Honour Among Thieves: "The Hopping Hobgoblin Inn"

10 days ago (Edited)

In 2008 I was gifted a Vaio Laptop with an intergrated GFX card that could run low to middle end computer games of that time. I was 18 and had not played video games for a while.

I came into video games during 1995/6 when the first Sony Playstation came out. At 5/6 years old i was already in front of the TV bashing buttons and swearing at my milk for not staying warm through the night.

When i came into my teenz i left the console world and headed for the PC realms where i was exposed to the world of computer games.

In 2002 Bioware came out with Neverwinter Nights which quickly consumed my life. Bearing in mind this was way before the Beemdog takeover and Enhanced Edition update, so the GFX wasn't the best, especially on my then low-end laptop.

I didn't get to play NWN until five years later in 2008; the game quickly became my favourite (and still ranks 2nd place in my top 5 games of all time). I played through the original campaigns plus some of the expansions and i loved it. I fell deeply in love with Jeremy Soule's awesome music, due to my time playing my first ever MMORPG called Guild Wars back in 2005. When i found out J.Soule composed the music for NWN I immediately locked myself away from the world and became a playa.

Almost two decades later I still find myself coming back to Neverwinter Nights, mostly playing custom playa-made modules such as Savant's "Aielund Saga", RogueKnight333's "Sword Flight" and some other random unfinished ones. What makes NWN a great game is the inclusion of the Aurora Toolset which has allowed for the continued creation of many, many, MANY custom campaigns 15 years later.

NWN's modding community is rock solid.

I've been wanting to try out Baldecaran's "Honor Among Thieves" for some time. Knowing his reputation in the NWN modding community i knew i'd be in for an ace time...

They say there can be no honor among thieves. They say that human greed is stronger than human loyalty, and that no promise is safe from the corruption of gold and power. But even within the shadows, some order must be held. Here, knowledge is more powerful than the sharpest blade, and alliances are kept through a careful balance of lies. And though indeed there may be no honor among the thieves, there is respect amid distrust...

A chance meeting at a country inn leads you into the dark underbelly of the city of Endorr. There, you become entwined in a tangle of lies and deceit, as you infiltrate a local thieving guild in search of a stolen artifact. And as you discover the truth of the shadowy world around you, you learn the nature of your own conscience. Who around you deserves your trust? And what is the price of your own honor?

I'm not sure what the price for my honor is, but what i do know is that NWN works on the Dungeon's and Dragons 3rd Edition ruleset which i still struggle with understanding to this day. But hey ho i know i'm slow but lets gooOooOo....

Introducing Shung-Fan the Halfling (midget) Rogue. I chose a Rogue class cuz i always play Rogues in any RPG game and also because the title of this campaign has "thieves" in it. So there.

I generally try to max out Dexterity for the rogue traits and Wisdom as a hedge against mind/crowd control abilities from Enemies. A dashing Rogue must be indomitable, fast and wise.

So the blue skinned (midget) Rogue lands at "The Hopping Hobgoblin Inn", some countryside Inn. Why the blue skin? Because Shung-Fan likes how it fcks with people. Also i dunno...i originally wanted to give him pink skin like Majin-Buu but....i dunno...

Chattin' with the locals told Shung-Fan everything he needed to know: they were drunk and were still drinking. Some geeza named Toman spoke to Shung-Fan about some creature trolling the community, hinting that he ought to deal with the problem. The proprietor of the Inn had work but it didn't sound interesting; seems people have problems upon problems they cannot untangle from...

...Shung wasn't havin it, so he bounced from that conversation to the next and the next. A normal day for a small dude eh?

Moments later he caught the attention of a well dressed man by himself at a side table. Not expecting anything unusual, Shung walks up to the man named...

...and was invited to...

So! A well sojourner with a job! Does that mean gold???

A score! A Challenge! A man with gems who needs his pockets unburdened! Now this is a job for Shung-Fan! Lots of gold too!

YES!!!

Moments later we find Shung-Fan casing the entire joint. There's only two rooms upstairs, one vacant and the other with a guard standing outside. Shung-Fan walks up to the guard who tries to talk smack, realizing this must be the room to...

...the man of many gemz!!!

Shung's problem is he needs to get into that big bad chest. He needs the room vacant. He needs to get the merchant and his guard(s) as far away from their own room as possible. Honesty is always the best policy...