Daddy Fate, third in my villain series

Years ago I fell in love with the book and the movie “The Last Unicorn” by Peter S. Beagle. One of the characters that always stood out to me was Mommy Fortuna, a witch that ran a dark carnival of monsters, some real, most fake. When one of my players made a paladin and wanted to be able to use summon mount to bring a unicorn into her service, I hatched an adventure.

The party found a strange traveling circus outside of town which featured magical monsters as the main attraction. The group found out the owner, a man by the name of Daddy Fate had captured and subjugated a unicorn. The party befriended the monsters, freed the unicorn and were marked as Manticore and Harpy friend as well when they defeated Daddy Fate and his goons.

The benefit of the Abyss Modified version of Daddy Fate was he had a few years to mature from the original interpretation. It also helped the group had never heard of the “Last Unicorn” which is a crime.

This character evolved over time and in my Abyss Modified game the group ended up getting the chance to take one of three caravan quests to take them from one city to another. Boring wine merchants needed assistance disputing improper taxation on their trade routes, general merchants from one town needed protection on the road, or a circus needed extra help keeping their tight schedule on the way to the big city. They took the bait and Daddy Fate rode again.

Daddy Fate’s Traveling Menagerie of Magical Monsters captivated the players, their bard talked them up, and the next morning they were on the road with the caravan of carts. Daddy Fate himself was an imposing figure, tall, muscular, well dressed, and good with a blade as he carried four of them. The group traveled with him and his men, talked to the monsters in the cages, all of which were real. They made it to a halfling village and were press ganged into preforming with the various acts. The party was drawn elsewhere for a side quest and when they returned, they found the village empty, the circus gone, and the horses dead. Realizing something was foul, the party took off in pursuit.

Eventually they caught up finding there were numerous Daddy Fates, his helpers were werewolves, and the halflings were going to be sold off to an extradimensional trader. The party threw down with Daddy Fate within his magical tent, he revealed himself to be a four-armed oni, and chaos ensued. The party fought valiantly and released monsters while fighting off various foes. Eventually Daddy Fate lay dead at their feet and the monsters were all set free. They found the halflings as well, all safe and sound once they removed them from a magic painting. The group got the halflings set up for safe travels with a few of the goodly monsters and set to exploring the rest of the magical tent. It turned out Daddy Fate was just a crony for some other larger extraplanar monster trader and the party chose to parley instead of fighting him and his horde of armored ogres.

The question now is how can you use this menace in your games. I have Daddy Fate as one of many agents working for a dark criminal extraplanar monster trafficking ring that has also dabbled in selling humanoid creatures to powerful creatures in other realms. After the defeat of Daddy Fate the organization might send more minions after the adventuring group seeking revenge. Possibly the criminal ruler might decide the realm the party is on is not worth dealing with and take his business elsewhere.

Here are some adventure hooks to tie Daddy Fate into the stories of your parties:

-A mysterious benefactor hires the party to fight and capture monsters, only paying if they are brought back alive. After the first few missions the contracts start targeting civilians.

-Monstrous guardians of good in the area have gone missing. Threats they protected from are emerging from the shadows again. The party must figure out what happened to the guardians and bring them back before the worst happens.

-Party hears about a great circus in the area but when they get their find all the magical creatures are under a spell. A character bonds with the unicorn and it tells them the tale of being captured by terrible monster and is afraid of being sold to some other world.

-Rumors of villages being empty and the only clue leads the party to the circus. After finding a few empty towns the party finds a way to head off the circus or wait for it to set up again and attempt to free the villagers from Daddy Fate’s magical portal tent.

For monster stats I ended up using storm giant stats for Daddy Fate, modifying his lighting to a line attack when he crashed his swords together. I halved the damage for that attack as well. Our party would have anywhere from four to fifteen players depending on store turnout so throwing such a strong creature at a lower-level party was more balanced. If you are using him or a similar threat in your game feel free to modify the creature stat block to fit your gaming style.

Always remember that if you base a monster or character on an existing thing to credit the original source. As an artist this was grilled into us. Pay homage to an idea, never copy it and claim it is your own.

Oni of Plagues from the Rising Sun board game expansion Monster Pack

I knew when we started the story arc, I was going to need the best oni or ogre mage miniature I could find and luckily, I had found this one in a box set on sale at a local game store. I threw a quick paint job together and brought my other oni figures as lesser minions. It achieved the effect I wanted, the party knew he was a big deal when he towered over them. The Rising Sun board game has many fantastic oni miniatures and took some time to hunt down the base game. Incredible miniatures that are also scaled incidentally for rpg use.

Thanks again for checking out my posts and have a great day!