The Reward

 Last week's game session saw the players run through the Warlord's Vault. I based this on the Creations' Edge Games adventure of the same name. I kept the concept and the rewards but I came up with a new map and added magical summoned monsters rather than a bunch of monsters sitting in rooms waiting for the players.

One player has dropped out of our regular group. He noted that he felt the game rules were too bare-bones for his liking. But another player has been able to drop in more often so we still had three players.

I posted the map I created below. I have been using Blender to create all of the maps I use in Roll20. I find it gives it a pretty good look. The maps are 3D so I can also picture how the rooms are connected, and I can easily create images for Handouts or action shots.

My version of the Warlord's Tomb Map

As I noted I kept the rewards as written in the adventure. One issue with using published adventures is that the amount of magic items tends to be high. But I decided to leave them in.

Session 41: The Warlord’s Vault

Players: Lakima (Magic-user), Eathwund (Fighter), Alonso (Human Fighter), Domago (Human cleric NPC), Lantosh (Human Fighter NPC), Fenris (Human Thief NPC).

Eathwund and Domago spend the night in the Blue Dragon Inn in Caster’s Ford. In the morning at breakfast, they meet their friend Alonso who has ridden overland from Edgerton over the past two days to join them. Eathwund fills Alonso in on what has become of the group. The rest of the company is trapped behind a rockfall in the Temple of Medamellara in the Valley of Heroes.

The trio packs up and heads over to the Greenstone brother's shop where Otto Greenstone and his six dwarven brothers are waiting. The Dwarves load up a large metal wagon pulled by four oxen. The entire group head out of Caster’s Ford bound for the Valley of Heroes. Progress through the snow is slow as the oxen are not very fast

Meanwhile, at the Temple of Medamellara, the evening before Lakima, Moonshadow, and Lantosh take turns through the night keeping an eye on Fenris the thief. The silver dragon Lethnearinos has wandered off deeper into the temple looking for a suitable resting chamber. Earlier that day Lethnearinos had dug the front of the temple out. When Lakima and Lantosh wake they find Fenris is cooking breakfast over a brazier of hot coals. Moonshadow has vanished and taken her equipment and sleeping gear with her. Lantosh checks his pack and tells Lakima that the silver necklace they found on the wizard’s corpse is also gone. He says it loud enough for Fenris to hear. Fenris says, “Oh that? I picked her pack after I saw her lift it from your pack”. He holds up the necklace and tosses it back to Lantosh.

Seeing as Fenris had every opportunity to leave, rob them, or kill them in their sleep and did not, Lakima decides he can be trusted. He accepts Fenris into the adventuring company. For the rest of the morning, Lakima straightens up the library and workshop in the Temple. Lantosh stands to watch at the busted front doors and Fenris sticks close to the fire.

Around noon the two parties of adventurers meet up again. Eathwund and Domago are surprised to see that the debris has been cleared from the front of the temple. But they call out and Lantosh answers. The two groups exchange stories. Otto Greenstone and his brothers immediately set about inspecting the damage to the temple and taking measurements. Otto carefully makes notes in his journal. Throst Greenstone ventures deeper into the temple and comes running back yelling “Dragon, dragon!” All of the dwarves with the exception of Otto scramble for weapons (Otto yawns). Lakima quickly settles them down, explaining that the silver dragon is a friend and the new guardian of the Temple.

The dwarves and Lakima go over detailed plans for a few hours detailing changes to be made to the Temple. They agree on a price and a discount if the Company of the Black Dragon can clear the nearby Warlord’s Vault of a manticore problem. Lakima tells Fenris that they have an immediate job that will give him a chance to show his worth. The Warlord’s vault is a trap-filled dungeon protecting the treasures of the warrior Uther Grimwulf from unworthy recipients. The dwarves are responsible for the dungeon's upkeep but cannot do their work with a manticore in the entrance chamber. The Company of the Black Dragon set out immediately for the Warlord’s Vault further up the Valley of Heroes. The dwarves set out with them but quickly fall well behind. The next day they arrive.

