Never Trust a Kenku

My friend in high school tricked me one time. He was GMing me 1:1 in a new campaign. I was following a Kenku.

We played for an hour and he described the desert.

And nothing happened. Just following the kenku.

So, finally, I say something along the lines of, “This is boring.”

My friend cracked up.

He had been giving me the same description over and over, waiting for me to notice. And it had taken me an hour. hah.

Alas, he had nothing prepared. It was not a real campaign. It was all about the trick.

To this day, I still don’t trust kenku. Or descriptions involving sand.

I shared that story on Discord when kenku came up, and thought you might enjoy it too.

I got owned pretty good.

We got to talking about kenku because I was working on my Lost Isle campaign seed, and I ended up with a chain of events culminating in a bird that repeats the last sentence it’s heard.

Alas, I went in a different direction for the campaign seed. While this bird offers a fun puzzle, characters could speak first, ruining things.

So, I’m keeping the bird but using it elsewhere.

Instead, I figure the captain received a treasure map where X points to a secret island in the sea. The map was made by dire wasps the size of a dwarf’s forearm.

The wasps were created by The Powers That Be to build a dungeon. The inspiration for this came from painting the in-laws’ house in 32°C heat. I had to whack a lot of wasp nests. The critters used open knots in the wood, and chewed deeper into the old lumber siding.

So the bad guys baked the dungeon plan into the dire wasps’ DNA and sent them to the island to breed and dig for a hundred years.

And it worked. But, unbeknownst to the villains, the insects also make their hives using the same pattern. Old hives fall away and rot. But peel away the outer layers, and you’ve got the entire map in 3D miniature.

So I figure the giant mosquito demon air-mailed one of these hive husks to the captain with a nice note.

And that completed my seed to explain a chain of events that starts with mutant dire wasps and ends with a merchant marine ship wrecked on an unknown island in the middle of the sea ripe for a mosquito demon to declare salvage rights.

Where That Chain Came From

Dungeon-building bugs, hive husk maps, and villains with evil plans all spawned from my 3 Seeds prep for Lost Isle, which I featured in this week’s GM’s Log.

I use three short Mad Libs that help me think through key campaign details before they sting you.

I’ve got a Mad Lib for your villain, one for your world, and one for your campaign.

Three seeds total, and they connect. Fill them in once, then re-read each time you prep to easily switch into campaign mode and be inspired to craft chains like this one.

GM’s Log #11: The 3 Seeds Framework is live for CampaignCraft members now:

https://www.roleplayingtips.com/campaigncraft/

Beats an hour of sand.

Cheers,
Johnn
roleplayingtips.com
https://discord.gg/6MxTRAqQ76
Have more fun at every game!

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