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Fridge Brilliance
- The Central Theme of the worth and purpose of a person and their talents has appeared in a lot of characters throughout the campaign.
- The reason why the events with the Spine of Death exists is because the high officials viewed necromancy as too dangerous and refused to allow it to be used even when Belkinus was at war with a neighboring country. This led to the death of Abbigail Miharian, which led to her sister Kara pursuing True Resurrection. This would jumpstart everything that following, ranging from the law and discrimination against necromancers to the creation of the Spine of Death.
- Nathaniel is a popular figure in Belkinus, known for hunting down criminals and necromancers. A key factor to the Witch-Taker's success is his proficiency in charm magic. However, there are still people who don't trust Nathaniel because they see his charm magic as too dangerous since it can basically mind control people against their will. In fact, this conflict stem as far back as with Nathaniel's father, who refused to allow Nathaniel to use his charm magic to make a murderer confess to his crime. This frustrated Nathaniel so much that Nathaniel resorted to charming his own father into falsely confessing to necromancy.
- Grikyak is a merchant who lost his whole business when the Spine of Death attacked Belkinus Proper, destroying all his products in the process. And when tried to sell off his destroyed products as amazing goods to the party, his kind heart and pride as a merchant forces him to confess when Enoch tried to pay the merchant handsomely. However, the party believed in the goblin merchant and wanted to help him out, so they donated their money to Grikyak so he can start all over again. This led the goblin to later being challenged by another merchant in the business world. And when Grikyak lost, he refused to give up. This impressed the business-savvy merchant, causing him to help the goblin start up his business. And now, Grikyak was finally able to strive again as a businessman.
- Scorpio was a mercenary-for-hire who had worked alongside Luna in the past. However, in recent days, Scorpio struggled to make money and started to get tired of the mercenary work. Even though he has the talent as a mercenary, he began to think that the mercenary life may not be it for him. This reveal to Luna made her start reflecting on her own life and the lives of other people like Craighton.
- Mirth is an inspiring inventor and potion-maker who wished to be helpful to other people. However, he is seen as a nuisance by his town because of how his inventions fail. He only finally started to find success when he relied on necromancy in order improve his inventions and potions. However, when the party found out, Enoch desperately tried to convince Mirth to find another way and to turn away from necromancy due to how frown upon and illegal necromancy is. Unfortunately, Mirth needed necromancy to finally be useful, so he left for the Spine of Death so he could be accepted. And when Mirth found out that Bloodstride had been using the Spine of Death as nothing more than tools for his own ambition, Mirth is devasted when he taught that the Spine of Death being a place for necromancers to belong to is a lie. However, the party assured Mirth that, unlike Bloodstride, the other necromancers clearly believed in the idea of finding a place to belong, and they even showed Mirth a place like this in the form of Cloveway.
- Craighton is seen as a protegee in magic by Sage Anabelle, leaving the latter making the former her apprentice. However, Craighton grew tired and frustrated over having to identify magic items and inspecting things everyday. He only find enjoyment again when he served one of the nobles some tea that he brewed. This led Craighton to finally find new fulfillment in tea-making, and convinced him to quit his job despite his master's arguments that he would be wasting his potential in magic by abandoning it.
- Rottak is a talented bard that Renee met in Chester City. As Renee and the tavern patrons can attest, Rottak is an excellent dancer and has the looks to back it up. However, despite her talents, she is unable to get a role in the theater. And without the means to make enough money for her family, she is forced to work with the Protectors despite knowing their bad reputation.
- Rhushk Hookscales is one of the major leaders of the Protectors, an infamous mercenary group that claim to defend people for a price but are actually no different from thieves and exploiters. She admitted that she genuinely wanted to do better than being a thief, but she is treated as a criminal for just being an urchin. And with a family to fed and no other means to earn money, she is forced to be a criminal just as people judged her to be. She even lamented how society treats all urchins as criminals just as it treats all necromancers as villains, all because it wouldn't give them a chance to be something else and forces those people to be exactly how society viewed them to be.
- The reveal that Chandrelle is the true BBEG of the campaign is foreshadowed a lot.
- The trailer of Belkinus Necro Hunt show only two NPCs, Chandrelle and Bloodstride. At first, it seems like it was showing a member of the good guys and bad guys respectively. But it turns out, it was actually showing the Big Bad and The Dragon instead.