A large statue of a wolf rests in the snow outside the entrance to the vault. A huge pair of bronze doors that once protected the vault lie on the ground in the entrance. Lakima tells Fenris to scout ahead. The scout moves forward into a large octagonal chamber. A fifteen-foot tall stone statue of Uther Grimwulf dominates the chamber. To his left, he sees a collapsed wall into a room beyond. Ahead are two closed bronze doors with no handles. Fenris motions everyone forward. They quickly deduce that the manticore is in the side chamber beyond the rubble. Eathwund and Alonso move to flank the opening. Fenris readies his heavy crossbow. As light from Lantosh’s lantern and Lakima’s staff is cast into the chamber they hear a large beast getting to its feet. Then the manticore lets out a roar and comes into view. Fenris fires first and the iron bolt thuds solidly into the manticore’s chest near the heart. Blood sprays onto the floor and the beast rears up on its hindquarters. Alonso casts a spear and misses. Then draws his two-handed sword and advances. Eathwund closes on the manticore and strikes it with his flaming sword. The manticore desperately slashes out at Eathwund with its claws but Eathwund gets his shield up and blocks the attack. Then the manticore fires a spray of spikes from its tail. A few strike Eathwund’s shield and one flies true and strikes Lantosh in the chest. Alonso and Eathwung both attack from opposite flanks with their swords and strike the manticore down. The beast cries out and topples to the stone floor.

Alonso, Eathwund, and Fenris check through the manticore’s nest of leaves, branches, and gnawed human bones. They find some gems, a scroll case, a full potion bottle, and a battleax. Eathwund offers the battleax to Alonso but he shakes him off, “I prefer a sword, thank you.” So Eathwund gives the two-handed battleax to Lantosh.

Their mission accomplished, the group pauses in the chamber while Domago cares for Lantosh. Lakima suggests they try to defeat the tests of the Vault. Several magic weapons that were the property of the hero Grimwulf are rumored to lie in the vault. The group decides to take the test of the Vault. Lakima carefully examines the walls and after a lengthy check finds no fewer than five secret doors. He waves Fenris over and asks him to check the door on the north wall. Fenris declares the trigger for the door safe and depresses it. A stone door slides back into the wall revealing a large chamber with a fountain. Everyone enters the room and approaches the fountain. The walls are painted with frescoes depicting a human hero saving a merfolk town from a sea serpent. The hero is given a statue of a mermaid by the merfolk after saving them. The statue in the frescos looks like the statue of a naked mermaid standing in the dry fountain. Fenris spots a riddle written on the edge of the fountain’s basin:

Three lives have I. Gentle enough to soothe the skin, Light enough to caress the sky, Hard enough to crack the rock.

The heroes debate the meaning of the riddle and Fenris examines the statue and the fountain closely but finds no clues. Lakima pours some water from his waterskin into the basin. As soon as the bottom of the basin is covered in water they see a silver key appear in the water. Fenris reaches out and picks up the key. It is a simple, flat silver key with a Moon Rune engraved upon it. Fenris heads over to the doors but sees that there is no keyhole. Lakima suggests that they try another secret door.

Fenris opens another secret door and this time they see a much smaller chamber. A short hall leading to a stone block upon which rests a blue cloth. On top of the cloth is a silver key. Lakima and Fenris both say, “that looks like a trap!” at the same time. Fenris approaches the key carefully. The other delvers wait in the main chamber. Lakima calls out to Fenris to use a thread to pick up the key. Fenris nods and produces a silver thread. But he is unable to get the thread under the flat edge of the key. He reaches over and picks up one edge of the key and slips the thread through the end. Just then there is the sound of a thunderclap in the main chamber. The heroes in that chamber spin about to look at the source and see a flaming, humanoid, figure striding towards them. The creature looks like a humanoid figure engulfed in flames.

Fire Phantom

Eathwund is closest to the figure and he swings and hits it with a solid slash with his sword. He feels the sword impacting a solid object like a body but no injuries are visible. Alonso rushes over and swings as well but misses, Eathwund also misses on his second strike. Domago and Lantosh fire sling bullets missing wildly. Fenris fires and hits the creature with an iron bolt. The creature swings repeatedly at Eathwund with flaming fists but Eathwund manages to keep his shield between him and the strikes. The creature extends a hand and blasts Eathwund with a bolt of flame. Then Alonso and Eathwund both strike the creature one after the other and its flames go out. The creature staggers and crashes to the floor, a blackened cinder.

