Sword Of Kadorn

The Plot

An introductory fantasy adventure. Players are a group of village adolescents who have discovered a Sword of Power. The local lord responsibly decides that it should be sent to the capital, where they have mages who would understand such a thing, and since the PC's are not needed between spring shearing and harvest, the lord sends them with an advisor (village hedge-wizard, old man-at-arms, family retainer, whatever). The sword has chosen one of the PCs as its carrier.

Beyond the simple journey to the capital is the fact that the sword has its own agenda. Possibilities include:

• The sword was created to kill a particular ethnic group in a war; that ethnic group subsequently won the war, and it turns out that all the PC's but the chosen carrier are descended in some way from that ethnic group. Over the course of the journey, that PC argues with the sword over whether or not the other PC's should be killed. (PC: "It will be rather a long fight if I have to kill everyone in the province" SWORD: "But the glorious fight will at last be won!")
• The sword is a Lawful Good sword created a millennium ago, when morals were considerably different. It wants to encourage the kind of behaviour that it believes is good, probably rough eye-for-an-eye justice that is frowned upon in most civilized societies.
• The sword is a weapon to be used in an upcoming Apocalyptic War between Good and Evil (tm) and is searching for the best Hero (tm) for the war. In this case, the PC's are simply a vehicle for it to get to the capital. It may have magical abilities that keep the PC's alive during the early parts of the journey, but after it leaves them, they must learn to live without it.