A GM Adventure based on the movie, Sorcerer’s Apprentice
The Way I Would Run It.
– Me
The first part, create an Object of some kind that has a series of creatures captured in layers. The prisoners can be released under the correct circumstances, but only one after the other. The outer most creature is the Mini Boss, and the rest are sequentially lesser power until the last one trapped. That one is the Final Boss and a GM NPC. Make sure this item gets to one of the PCs who accidentally lets the Mini Boss out. (you made it happen, let’s be real)
Yes, you hit them with a Mini Boss fight as their first encounter. In a session 0, this can become the focus of a campaign for years, or just a short campaign thread, even concurrent with other quests. I would normally classify this idea as a Major Side Quest.
The second part is a Powerful Ally who knows about the Object because they helped make it. They have been travelling through the ages/lands guarding it, and adding enemies to the the Object as they are found, until he thought he got them all. But here comes the party who somehow let the Mini Boss out. Make it scary and funny, but be sure its seen as the party’s fault, at least in this fucker’s opinion.
So, have a memorable first encounter where you introduce your Powerful Ally (and you get a fun NPC!). This Ally knows the Mini Boss, a powerful villain, but with no knowledge of where or when they are. They will be disoriented with the situation, . They only know they have escaped and can continue their plan.
They have been trapped inside the Object, where they could not die. A long time passed — from a decade to centuries — while they were in prison. An Enemy at the party’s level, that can give them a real challenge, but in the end, gets away. The encounter should only last a few minutes at best. After all, the Mini Boss wants to get away and regroup to eventually steal the Object or use it if they successfully got it.
Third part. if you want a longer campaign out of this, try your best to make it believable that the villain barely got away. Write down any powers you used to make this happen and draw up this NPC as a character, ensuring they at least have those powers. They will have a goal of letting the others in the prison loose, so they want the Object and know the process for freeing people. You can even have them do it multiple times, as they manage to steal the Object from the party and release another wizard. Give the Object a recharge for opening, programmed in for this sort of thing so the party has time to catch him and take it back. It was a prison, after all. It has some security.
The reason they were trapped is up to you, but this is commonly a prison break kinda thing. Someone or Something put them there and the why only matters if your players are into the long story. Prepare as much for that as you think your players will go for.
If you follow it to the Last Part, then the Big Bad will emerge from the Object, along with another surprise NPC who has some connection to the Powerful Ally that was trapped along with the Big Bad. Whether the party knows this depends on how they treated the Ally until now. 😂
And that concludes this issue of How I Would Run It. I hope you enjoy it.
Play to find out what happens next!