Fenris shows Lakima the second key, the rune of a cup is engraved upon it. Lakima tells everyone that the next door will likely have another guardian. Fenris opens another secret door and again sees a small chamber with a stone stand and a key. Fenris grabs the key and there is another crack of sound. Appearing 10 feet off the ground flapping wings of ice is an Ice Drake. The creature rears back and lets out a high-pitched cry. Lakima yells at everyone to get back and then he casts a fireball on the creature. The creature melts and rains down on the floor completely disappearing.

Fenris tells everyone that the third key has the rune of a sword upon it. Eathwund suggests that they battled fire and water. The next creature may be earth. Everyone nods. Lakima asks if the runes could signify the suits in a deck of cards. Fenris agrees - but notes it is more like a tarot suit. Lantosh points out the bas-relief carvings on the walls. They depict Uther Grimwulf’s many heroic deeds. Near the door to the fountain, he can be seen negotiating with a mermaid, fighting fire elementals near the door leading to the second key, fighting a White Dragon near the door to the third key. The next secret door shows him fighting a four-armed demon. Lakima tells Fenris to open the next door. The scout does and again there is a small room with a key. When he lifts the key there is a thunderclap and a nine-foot-tall, four-armed stone gargoyle appears next to Lantosh and Domago. The creature immediately attacks the two startled adventurers with a flurry of attacks. Clawing with all four arms, rearing back, and attempting to gore them with a single horn on its forehead. Lantosh is in fact clawed twice and then gored directly in the chest with the horn. He slides to the floor in a heap, unconscious. Eathwund and Alonso rush over to defend their fallen friend while Domago drags his body to safety. Lakima hurls his magic dagger at the gargoyle striking it in the back. Then he hits it with his Staff of Striking. Eathwund slashes the gargoyle repeatedly with his sword - which reverberates in his hands as it strikes the stone. His blow slashes into the chest of the gargoyle and it breaks apart and collapses. Domago does a prayer of healing over Lantosh and manages to revive him. Lantosh weakly gets to his feet. It is clear he will not be able to continue to fight. Lakima checks his pack but finds he has no more healing potions. Alonso comes over and hands Lantosh a healing potion and Lantosh drinks it recovering much of his wounds. He thanks Alonso.

Fenris opens the last secret door that Lakima had found. Inside is another small chamber. A stone display covered with a blue cloth rests at the far end. But there is no key! Fenris rushes forward and carefully checks the display. Patting the surface checking for an invisible key. Nothing is found. Lakima suggests that maybe some other adventurers found the key and they will find it further in the vault. He walks over to the bronze doors and gives them a shove. The doors do not move. The hinges are rusted solid.

It takes Alonso, Domago, and Eathwund working together to push one door open far enough to step through. Beyond is a long hallway. But every ten feet the hallway is blocked by a translucent barrier of prismatic energy. To either side of each barrier are alcoves. In each alcove rests a strange, short stone statue holding a shield and sword. Fenris examines a metal post in the center of the barrier and tells everyone that there is a keyhole with a diamond rune above it. They now have keys with a mace, moon, cup, and sword rune. But no diamond rune. Lakima examines the barrier closely and becomes convinced it is made of prismatic energy and will be deadly to touch. They are at a loss as to how to proceed.

Prismatic Walls

Heading back into the chamber, Lakima leads everyone over to the manticore’s chamber. Spending some time putting the busted stones back into a pattern to show the ruined bas relief they find it depicts Uther fighting a band of trolls. Lakima suggests that the key must be in the chamber somewhere. Since they have searched everywhere he suggests searching inside the manticore. Eathwund takes his sword and slices the belly of the manticore open. Entrails spill out onto the stone floor. Slicing open the stomach he spots a silver key. Fenris cleans it off and proclaims that it is marked with a diamond rune - the key they were looking to find. Going back to the barrier Fenris uses the key and the barrier vanishes. But he cannot pull the key back out of the lock so they leave it in. Ahead of them is another barrier and two more statues. Lakima examines the statues but they are inanimate as far as he can tell. He tries moving one but it is massively heavy and does not budge. Fenris calls out that the next barrier lock has a Moon rune. He uses the key and another barrier disappears. But there is another barrier before them. Fenris checks the keyhole and exasperatedly says, “we need a key with a sun rune!” They do not have this key.

