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I’d like to do something not normally done on my blog, talk about video games.  This is an RPG game, so, why not?  It’s called Sacred 2:  Fallen Angel, developed by Ascaron Entertainment for the PS3 and Xbox 360 platforms.  I’ll be talking about the Xbox version on this review, and after taking a spin through the realm of Ancaria and bathing in T-Energy, here are my thoughts.

"Go! Go kill and loot their things, young one!"

My first thought is, “Wow.  What depth.”  For better or worse, Sacred 2 is a huge game, providing hours of gaming in an expansive world.  If your thing in console RPG’s is to build, tweak, and grow characters then throw them out there into the world then this game is for you.   You can play six different classes, and branch out into the light, or dark path, called Shadow in the game.  The story is standard fantasy fare, a substance called T-Energy is under control of the High Elves, and now factions within the Elves are fighting to control it.  Whatver it is, it’s just a reason to hack-n-slash your way through countless monsters and then take their stuff.  A lot of comparisons have been made to the Diablo games, and they are justified.  Kill-Loot-Equip-Repeat.  It is a fun time killer for us fantasy fans that like watching these worlds come to life.  Some of the landscapes look absolutely gorgeous on my 1080i set, and the game benefits greatly from this.  Keep in mind guys, there are 22 square miles of land in this game, it is huge!  The game can also be played via Xbox live, and that’s always fun.  Up to 4 players can create a party and take off into the wilderness to kill guys and take their stuff. 

"Gimme your wallet."

The game isn’t without its faults though, and I’d be remiss if I didn’t point them out.  The frame rate on my X-Box takes a hit, there’s lots of pop ups and weird graphical irregularities that come up from time.  If you are looking to spend a while killing skeletons, then who cares?  But there are players who pay attention to those types of things.

Characters have tons of options in the game

In closing, Sacred 2:  Fallen Angel in no way reinvients the wheel of fantasy gaming.  It’s a hack and slash, where you level and grind, level and grind, but it’s cool enough to sit with on the couch and escape your personal grind for a few hours.  There’s good replay value as well, given there are 6 different classes to choose from, with both a Light and Shadow storyline.

 Sacred 2:  Fallen Angel has received a ESRB Rating of M for Blood and Gore, and Violence.

I wanted to throw a couple of tools your way, just in case you weren’t aware of them.  Yes, I’m talking to you, “Mr. New DM who has no money to pay for expensive mapping software”.  These are free and kick ass.  One is for maps, and the other renders out cinematic landscapes to use as playing aides for your table.  Don’t describe Mount Doom, show them Mount Doom.

Let’s begin with the mapping.  This is a program called AutoRealm.  It is free, open source and will certainly satisfy your need for computer mapping while you are starting out as a digital DM.  Here’s the link:  http://autorealm.sourceforge.net/

It is a fractal mapper, comes with symbols, and has a slight bit of a learning curve.  It’s free, so download it, play with it, and soon you’ll be making maps like this:

Map courtesy Roy Altman at the Autorealm website

Now, I’m not so sure, but it seems by the website that the last developement took place in 2005.  I have version 2.2.1 installed on my system and it is cool.  To be honest, I still haven’t completely gotten the hang of it, but I’m dense for these things anyway.  Don’t use me as a benchmark.   You can find a bunch of tutorials here:  http://tutorials.autorealm.org/

Now, this next program kicks some serious ass.  It’s called Terragen, a photorealistic animator for making landscapes. How would you use this for D&D?  Well, if you are setting the scene by describing a  mountain range, a lake, a river bed, show your players exactly what it looks like.  Take a look at these pictures from their website.  These are actual renders.

Image created by Manel Giuli, copyright Manuel Giuli

mage created by Frank Basinski, copyright Frank Basinski

As you can see, two very different landscapes created by Terragen Classic.  Guys, these pictures move.  They are animations.  The camera can pan around the mountain, do whatever you want.

Check this video out:

Yeah.  Your players will flip if you show them your version of The Shire, as rendered by you.

Terragen takes some learning, but if you look, you’ll find plenty of tutorials that’ll teach you the basics.  I was making animations back in 2002 on that thing, with a crappy computer.  Rendering time was an issue back then, but today’s machines are much faster, although I can’t really say I’ve rendered anything in a while.

Guys, these programs are free.  Go get them, and learn to use them, they’ll spice up your campaign and make your sessions a little more memorable.

