The Bar Tab (Sensory Experience)

Adapting Sensory Experience

If the characters go to the Smoldering Corpse (or other bar or market before taking the bait) and order an exotic drink or food they are approached by a tiefling Sensate, Aza Dowling. This is one of Farrow’s alter egos. She has the same patterned marking on her right cheek.

Aza sincerely wants to capture the characters’ first raw experience of the food or libation. Instead of performing a random act of kindness or terror as described in the adventure as written, they need to succeed on a DC 15 Charisma (Performance) check to properly capture the sensation of a positive experience of Joy or Serenity or a DC 15 Constitution check to capture a Fear or Disgust response.

The purpose of this encounter is to seed Aza’s presence via the face marking for the Harmonium encounter. This also establishes a logical point when Shemeska becomes aware of the characters’ latest incarnations. It may not come up for the characters, but I try to tie down these details so that the background events make sense to me.

This event can alternatively be triggered if they attempt a Performance check of some kind in a public space or another display that would draw the attention of the Sensates.

Note to Self

The characters have wracked up a 15gp tab at the Smoldering Corpse, but they were not short on funds when they left the collateral. One of their more paranoid incarnations, the smuggler, started seeing plots and schemes everywhere after awakening with no memory (for good reason!), so they left a package in the least likely place where it would be discovered.

The bartender Barkis doesn’t remember much about the characters other than they often met up here, sometimes with other people. He vaguely remembers a modron coming in here not too long ago asking after them. He doesn’t know the dark of their dealings, and if he did it’s in his best interests to not rattle his bone box.

If they pay off the tab Barkis will procure a bundle tagged with the chosen character’s name. It’s a silvery longsword (or other weapon befitting their class) chased in a purple and green iridescent patina. It has an ebony pommel stone and shimmers in the light.

This is a celestial weapon forged on Mount Celestia and modified by Tripicus of the Mind’s Eye so that fiends may wield it without harm. It is magical and does maximum weapon damage when it lands a critical hit against a fiend.

The character that left the collateral has a surge of memory when they grasp it and remembers that there’s a hidden compartment in the pommel. If they open it they find a note written to themselves:

Dear [Character's Name],

By the gods it’s weird to write a note to some other version of myself. I don’t have much time. I’m–well, "we’re" I guess–being watched.

I haven’t got a clue to what’s causing this…glitch in reality. I’ve seen our companions die before my very eyes and return as some other incarnations of themselves. I’m afraid it may happen to me, and I won’t remember anything.

Here’s what I’ve figured out so far:

• Everyone glitching out is involved in something big. Don’t trust anyone.

• I don’t know exactly how, but the aasimar called Spiral knows who you are. She gave us this weapon, but we didn’t get far with her. I think we came on a bit strong. Don’t trust her.

• The name of the Seeker “Tripicus” came up in connection to the blade. We need to find him, but don’t trust him.

• The Planar Trade Consortium has something to do with Spiral. We should find out what, but tread carefully and definitely don’t trust them!

• There’s a modron involved? I don’t know. Just don’t trust them, I guess.

• The acolyte with the purple markings on their cheek saved our butts. You can trust them!

• There’s more info in the mimir, but it’s also glitching out. If everything goes okay I’ll figure this all out and you (me?) will never end up collecting this. But just in case I’m hiding it here.

– [Character's Name]

Barkis knows of Spiral Hal’oight. She sometimes ends up in his bar when she goes bust gambling at the Bottle and Jug. He doesn’t have any information about the other clues, and he will look around and tell them to shut their bone boxes if they mention the Consortium or Zadara.

If the characters had the Sensory Experience encounter with Aza/Farrow here in the bar, they are long gone.

Last Call

When the characters leave the bar and get a block or so away an imp will appear. It squeezes poison from its barbed tail and rubs it on the hearthstone of a black marble archway. This is the key to a portal opening up in the Nine Hells.

Shimmering green radiates from the imp’s poisoned grasp and expands to fill the arch. A landscape of impossibly sharp stone claws at a sickly orange sky streaked with violent clouds.

White hot flames shoot from a rift beyond the portal and two devils with wickedly barbed beards and long glaives step through the portal onto the streets of Sigil.

The imp screeches “These are the ones! They have the blade!” as the portal snaps close.

Two bearded devils demand the angel’s blade and attack. If they are killed their bodies dissipate and their souls return to the Nine Hells, but a successful DC15 Intelligence (Religion) check reveals that they are servants of Asmodeus.

Asmodeus’s followers have caught wind that devils and yugoloths outside the hierarchy of the Nine Hells are being armed with powerful weapons. They’ve tracked down one of the weapons to the bar, and the imp has staked out the bar for the past few weeks, waiting for someone to claim it.

The goal of this encounter is to apply some outside pressure while the characters are exploring Sigil. They should also question why devils would oppose being armed for the Blood War. This is the first sign that all is not right with the Outlands.