Everyone heads back to the main chamber to take a rest and debate where the next key could be hidden. Alonso and Eathwund lift up the fallen bronze doors at the entrance but find nothing underneath. After a lengthy pause, Lakima checks the chamber that had no key in it at all. He yells out, “A secret door!” Fenris comes over and checks for traps and then opens the door. A short, narrow hallway is revealed. It looks undisturbed for ages. The hall ends in a dead-end so everyone checks the walls and floor for secret doors or levers. Lantosh finds one along the south wall and Eathwund finds one at the dead end. They decide to open the south one first. Inside Fenris sees a small crypt. A stone coffin rests on the floor. As they watch, four small braziers burst into blue flame lighting the chamber. Five hooded statues with heads bowed surround the tomb. On the iron surface of the tomb rests a silver key.

The Sun Key

Lakima asks Eathwund and Alonso to follow him into the tomb to protect him. Then he reaches out and picks up the key. At first, they do not hear anything - then one statue in a dark corner begins to move. It lifts its head and the robe falls away to reveal a creature with the lower body of a serpent and the upper body of a woman. Her face is hideous and she has snakes writhing in her hair. Everyone immediately looks away as the medusa steps into the light. Alonso and Eathwund avert their eyes and swing wildly with their swords but miss completely. Lakima reaches into his pack and pulls out a small, metal mirror. He hears the medusa recoiling from him and stepping toward Eathwund. Eathwund puts up his shield and blocks the creature away. Fenris reaches into the chamber with his crossbow and fires blindly but misses. The medusa stands beside Eathwund looking upon him but does not directly attack. Lakima tries calming it down but it just hisses at him. Lakima casts Phantasmal force and makes an enormous mirror appear between Eathwund and the medusa. The creature backs away into a dark corner. Lakima yells, “everyone out!” and all three run from the chamber. They immediately shut the secret door and Fenris grabs a mallet and some iron spikes to attempt to jam the door shut. Everyone steps back from the door and waits but nothing happens. Fenris heads down to the dead end and opens the secret door. He finds it leads back into the hall of barriers. Lakima takes his small mirror and mounts it on the wall facing the secret door into the small tomb.

Lakima hands the silver key to Fenris and says, “the sun rune”. Fenris nods and uses it in the barrier. Another wall falls. Ahead they see another wall, using the mace rune they lower it. Than the Sword rune key to lower another wall. Finally, they are before a final wall. On the other side, they can see a large chamber bathed in blue light. The final key is marked with a cup rune. The barrier drops. Lakima tells everyone to be cautious he expects more monsters.

The heroes fan out into the large chamber. A large tomb dominates the center of the room. False moonlight spills in from illusions on the wall designed to look like windows. They see six display stands. On each stand rests an object. A sword, a suit of plate mail armor, a shield with a lion image upon it, a necklace with a medallion, a helm, and a plain leather bag.

The Reward

Alonso reaches out and picks up the helm. Immediately, the illusion of a helm replaces the object he has taken. He places the helm on his head and feels more powerful. Once everyone sees that nothing bad happens to Alonso they all pick items off the displays. As each item is picked up an illusion of the item replaces it. Eathwund picks up the armor, Lakima takes the necklace, Fenris takes the bag and discovers it is an empty bag of holding, Lantosh takes the shield but decides to give it to Domago. Domago takes the shield and suddenly a Lion appears beside him. The lion nods to Domago. In shock, Domago takes off the shield, and the lion vanishes. Lantosh takes the sword and puts it in a sheath over his shoulder. After one last check around the chamber, the group heads back toward the entrance.