I went backpacking through Europe for a month back in 1996.  I was 23 years old, had a couple of hundred bucks saved up, so I decided to take the plunge.  I went with 3 other friends, and spent the month traveling from hostel to hostel aboard rickety old trains.  It was a great time, but spending a month with three other guys while sleeping in smelly hostels and gyms got old quickly.  We were getting sick of each other and towards the end we were at each others necks more often than not.

Imagine if that were the case with 7 adventurers, travelling by foot and horse accross the plains of a dangerous world, where monsters and dragons wait in the dark, ready to pounce on unsuspecting folks.  The stress of having to watch your back every night would surely get to the closest of companions over time, no?  I think this may be happening in my game.

"No, you stupid, pointy ear wench. North is that way. You suck."

There are certain players that tend to stick together, there are others that for some reason or other smile a bit when another fails, it’s really bizarre.  You’d think that by the upper reaches of the heroic tier, they would have built a true Fellowship, but alas, not in my game.  Complaints about who has what and who does what, along with personality clashes tend to creep into the game.  I still think we have a good group, and for the most part they tend to get along well, but the issues are there.  Now, this post isn’t really to talk about my home game, but about what can be done about it, for my table and yours as well.  If you’re a newbie DM out there with these problems, then keep reading and let’s try to figure out a solution together.

1.   Talk to the players involved, outside the game.  It may be the quickest way to get the problems fixed, although it causes you to extend table drama outside the context of the game.  Me personally?  I’d rather deal with stuff in-game, but some would consider this solution the quickest.

2.  Make them have to learn to value each others abilities.  You are the DM, you are the director in a fantasy flick with an unlimited budget!  Use it.  You can create set pieces and dramatic scenes that highlite every single one of your player’s abilities, strengths, and weaknesses.  Make the other players realize that they are all as important to the party as the next guy.  The party is caught in a situation where only one of them can get them out of it.  They won’t be smirking if he fails now.

3.  Let them go at each other.  This could go either way, but it just may make it obvious to the players that lack of unity won’t get them very far.  If the player’s truly are at a boiling point with each other, and the dwarf really wants the elf’s head, let them go at it.  See what happens.  See how the outcome affects yours story, chances are the “winner” won’t have much to celebrate about later.  Teach them a lesson.

4.  Try to really understand what’s causing the issues.  Maybe it’s you as a DM.  Maybe you are creating situations that are causing the situation.  I know in my case, I’ve gimped the party on magical items, and there are players walking around shining like beacons of magic while others are pulling out rusty swords to battle with.  It’s caused issues that I’m trying to rectify now.  Look at your style, your interactions with players, and your player “spotlight” time.  Everyone wants to shine, so offer them all the chance.

5.  Last but not least, use your DM authority as a last resort.  You are the guy running the show, and if a guy is really making your table uncomfortable, then do something about it.  If you have to tell him you want him out, do it.   Don’t let the group’s enjoyment be affected by one guy being a jerk.  It’s not necessary.  By simply volunteering to run these games you’ve earned some respect.  Cash it in if you have to.

This is the advise I could think of.  I’m sure more experienced DM’s will post below and leave some very knowledgeable comments…

I had an interesting discussion with some friends tonight about D&D 4th ed.  The four of us were discussing the merits and drawbacks of 4th ed.  in relation to other editions of D&D.  Some background before I get into it, we’ve all played together at some point since 2nd ed. AD&D, and two of them play in my current game now.  The other lives out of state, but plays in a 4th ed. game where he lives.

The general consensus that came out of the discussion was that 4th ed. is too geared towards getting to the next encounter and not enough towards storytelling and character building.  I have blogged about this before and my stance has always been that a group will bring in as much roleplaying to the table as they want.  Some people still think that they need the rule book to specifically tell them how or guide them towards roleplaying in order for that to happen.  I’m not sure I understand that point of view.  It doesn’t hinder roleplaying if you don’t let it.  But that’s not what this article is about, so enough about that.

As the title reads, this post is about metagaming, and specifically, about how I think it’s partly to blame for killing the roleplaying.  I feel it at my table, and after tonight’s conversation, I feel it may be happening at other tables as well, and I want your input.  Here’s what I’m thinking:  the combat is taking way too long in 4th ed. and players are feeling pressured to go from combat to combat in the time they have allotted to play, in order to collect their xp, loot, and level up. There’s no stopping to smell the proverbial roses in D&D anymore.

