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Encounters of Athas 3 - Templars

The latest in a series designed to provide DMs with encounter or location ideas to add flavor to their campaigns. In this installment, we focus on encounters taking place with templars.

Templars are a common sight and frequent hazard in the brutal city-states of Athas. They wield nearly unlimited power within their city states and rarely travel alone, flanked at almost all times by a troop of well-armed guards to back up their authority. Wherever a templar is found, trouble and danger are always near.

Humans from Terrors Beyond Tyr by Baxa
Humans, Terrors Beyond Tyr Baxa by Baxa

1) A lone templar from another city-state appears outside the city gates. Her garb is strange and she speaks of the sacking of Yaramuke as though it had recently happened.

2) A templar corners you in the market. He believes you are the point of contact for a smuggling ring, and wants to turn you into informants.

3) A trio of templars approach you. They have an offer of employment: you will provide additional security for an archeological expedition to some nearby ruins. When they believe you can’t hear them, you occasionally catch mention of words such as “blue age” and “life-shaping.”

4) You stumble across a dead templar in a back alley. Just moments after your discovery, a pair of templars arrive and accuse you of the crime.

5) A templar threatens to have you sent to the arena if you don’t acquire and smuggle certain contraband into the city for him. Your first job: an assortment of crystals held by a nearby tribe of elves.

6) The templars have been on high alert lately, and rumor has it that one of the sorcerer-monarch’s high templars is not in the city. At a nearby tavern, you happen upon a drunk, low-ranking templar who seems to know more than her station would otherwise suggest. In her drunken ramblings, she mentions a few garbled words that you manage to make out as “void wardens.”

7) A highly placed templar has recently been stripped of his position by the sorcerer-monarch. As a result, lower ranking templars have increased their efforts to control the populace in a bid to advance themselves. While passing through, you come across two separate groups of templars accosting shopkeepers in different areas of the market district. Can anything be done to ease the burden imposed by these groups of templars, and what might the merchants pay to make it happen?

8) Two templars can be seen in an isolated corner having a conversation in hushed tones. Things appear to be tense between them, as one eventually slams his fist into a wall and storms off. As he leaves, he says something about a tohr-kreen and “a fool’s errand.”

9) “Congratulations, citizen! You have been selected for random search and detained.”These templars will now escort you to an appropriate location to perform the search. Do not resist.”

10) A group of templars and their bodyguards approach and demand you explain your business. As you do so, one of the templars telepathically communicates to you that they need an inside agent at the next gladiatorial games. If you help them, they can make it worth your while.

Summer Santos