As they step outside they see it is late afternoon. Coming toward them they see the Greenstone brothers on their enormous iron cart. Otto Greenstone hails them. “I see you have succeeded where many have failed” Lakima and Eathwund nod. “Tell me, did you find the diamond-rune key?” Lakima tells Otto it was in the Manticore’s stomach. The old dwarf laughs, “that is why we could never find it”. The dwarves explain that they were paid to maintain the Vault after each foray by adventurers but the manticore prevented them from doing their jobs. Now that the treasures have been taken from the vault - it was their employer's wish that it be turned into a memorial tomb. They will remove the traps and set up the tomb for safe viewing. One dwarf carves a message above the entrance, “The treasures are gone but the hero remains.” The dwarves thank the heroes and set to work on the vault. The heroes mount up their horses and Lakima allows Fenris to ride with him. They set out for the Temple of Medamellara again and arrive early the next day.

Sewer Map

This past weekend the players descended into the sewers - finally. This part of the campaign has been ready to go for four sessions but the players have been avoiding it. I believe because they were concerned about a fight on the Rat King's home ground.

I have been struggling with the right way to map the sewers. At first, I had a compact portion of the sewers mapped with the Cheese Factory Cellar and the Rat King's Lair. To prevent the players from wandering off the map I blocked the passages with narrow pipes connecting sections. Assuming the players would not want to submerge in sewer muck.

In the lead up to enter the sewers in a previous session, one player character became obsessed with finding an entrance to the sewers across town from the Cheese factory at the river. This despite their having seen an entrance in the factory. I had one of his informants show another manhole style entrance near the Factory. But he still showed interest in the river.

To cover this eventuality I came up with a map of the entire sewer network under the town. This was too big a map to load into Roll20 so I had it split up into nine pieces. But I felt this was a terrible move logistically. So I ended up creating one enormous, detailed map. Rather than loading it into Roll20 as is, I reduced the size to only 10%. The end result was of manageable size but blurry. So I took snap-shots of the key areas at full resolutions as battle maps.

In the end, the players used informants to find the location of the Rat King's Lair in the sewers and they did not spend much time on the map I spent all week working on. Oh well.

The final battle with King Rat occurred which closed out a long-running villain in the campaign. I wrote up King Rat as an intelligent Giant Rat of enormous size. With three attacks there was a good chance he might be a troublesome foe. In the session, the fighter ended up one-on-one with the Rat King for 4 rounds. He should have been mauled. For three rounds I managed 1 hit on three attacks per round. Finally, in the fourth round, the Rat King hit 3 times and almost killed the fighter. It lacked the punch I was hoping for but I think it was just bad rolls.

The session this week had another new Player. So I had five players in total and three NPCs to handle. We did have a few moments where more than one player talked at once. But it worked out okay.

Session 27: Lair of the Rat King

Players: Lakima (Magic-user), Eathwund (Fighter), Carric (Elven Thief), Grimble (Human Fighter), Kal the Bear (Human fighter), Domago (Human cleric NPC), Lantosh (Human Fighter NPC), Dag Icefoot (Dwarf Fighter NPC).

As the session opens Lakima states his intention to question the wererat that he charmed in the fight at the Cheese Factory and turned over to the Watch. Grimble says he would like to come along. Everyone else is busy watching the hippogriffs or at other places in town. Lakima and Grimble arrive at the Watch Station and ask to see the prisoner. Sergeant Frans takes them to see Grendel Orfman. Lakima tells him he meant the wererat Kirnon. Sergeant Frans tells them the wererat was taken to the castle and tried. He is due to be executed tomorrow. They do ask Grendel some questions but he has nothing to add. They head over to the Castle (Edger’s Hold) and get permission to question the wererat prisoner. The guard tells them that the man is crazy, always talking to himself. As they approach the cell in the dungeon they do hear a one-sided conversation. Once they enter the cell it is clear that Lakima’s charm spell is still holding. The man is happy to see him and tells him that he was just talking to a giant rat sent by the Rat King. They are planning on getting him out. Unfortunately, the wererat also does not know King Rat's location. He took orders from a cleric called Nat. Lakima tells the guard to move the wererat to a new cell that is not so far underground. 