Time is apparently of the essence in 4th Ed. D&D.

At my table for example, time is very critical.  My guys know we have about 4 1/2 hours to get things done.  There are 7 players, with a lot of goofing around before we get to it.  Combat takes a long time.  Unfortunately, I find them rushing over the roleplaying elements I try to sprinkle into my game because of the need and desire to get to the last encounter before the time runs out, and the time the encounters are taking play a huge part in this equation.  The way I DM, I have my encounters prepared for the night on a big DM binder.  I write my flavor text, have my papers with the combats prepared, and have scripts for the NPC’s they may or may not interact with.  I’m ready to roleplay or not.  It’s their call.

My gut feeling tells me that combat length is an issue being discussed and watched over at WOTC.  It’s affected their Game Day events, it’s affected the perception of the game, and now I believe it’s affecting the way people approach the way they play.  When one of the guys, a guy that loves roleplaying, tells me he just goes from encounter to encounter without really ropleplaying; well, then I know something is off.  And I think this may be it.  I think combat length may be the key to the problem.   Have you stopped to think about why there’s no random encounter tables in the game anymore?  A hard random encounter can take up half of a four hour session.  That’s not good for anyone.

I hope I was able to clearly make my point.  Whether you agree with me or not, I think it’s at least something to consider.  If players weren’t metagaming and factoring in the time it takes to resolve a fight, they’d stop and smell the roses and take in the world a little more in the gaming session.

I’d love to read your thoughts.

So, another reader makes my life as a blogger easier by providing material.  At this rate, I won’t have to write a word, and the site can live off guest writers.  I kid, I kid.  It’s always welcome though, and if it’s halfway decent, you’ll have a place here to publish your stuff if you don’t have an outlet for it.  So, today’s post comes from reader “Mike”, who has submitted an alternate mechanic system he uses in his games and is contributing it for discussion and critique.  Mike describes himself as a 15 year DM who is always looking to better his craft.

Here now is Mike:

—-

*4e Rules*- I have purchased the core 4e books and the PHB 2 because I
wanted to judge for myself on 4e instead of just listening to other peoples
opinions, while valid, of 4e.  I read through all the books till my eyes
bled and found that many of the mechanics I really liked, but the classes
and the lack of customization, I really don’t.  I also don’t like that many
of the powers are honestly just variations on a theme.  So reading through,
I looked at what made 4e, to me, more fun/easier and decided what I wanted
to keep.

- All characters initiative going up every even level.  This makes sense
to me.  Adventures of level 12 still going at their original +2 (because
they don’t have a great dex or imp initiative) just seems so non-epic to me.

- I’ve kept healing surges, to lighten the load on the healers, but they
only get 2 + CON Mod (min of +1) healing surges per day.
- Bloodied- I’ve kept bloodied, but when bloodied characters take -2 to
all roles, showing that they are becoming fatigued.
- One thing that really annoyed me with 3.x is status effects.  The are
difficult to keep track of.  “You are poisoned, feared, etc for 2d4
rounds.”  I like 4e use of it goes on the whole encounter, but at the end
of your turn, you get a save.  I’m keeping that, but using 3.5 saving
throws.
- Powers- What I decided to do with the powers is at level one the
players can choose 2 powers, either encounter, daily, or utility.  Both
can be used once per day.  As they level up they can swap out powers for
something else.  Also if they really like a low level power, we buff it
up to match their level.  IE- I have a 3.5 warlock in my campaign who
really likes the 4e spell of Falagenos (spelling), which is a level 1 daily
and does 3d8 damage.  Not exactly a wow of a spell when you are level 12.
So we upped the damage to 8d8 + ½ level.  Bit better.
- I also like the status affects more in 4e, but haven’t had a chance to
play with those yet for 4e, but plan on attempting to add them to see how
they work.
- I’m using 4e races, racial abilities, and racial powers and seeing how
that works in 3.x
- Quick Draw feat gives an additional +2 to Initiative.  I like this.
- How do you update Monsters from 3.x to reflect the initiative
boost?  Simple,
look at their challenge rating or level advancement, and ½ that.  There
is their new bonus to initiative.  If they have a rapid strike or quick
draw feat give em +2 initiative.

