Nearing the halfway mark with these posts. Today’s theme is…

I thought that this was going to stump me.

Today’s word for me is inspiration for an adventure hook.

Back in 2011 there was a movie called The Eagle, starring Channing Tatum.

The basic plot summary is that it tells the story of a young Roman officer attempting to recover the lost eagle standard of his father’s legion.

The eagle standard of the Roman legions were their version of a banner. Banners in one form or another have been used by military regiments for centuries.

I think there are a couple of ways to use the basic plot of The Eagle.

The first is with a brand new party, the members of the party are all serving in the army of some kind, same unit, went through training together etc. Or they are ex-military and had served together. Which ever is chosen, it gives the party a common bond and a reason why they will be trying to recover the lost banner.

The banner they are trying to recover is from the regiment they are currently in or were serving in depending on the option they went with above.

The other way to hook them in during an existing campaign is to have them hired to recover the banner. Or they come across the site of a battle with corpses all over the place. They discover a soldier on their final breathes, who gets the party to promise to recover the banner and return it to the survivors/rest of their regiment.

Which ever of the above options is used. The party will have to infiltrate enemy territory , locate the banner, capture it and escape.

There is definitely several sessions of adventuring here.