dailyadventureprompts:Heist: The Vault of Von-Straussgard There she is friend, the flagship o
dailyadventureprompts:Heist: The Vault of Von-Straussgard There she is friend, the flagship of the imperial airfleet, greatest in guns and glory if not in girth and raw tonnage. Named after the daft bastard who proved once and for all that the only true genius of empire was being able to outspend your opponent. Once we crack her, we’ll be spending too: enough to buy our own little empire, and maybe a pretty ship for each of us, eh? Setup: One of the grandest ships ever designed, the Von-Straussgard was built to show the might and resources of the empire, a flying cathedral to the power of the sovereign dynasty. In this time of peace, the great airship mainly takes on diplomatic missions, visiting the empire’s client states as a mobile consulate, returning home as a one-ship treasure fleet, its hold stuffed to bursting with tribute. No thief in their right mind would ever dare attempt to break the Von-Straussgard, which is exactly the reason it serves as such an excellent “Heisting-the-crown-jewels” capstone for a party of master criminals. The Sheer hubris of breaking into a floating fortress, garrisoned by the most loyal of the empire’s troops, with nothing but empty air to cover your getaway? It simply can’t be topped. Adventure Hooks: Provided one could simply walk past all the defenses, they’d have their pick of prizes within the Airship’s many vaults. The wealth of client nations, prototype weapons a fortune in art and embellishment made to decorate the Von-Straussgard, but the greatest of all these treasures is a gemstone kept in the most defended part of the airship. Known as Urania’s Insight, this diamondlike jewel is said to refract possible futures within its infinitely shifting lattice, giving the bearer the ability to see the outcome of their decisions decisions days or weeks ahead of time. It is the gift of prophecy given form, trapped in frozen starlight like a bubble in amber, and there is no empire across the multiverse, and there is no empire or despot that would not beggar themselves to possess it. Infultrating a swanky diplomatic gala held onboard could provide the party with a means of ingress, but that would require them to pass unoticed among a who’s who of dignitaries, political power players, and the empire’s very best spies. Can the party continue their heist even when one of the high profile guest is found dead half way through, and the ship is put on lockdown? How about when one of the world’s greatest detectives arrives on the scene, and starts sniffing out clues left and right? Do the party abandon ship? Go on with their plan? Come forward with what they know of what’s taken place in order to help prevent a war? Shipwright Vanessa Awller has lost her mother, which is to say: her mother was taken from her and is now a prisoner of the empire. Ms. Awller’s mother was a shipwright herself, best of her age, and was chosen from among many to design and oversee construction of the Von-Straussgard back when Vanessa was a girl. When the ship was completed, the workcrews were disappeared, and Vanessa’s mother was thrown into a cell within her own airship, her knowledge of the vessel’s structure and capabilities deemed too much of a security risk to ever let her breathe free air again. In the thirty years since, Vanessa has honed her grudges to a razor’s edge, becoming an accomplished shipwright herself, and running off with secret copies of the great ship’s plans. Now keeping company with mercenaries and sky pirates, she seeks a crew valiant and foolish enough to help her with her rescue mission, their services paid for with schematics of the Von-Straussgard’s vaults and internal layout. Keep reading -- source link