I thought I would dive straight into my thoughts for the first heist before talking about the wider campaign.

I’m going to open with the first heist of Golden Vault, rather than the opening of Dragon Heist. The reason for this is simple - it’s a great way of bringing the party together. The mysterious Golden Vault has brought the party together because they have useful skills. The initial heist is a test as much as anything else. Each PC has received a purse with 10 gp, and instructions to arrive at the private room of a tavern. When they reach the tavern there is a music box on the table and four golden keys spaced evenly around it. Placing any of the keys into the music box will activate a magic mouth spell that explains who the Golden Vault are (up to a certain point, and explaining their first mission). It also instructs them if they accept the mission to each place one of the golden keys somewhere on their body.

If they do this the key dissolves onto their skin leaving a magical tattoo of a key. The character then gains a permanent Rary’s Telepathic Bond with anyone else who has done this with one of the four keys. The bond can be muted at will.

The Murkmire Malevolence works on several levels. Its designed for level 1 PCs which always helps. It’s also a classic heist formula so that sets the tone for the whole campaign. The gala offers a great opportunity to introduce casually a host of important NPCs, the Cassalanters, Davil Starsong, Mirt, Laerl Silverhand, Volothamp Geddarm etc.

One of the two material NPCs in this campaign is Alda Arkin the curator of the museum. She is the principle antagonist but this is a good time to introduce my first maxim of the campaign…

“Every NPC has to be either repeated through the campaign or linked to one of the key factions in the campaign, or ideally both.”

In this instance Alda Arkin is secretly an operative for either the Zhentarim or the Xanathar, she helps them identify items of unknown provenance and also provides leads for old ruins to ransack. She is also a sponsor of one of the rival adventuring parties that the PCs may come across in the campaign. a party that will form part of her retaliation if the heist goes to plan. I want her to be an inveterate snob - who can illustrate one of the tensions in the city - particularly the decadence of the nobility vs most non-noble citizens. Alda also helps to reinforce the second maxim of the campaign.

“Every Heist must be perpetrated against someone who deserves it, or to achieve a great good, ideally both.”

The second NPC is Dr Dannell. Who instigates the heist. Waterdeep doesn’t have a university but it does have archeologists. I don’t really buy the fact that she’s ignored because she’s interested in the occult. In a world with demons and monsters that stretches things a bit far. So I’ll make her the daughter of a ship who spent her inheritance studying. She’s ignored because of good old fashioned snobbery (and the fact that Alda is trying to raise the price of Stone so it can be auctioned). I do like the idea of weaving Far Realm elements into the campaign and I’ll follow the lead in the book that the far realm is dismissed as a myth by almost all wizards and academics. The far realm could be an existential risk later on down the line that good and evil factions may have to work together to stop. Dannell can become a resource for information about Far Realm threats along with a useful sage in the fields of history, the occult, aberrations and anthropology. Dannell will also be a member of the harpers. She acts as a spy for them in academic circles, performs research for them, and operates a small safehouse in the city for agents. The harpers will handle the stone once it is contained.

It’s worth at this point discussing the third maxim…

“It’s ok to fail a heist and the party can chose to ignore an element of the campaign if they want to but both have consequences.”

What that means is that events progress even if the PCs choose not to get involved with them. In this case the Murkmire Stone ‘hatches’ and the juvenile horror bursts into the city. Dozens of people will die or be inflicted with madness. The PCs may even be in a position to help defeat the creature even if they don’t take part in the heist - or not. Either way they will see the effects of their inaction/failure. Eventually it will be destroyed. But Alda will be seriously affected by the event and become obsessed with tapping into the power of the Far Realm. She will spearhead a Zhentarim/Xanathar effort to tap into the power of the Far Realm with potentially disastrous consequences. Even if safely contained the Murkmire Stone remains a dangerous and disruptive weapon suspended as it is.

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