*Monster Mods-* One of the things that always got to me about many
role-playing games is the length of combat.  Something that many GM’s and
players have struggled with.  To me combat should be fast, furious, deadly
without the really striving for TPK.  What I decided to do was create a
style of “minion” or “mook,” for lack of a better term.  They don’t have 1
HP, but can def be killed in 1 to 2 hits.  But to make them more of a
threat, I give them a higher initiative, higher attack, and up their damage
and saves.  So if the creature has an axe that normally does 1d8 damage, I
up it to 2 or 3 d8.

The next style of enemy has slightly higher HP and doesn’t do as much
damage, but has some tricks up their sleeves that can make them just as
nasty, but again, they can go down in 2-4 hits.

Then it goes to mini-boss and boss type creatures.  These can be anything…  A
goblin king to a shambling mound to a chaos beast to a lich.  I look at what
the MM says their abilities, stats, etc are, use those as a base, and up or
lower damage stats and etc.  Usually I do this on the fly and have gotten
decently good at providing a challenge for my players.

*Fencing-* I’ve heard that Nobis is coming out in July and has mechanics for
fencing and I’m excited to see what they have come up with and may take that
over what I’ve done.  One thing that I see players rarely take use of is
blocking, parrying, and dodging.  Why?  Because combat is a war of HP
attrition, and the one who loses HP faster loses..  And with 3.x mechanics,
you have to use your attack (sometimes full action) to block or parry an
attack.  Then there is a complex set of rules that allows you to oppose
roll, roll again, then roll again (I’m exaggerating) and you may get a hit
off on the target for doing this…

So what I’ve come up with (and am currently play testing this) is Fencing
points.  You get your level in fencing points and they refresh every level.
Fencing points can be used to dodge, or block attacks.  You can block 1
attack by target once per round by burning points.  They refresh ever level.
If you have 4 guys making one attack each on you, you can burn 4 points in
an attempt to block.  If you have three guys making 2 attacks each.  You can
only burn three points and block one attack of each enemy.  To block or
dodge you roll a DEX (the Modifier) or Athletics/Tumble check (whichever is
higher) and dodge the attack and shift one square away.  The DC is their
attack roll.  For blocking you roll an opposing attack roll, if you beat
them, you successfully block their attack.  The next part has more on
Fencing options in the Eberron rules.

*Eberron rules-* I like Eberron’s rules for Action Points.  You get 3+ your
level and they add +#d6 (depending on level) to your attack, save, skill
check, ability check rolls when you decided to use one.  They come in handy,
and allow the players to be exceptional.  I give everyone the Action Surge
Feat, which allows the player to burn three action points to take an extra
move or attack action (basically what burning 1 AP in 4e does).  In regards
to Fencing it also allows bonuses.  If you successfully block an attack,
even if it is not your turn you can burn three AP and make a free attack.  If
you successfully Dodge an attack, you can spend 3 AP and make a move action.
These actions are limited because it is NOT your players turn, but allow you
to do something extra.

*Pathfinder-* I’m also using rules and changes from Pathfinder Beta and when
the published book goes live, I’ll assimilate what I like from that and what
I like from the beta.  Pathfinder has quite a few changes that I like to
feats, combat, etc.

Alright..  So that’s it..  My little bit of knowledge..  Whether you like it
or not, I just wanted to put it out there for others to criticize or take
ideas from or whatever..

Enjoy!

———————-

Thank you Mike.  Guys, the floor is yours for comments.  I’m sure Mike will appreciate it.

Here’s something that came up in my game, I’ll tell you how and why I ruled it a certain way, and then I’d love to get your responses and ideas about it.

One of the PC’s in my game because dazed.  Now dazed limits you to one action:  either a standard a move or a minor.  You can also take free actions.  After the player took his action, he decided he was going to use one of his action points to take a second action, since the action point grants him the use of another action.

I ruled no, that he could not.  Why?  Because in my opinion, the dazed condition specifically says that dazed limits the actions available to the player to one, and an action point is not a cure for dazed, a saving throw at the end of your turn is.  If one of his allies had given him a saving throw in the middle of his turn, and he would have made it, then he definitely could have used his action point.  Otherwise no.

He then argued that the game is excepetion rules based, and the action point is an excepetion rule to the dazed condition.   I said that on the contrary, the dazed condition is the exception rule to the action point mechanic.