- Throughout the campaign the party finds pieces of Kara's research papers that slowly reveals the necromancer's motives: she wants to syphon the magic (and consequently the life) of other necromancers in order to gain enough power to master True Resurrection magic so she can resurrect her dead sister Abbigail. It makes for a great motive for a tragic and relatable villain. With the reveal that Kara isn't the Black-Vein Queen nor the leader of the Spine of Death, you can't help but question who is the true Big Bad... and then you realize that Kara's motives for wanting to resurrect Abbigail are a suitable motive for Kara's other sister... Chandrelle.
- It's strange that Chandrelle didn't know about the situation of her undead sister Abbigail. First off, it was revealed that it should be impossible to attempt to raise Abbigail because the deceased elf had been buried in a grave in a protected city like Belkinus Proper. And yet, somehow Abbigail was risen as a failed resurrection experiment without anyone noticing that her grave had been dugged up. Second, how did Chandrelle never found out that Thorne is her sister-turned-undead? If Thorne had been locked up in a prison and Chandrelle found out Banishment Crystals aren't effective towards Thorne, it's odd that the Viscount never found out Thorne's identity nor found out that Thorne was resistant towards Banishment Crystals due to being an undead. So, unless there's been some serious cover-ups by other people, it seems like Chandrelle herself may have been doing the cover-up.
- It's odd the Bloodstride was able to gather so much information and research on the party, especially Nathaniel, who had went to great lengths to hide his personal connections to Lancel. Even with portals, necromancers, and people whom he can manipulate (like the Protectors), it's disturbing how much he was able to dig up on the party. It makes more sense since Bloodstride got help from the Viscount of Belkinus herself on intel gathering.
- The BBEG transforming into an undead skeletal dragon is actually hinted thrice. In Session 2, a young boy named Edmund told the party that he wants to become a dragon. In Session 18, the kobold tribe believed that anyone can transform into a dragon if they become powerful enough. And in Session 20, this was again brought up when Bulwark made fun of Dorti's belief that kobolds can become dragons once they become stronger enough. So, what happened when a necromancer like the Black-Vein Queen absorbed too much power? She transforms into a dragon!
- In the trailer, one of the scenes is a piece of floating land above a dark abyss. This scene foreshadows the existence of Verteheim, the Spine of Death's headquarters and school, being in a dead world.
- The Stick of Stickiness of all things was also an act of foreshadowing. The stick was revealed to have come from another world... And later in the campaign, the party end up having to go into another world in order to investigate the Spin of Deah. Word of God even confirms that the Stick of Stickiness came from the same dead world as Verteheim.
- It's odd that Bloodstride didn't use any spells, not even Legendary Actions or Legendary Resistances, during the boss fight against him in the dead world. However, it makes more sense when you realize that Bloodstride must have exhausted most of his magic on ressurrecting an entire army of skeletons, including a skeletal Naga. In the end, he only had enough magic to repair the crystal once Nathaniel force him to do so via the Dominate spell.
- During the Grand Finale, Renee use a Divination spell to ask the fates "Is there any way to subdue Chandrelle in a way that optimizes on her weaknesses?" The answer she got was "Powerful mortal. Strong of Will. Strong of Mind. Strong of Body. Strong of Moral." One interpretation is that the fates were referring to the party (who are all 'powerful mortals'), who compose of Renee (Strong of Will), Nathaniel (Strong of Mind), Luna (Strong of Body), and Enoch (Strong of Moral).
- Renee represent Strong of Will because she is one of the most compassionate and strong-willed members of the party. She was the one who reached out to Kara the most during her boss fight and she even took over the Witch-Taker organization to take it down a better path.
- Nathaniel represent Strong of Mind because not only does he specializes in spells that mind control people, but he is also the brains of the party due to his detective work as the Witch-Taker.
- Luna represent Strong of Body because she is the only party member who fights in close combat and she is the strongest of the group as well as the sturdiest against attacks.
- Enoch represents Strong of Moral because he was The Fundamentalist who learnt to grow into being more open and more accepting to the Grey-and-Grey Morality, even learning to accept people he initially hates like Nathaniel and some necromancers.
