Auction

... auctioning off an ancient and powerful suit of armor with the power to change the balance of Hell? Your players certainly have chutzpah. I'd like to think that if one of my PCs ever ran across something like that, he'd dump it someplace discreet, send an anonymous tip to Prince Talisid as to its location, and then retire to the base of the Spire. Just to be safe.

(Slight side digression - Membership in the Athar isn't just good for annoying the heck out of every divine Power in existence, it also provides you with a nice handy bolthole for when you get in WAY over your head! Apply today!)

But in any case, we're talking fiends here, and fiends Do Not Play Fair. I would expect several of their bids to be in the form not of valuables or treasure, but concepts of existence. Like deceit - "If you give it to them, they'll use it to invade your homeworld. We can show you." Or coercion - "We bid... your own eternal souls, honored auctioneers. We've a way to damn all your souls for eternity... but we won't use it, if you just hand the armor over to us." Or pride - "You control, at this moment, one of the keystones of the multiverse! Why give it up? Use it - in our service! Behind our banner, you will make the gods themselves tremble in their sleep!" Or possibly guilt - "The armor's not something you can entrust to them. But we, we have no real use for it, except to deny it to our enemies. It's been lost for eons, after all, and we've not suffered its passing. Give it to us, and we'll make sure it stays gone. And you'll be free of all guilt regarding the evil it might have one day done." Or fear - "Give it to anyone but us, and you'll be tricked, betrayed, backstabbed and tortured beyond all the limits of pain. And the ones you deny this prize to will help, to gain some small measure of vengeance for the power they've lost. But put it in our care, and we'll not only be properly grateful, but protect you from the others' wrath. You can trust us..." And of course, there's always wrath - "Pitiful, foolish mortals. You treat this as a prize to be sold, like so many larvae. But we know better. You're alone, frail flesh, without any real power - and one day you'll slip, and we'll take what is rightfully ours. Along with your still-beating hearts. Unless you were to simply gift it to us..."

In short, if this stays an auction, I'll be real surprised. It's got all the potential in the world to turn out to be a tug-of-war on a cosmic scale, with the hearts and minds of the PCs as the rope...

Rick Jones from The Incredible Hulk fame had this great mini-series way back in the day (I'm thinking 10 years ago) where pretty much he was thought to be responsible for singlehandedly annihilating the Skrull Menace. In comic-speak, this is a huge deal, and once word of it got out, pretty much every single alien race in the Marvel universe promptly descended on Rick Jones' house in order to either buy the secret from him, beat it out of him, or dissect his brain for said secret.

It was great. His latest girlfriend turned out to be an alien in disguise. Aliens harassed him in the toilet. Aliens appeared out of windows or telephones or vases, offering him crazy-exotic alien slave-girls in return for the secret. An entire armada of lizard people with ray-guns showed up at his front door and proceeded to blow his house up. Basically, all hell broke loose. Finally, a coalition of aliens kidnapped him, took him aboard their space-ship, and pretty much drew the information right out of his head without his say-so. In short, powers far greater than he took it away from him and put it up on auction.

Unless we're talking about crazy-powerful PCs here, just throwing up some mega-powerful artifact for auction, especially an artifact they aren't ready to control... It just invites all sorts of zany hijinks and disaster (many of which have all ready been pointed out).

Unleash all hell upon your PCs. They deserve it.

Especially a Yugoloth popping up in their toilet and making them an offer they can't refuse.

Now I'm getting a mental image of A'Kin doing that.

I can't help but find the image more than a little amusing.

Why no HULK SMASH? I'd imagine that annoyance at aliens would turn to anger rather quickly. Especially once they abduct you, and try to rip the info out of your mind.

Just a thought...since the auctioned artifact in question has the bona-fide spirit of a (very powerful) being inside it, what does IT WANT? Will the Devil Prince be able to affect the outcome of the auction?

