt washing over them with hollow laughter echoing in their ears. If the party was struggling to figure it out I would then allow a Spellcraft check assuming the players think to ask. If they don't, well the next encounter will be pretty tough!

 

[fiddlerjones]

If you hit con you'll end up with a lot of dead PCs, which no one really wants. I'd say if the god is one of physical evil (slaughter, disease, death), then go for strength. If it's a god of mental evil (madness, lies) go for wisdom or maybe charisma. Keep it the same though, theme is important here. Unless it's a god of chaos, in which case, random could be good. Alternatively, you could have it geas them into performing some deed of great evil in order to avoid the curse. You could give them an alternate way out, but doing so violates the geas so they have only a limited time to complete the quest. This is a good way to use some lower-CR encounters on them also and still have them be challenging. Have fun.