So DM’s, where do you stand on this?  Has it come up in your games?  We could find no answers online, only forum arguments either way.  There seems to be no clear ruling on this.

How would you judge it?

I have been running a 7-8 man group for a year now, although it has recently leveled off to 7 players being the norm, with usually 1 missing a session here or there.  Some players came in later, and I had the bad idea (although well intentioned) of starting them a few levels behind the rest of the party.  Because of that, I hit a situation where my players were not all of the same level, causing issues in the encounters and the way they were being designed.

 Last night finally, all that changed, and I am happy to report that the game ran better, a lot better than I was hoping for.  I decided to level up everyone equally, and even if you miss a session, you’ll be at the same level as everyone else.  It just makes life easier for me in the end as a DM, to know that the encounter I am throwing is appropriate for all players at the table, and not just 5 of the guys. 

 For the past year, my group has been carelessly cutting through my encounters because I was gimping the monsters to accommodate the lower level guys.  Yesterday though, they finally felt the force of a full blown hard encounter for their party level, and one of the PC’s even fell in battle.  The party is at level 8, they faced a level 9 brute solo Bloodkiss Beholder from Open Grave.  The fight was nasty, but they were challenged the way they should have been challenged.  A hard fight for their level.

Who's your daddy? He was last night.

 So here is a lesson for newbie DM’s out there:  I’ve blogged before about level discrepancies, but now I put it to the test.  Do yourself a favor; you are not doing anyone a favor by having lower level guys mixed in with higher level players.  It does a party no good to have a less effective striker in the party for example.  Plus, your encounters will become easier to design, and the result will be more rewarding and enjoyable to your players.  Trust me on this.  My player’s complained about no-show players being awarded XP, but you know what?  Too bad.  We DM’s have enough to worry about, to also have to be adjusting treasure parcels and encounters for mixed level parties.

 I’ll never worry about that again, and neither should you.

——————

Random plot hook of the day:  A group of kids went to play in an abandoned crypt, and one of them ran out saying the others had their blood sucked out by a beast.  This kid barely made it out alive, but his description is terrifying.  What happened?  Well.   A bloodkiss beholder happened, duh.

I see a lot of hate spewed at 4th Ed. by the 3.x crowd.  I guess almost ten years worth of gaming material both by WOTC & 3rd parties isn’t enough to foster years and years of further playing, but what do I know, I’m just a newb.  I guess we all have our reasons as to why we play a certain edition of D&D: the 1st Ed. guys love the Gygaxian feel of things, while 2nd Ed guys love THACO in all its glory, and the 3rd Ed guys wanted more books to sit next to the 235 other 3.x books in the collection.

Me?  I like the simplicity of 4th Ed.  You see, I’m a busy guy in my mid-thirties.   I have a stressful job as a tv producer.  I come home, and I have a wife and two little kids that require a lot of attention, and to be honest I don’t have the time to devote to a game that has a complicated rule set or long preparation times. With 4th Ed., I find that encounter building is simple, the rules are fairly easy to learn, character creation is quick and the overall system lends itself to a simple rpg.   Is it dumbed down? It may be, but honestly, I don’t care.   It’s just what a guy like me needs.  I like to sit around with friends for a few hours, talk smack, eat pizza, and play D&D.  I’m not looking for simulations or realism.  I’m a guy that is in a different demographic than the high school or college kid that can devote more time to his favorite hobby.   And rest assured kids, you’ll get here soon enough.

So I want to conduct a completely unscientific poll:   How many of you 4th Ed. players are like me?  How many of you have the same types of things going on in life that I do, and find that the game caters better to your situation?

In fact, I’m going to run an handy poll here to get your ages, and see what demographics we are talking about.

I look forward to your comments.

I received an email from one of my readers suggesting an idea for a tutorial.  Rather than have me blog about the topic without really knowing much about it, I suggested he write it and I just host it.  So, here now is reader Alex, with a pretty kick ass tutorial about making your own Dungeon Tiles.  Hear that Google?  Making your own Dungeon Tiles.   Yeah… that comes up a lot.

Here is Alex:

——–

Hello everyone.

The newbiedm made a tutorial, which I’m sure all of you have seen, awhile ago for creating “durable and permanent” character/monster tokens. It gave a lot of us a very cheap alternative to D&D minis for great looking, functional, character/monster indicators.