Oh, and no fiend worth the title would actually PAY more for such an item than TAKING IT BY FORCE might cost 'em. That being the case, if things start to spiral out of control, the Lady herself might put in a "bid" (and woe to any berk who isn't fast enough in retreat)

And don't forget that those that choose not to bid might be as important as those that do. What would happen if the Yuggoloths as a race decided not to bid, then refused to say why to anyone that thinks to ask? Are they just waiting to take it from the winner? Do they know something that no one else knows? I use the yuggoloths as an example because they are the quintessential schemers, but any one group that has good reason to bid and conspicuously avoids it would work

Part of the problem is that none of the parties would want to pay the money to actually BUY the thing. It's obviously artifact-grade armor, but that means it's going to be extraordinarily difficult to judge on cash. Expect it to cost a hundred thousand gp as a starting bid; it will go up from there, should the auction actually go off.

Hmmm. Things that could be offered as bids by various factions. . .

The Athar - All the accumulated dirt and underhandedly acquired knowledge they have on a single god or church of the PCs choosing

The Bleak Cabal - Probably not interested. Then again, how often are they really interested in anything.

The Doomguard - A Sphere of Annihilation and an Amulet of the Sphere, or a mature Rust Dragon

The Dustmen - The secrets of Lichhood, all the materials necessary to perform the ritual, and an eternity of guardianship over the phylactery after it is created

The Fated - They'd probably just try to take the suit for themselves, but if they couldn't get it, they might take something else that belongs to the PCs and offer it back in trade

The Fraternity of Order - An extensive list of useful laws of the multiverse, as well as known loopholes where relevant

The Free League - Probably not interested.

The Harmonium - Not sure

The Mind's Eye - Relevant knowledge of what they believe to be the PCs' path up the ladder of existance, as well as assistance in walking the path to its conclusion

The Revolutionary League - Positions of power within the new order they seek to create. Alternatively, they won't destroy the PCs' home/place of business/faction headquarters in exchange for the armor

The Ring Givers - Give it to them. Giving an item of such unfathomable value to the faction is guaranteed to bring enormous rewards back to the PCs as the multiverse balances itself

The Society of Sensation - A lifetime of free access to the sensoriums, as well as full access to their archives of art and poety and literature, cellars of fine wines and spirits, and about any other sensations the faction has to offer

The Sodkillers - A vow on the part of all Sodkillers to forever remove the names of the PCs from any association with crime inside Sigil

The Sons of Mercy - Not sure

The Transcendant Order - Not sure

The Xaositects - Increasingly large quantities of halibut. If the PCs accept, they will never be without rations, but their homes will tend to fill up with salted fish when they least expect it

And, maybe a few other groups

The Illithid - One week's access to the Cranium Rat mental network for any purpose the PCs wish to pursue

The Efreeti - Slaves. Lots and lots of slaves. Perhaps the services of a Noble Efreeti for a debatable number of years

The Mercanes - The secret that makes them so ridiculously afraid of Sigil

The Planar Trade Consortium - Knowledge of their entire network of portals and keys

The Formians - An army of formians to build the PCs a great fortress to their exact specifications on a cog of their own in Mechanus, as well as the proper treaties to ensure it is never taken over by hive expansion

The Ethergaunts - They currently have in their posession approximately two million primes from their latest invasion campaign. In exchange for the armor, they will not deliver ten dead innocents to the PCs every day for the rest of their mortal lives

Celestials - The secrets of the Pheonix's rebirth

The Kytons - A mature Nupperbio

The Parai - The secrets of Perfection learned from the assimilation of a thousand thousand minds

The Rilmani - An offer to balance the PCs. They will be altered in such a way as to walk with the order of existance at all times

Ok, I think that's enough from me for now. Might think of some more later

However, in an auction a starting bid is usually set and something like threats wouldn't be an acceptable bid (not high enough). In a silent auction, which I assume this will be for an item of such immense worth, a team of neutral experts should evaluate each bid before it is accepted.

But, the fiends can revise their bids, something like: "If you don't give us the armor we will leave 10 innocent corpses on your front porch every morning for the rest of your life. But if you do give us the armor we'll release the same number of people alive every day for the rest of your life." This also opens up a moral dilemma for good PCs. Is it better to save innocent people than receive a personal reward while condemning the innocent?

Of course, this sort of word-trickery could mean that the PCs are now targets for assassination so the Ethergaunts don't have to release anyone.

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