A young noble boy unexpectedly playing with his puppies in the basement right in front of the family vault the crew intended to break into proved to be far more of a challenge (and a plot point) than I could have anticipated.
The crew, of course, kidnapped the boy and his puppies. Then robbed the family blind. Where does the ransom come from?
As a noble family they probably have more connections than money, so they reach out to anyone who wants to get in good with them—bankers and businessmen who want to be associated with a noble name, nouveau-riche and lesser nobles who want allies, etc. maybe they even sell off some land or a lesser title (that goes with an estate out in the deadlands).
The question is, are they really going to pay a ransom, or is it a trap to catch the thieves and show everyone that kidnapping a noble doesn’t get you rich, it gets you dead?
Agree with Jeff, nobles can’t exist in a vacuum. They have to have both friends and frenemies who would lend them money – some because of the horrible thing that befell their friends, and some because they’ll have the nobles in a bind thanks to the debt.
What have the scoundrels done to ensure the nobles can’t try to track them down and murder them all in their sleep, either before or after the ransom gets paid? There’s no reason the nobles wouldn’t just offer some hunters a percentage of the ransom to put the thieves in the ground.
Since this is Duskwall, they had better have a whisper warding the kid. I can imagine the noble going into the family crypt, releasing a powerful elder ghost, and sending the ghost to find the blood of his ancestor, possess the child, and walk him out of there, killing all who stand in the way with telekinesis.
It’d be cold (and oddly appropriate) for them not to care so much about the kid, but the dogs? They were some sort of purebred somesuch worth a lot of coin.
The nobles’ connections don’t have to be legitimate, either – maybe they have powerful friends in The Hive or the The Unseen, and the crew has inadvertently pissed off a powerful gang. The nobles could also be ‘protected’ by a gang who doesn’t appreciate upstarts infringing on their turf.
(The dogs are interesting, because what is the status of animals in Duskwall? Have dogs been able to survive a thousand years of darkness alongside humans? I might think dogs are relatively rare, especially since all of civilization is herded into great, dog-unfriendly cities, which may make them much more valuable as Adam Schwaninger said. Of course, cats are doing all right in crowded cities of eternal darkness.)
Yeah I think making the dogs of great value is a good idea, as one of the PCs has grown particularly attached. I also think it would be interesting if the crew were contacted about a ransom, but for the dogs. Just a total lack of interest in recovering the child and no explanation why.
Also, they did infringe on someone else’s turf running this job. I know the dimmer sisters are in Brightstone. Who else?
Peter Ghazarian As for who else is involved, here is my recommendation. Look over the faction lists. Think of one or more that it would be great fun to play. Suddenly, those factions are involved. =)