He helped us out more with his 1″-scale battlemap tutorial. It gave us our own, fully-customizable battlemaps at the proper scale. They can be as versatile as we need them to be. They’re a good replacement for dungeon tiles if you make enough of them, and you can control exactly how good they look depending on the printing quality you choose.

Wouldn’t it be nice if you could combine the idea of having “durable and permanent”, and the idea of making your own battlemaps? NewbieDM has graciously allowed me to make a guest tutorial to take you all through that very process!

I’d rate the difficulty of this project at slightly above the custom token creation. To get the pieces to come out right, you need to have a bit more patience and motivation, but the result is worth it.

I’ll follow the format of the previous newbiedm.com tutorials:

Here’s what you’ll need:

• A 1″-scale battlemap. Follow the tutorial if you don’t already have one.
• Graffix Medium-Weight Chipboard. Comes in small, medium, and large sizes. I use the 8.5″ x 11″ pack of 25, which costs $8.00 or so after shipping.
• Rubber Cement (spray adhesive, contact cement, heavy-duty glue, whatever you have had the most success with while permanently pasting paper to cardboard)
• Cardstock. For printing on. Printer paper, glossy paper, copy paper, etc can be used, cardstock will be a bit more durable.
• Exacto-knife
• Ruler

The Graffix chipboard is the star of the show here. I did my homework for a little while and this is the stuff to use. It’s just about as close as I’ve been able to find to the actual material used by WotC in their dungeon tiles. The thickness and stiffness is just about identical. The differences are negligible, and the price is more than right (it’s basically 4 sets for the price of 1 plus a bit for glue/ink/paper replacement as needed).

First thing to do is cut out your battlemap and get it pasted onto the chipboard. I make x marks on the chipboard where the corners will be so that I know where to glue.

Once you’re done making the marks, your chipboard will look something like this.

Now you’ll want to take your glue of choice and apply it to both your chipboard and the back of your battlemap. I use rubber cement because it’s what I’ve been using for my character tokens, and thus what I had on hand. The newbiedm suggested spray adhesive, which would probably work just as well. Wax paper makes this process easier. Follow the directions on your glue for best stick.

Stick your battlemap to your chipboard using the marks you made as guidelines. Flatten the edges down well and wait for it to dry a bit.

Take the ruler and exacto-knife and cut along the edges. Make sure you’re cutting over something you don’t mind slicing up. I use a doubled-up piece of cardboard, as you can see there beside my hand.

Once you get that piece all cut out, you should be done! Below is a picture of the mat that I photographed the creation of beside a couple custom ones I had already done, and a couple of WotC dungeon tiles.

Basically the same process can be used to put a map on the opposite side of the board, except instead of exacto-knifing the board when you’ve glued the map on, you’ll flip the board over and exacto-knife the excess paper hanging over the edges of the chipboard.

The major difference is that the WotC ones are glossier. If you’ve got a nice printer, you can print out pretty decent looking scenery. If you’ve got a normal printer, well, you’ll be a little limited, but, as you can see, the tiles still come out very nicely even with a standard quality printer. I used the “normal” setting. I could see a draft setting still looking decent while saving some ink, and a best setting making some very impressive looking tiles.

Also, here’s how the edges compare:

As you can see, they’re very close, and when you lay them beside eachother and start playing, you really don’t notice the difference much at all. Also, if all else fails and you just keep noticing that 1/32nd of an inch…just remember that you paid 1/4 the amount for a nice looking set of DTs, and you get to customize them!

Thanks for reading, I hope it helps, and thank you to the newbiedm for hosting the blog-post!

————-

And there you have it, my first reader-contributed post.  I hope it’s not my last.  If you’ve got a topic you’d like to contribute to, or a tutorial you’d enjoy writing, drop me a line at newbiedm@newbiedm.com and let’s get it published!   I want to thanks Alex for taking the time to contribute to the blog with his fine tutorial.  I’m going to order a pack of that chipboard myself.

———–

Random plot hook of the day:   The PC’s arrive at a small city, and the town guard that lets them in makes it a point to mention the nice magical weapon one of them carries.  Later that night, a cat burglar breaks into their room at an inn, and makes off with that particular item.  Over night,  a VIP in town is murdered using the weapon, a lo and behold, the PC’s are wanted for questioning.  It seems the bloody blade was left behind after the killing.  Now what?