Sometime later with most of the order back at the Chapter House, they begin to plan. Lantosh heads out to relieve Eathwund. At the hippogriff wagon, Eathwund is approached by a powerfully built human with a large sword on his back. The man introduces himself as Kal and says he is a mercenary looking for work. Despite the company being fairly full of hirelings, Eathwund offers the stranger a job. Lantosh shows up and Eathwund shows Kal to the Chapter House.

Kal is introduced to the other heroes and given some background on their encounters with the Rat King in Edgerton. They begin discussing ways to find the location of the Rat King. The idea is to wait for the Rat King to attack and follow them back to his lair. As they talk a man comes to the shop. He introduces himself as Dakuya and he is interested in buying all four of the hippogriffs. He offers 800 gold each. Lakima leads the negotiations for the team and negotiates the price higher. Then the merchant Simion Torenescu enters and offers more for the hippogriffs. The two merchants, who seem to know each other, set off a bidding war. Just when it appears Torenescu has won the bidding an old wizard named Arturas enters the shop and offers 3,500 gold for one hippogriff. Lakima tries to spin this in their favor but Simion is determined to get all four. Baron Lucien Vorloi enters and bids on behalf of the Castellan of Edgerton but is quickly out of the running. After much haggling, they settle on selling one hippogriff to the wizard for 3,500 gold, and the other three to Simion Torenescu for 6,000 gold. Simion Torenescu arranges for the delivery of a promissory note for the payment. He agrees to pick up the hippogriffs before noon on the next day. Arturas pays in gold immediately that he takes out of what is clearly a Bag of Holding. He also gives Lakima a wooden stick claiming it is magical. As they head over to the square to get the hippogriff for Arturas they find an altercation has occurred. Some thieves tried to distract Lantosh and the Watch guard and make off with a hippogriff. Lantosh stopped them and struck one of the thieves. Unfortunately, he killed the thief so they cannot question him. The watch has just arrived to take Lantosh's statement. The senior guard tells Lakima that he recognizes the man, he is a member of a local gang that hangs out at Fleetwing Stables in Mirdton district.

The next day Carric goes over to the low market and his contact Maik tells him one of the urchins has seen what they think is the Rat King’s Lair. The boy leads Carric into the sewers and shows him the directions to the lair. The heroes leave the hirelings to guard the house and the wagon of hippogriffs and head over to Fleetwing Stables to have a talk with the local gang. They surround the small stable. Lakima casts Monster Summoning and four giant rats appear. The rats are sent into the stables and soon the sound of fighting is heard. Eathwund rushes in and sees three armed men fighting off the rats. Lakima casts sleep and all of the three men fall asleep. Carric, Kal, and Grimble burst through the back door of the stable and confront a fourth man who surrenders. Under questioning and some duress, the man admits to targeting the wagon of hippogriffs. They would not normally mess with the Company of the Black Dragon but the pay was good. He admits that the merchant Dakuya paid them to do it.

Everyone returns to the Chapter House as it is now early evening. The night passes uneventfully. The next day Lakima splits up some of the gold received from Arturas. Dag Icefoot returns from his partying and shows them his new Dwarven Axe. Kal takes some money and heads over to a local armory where he buys a suit of chainmail.

They make plans to enter the sewers. They decide to do it in daylight hours. They calmly open a sewer grate in a small square in full view of many locals and all eight heroes descend an iron ladder down into the sewers. The sewers are a 15 in diameter brick-lined tube. A channel in the center of the bottom carries water and sewage. Dry platforms are along the walls.

Carric leads them for a long walk underground to the side passage that is supposed to hold the Lair of King Rat. He scouts ahead and spots a barrier of wooden crates. Behind the crates are two wererats. The group decides on a frontal approach. The charge forward to the barrier. The wererats and some giant rats behind the barrier are well protected. But Dag, Lantosh, Grimble, and Kal leap up on the crates and attack the wererats. One wererat whistles and a horde of normal rats pile out cracks in the walls and swarm the barrier. They overwhelm and knock Dag into the sewage. Lakima casts Sleep but only a few rats are affected. Lantosh takes a hit from a sword but Kal, Eathwund, and Carric press the attack. Lakima then casts Lightning bolt and fries all of the normal rats and burns one Wererat slightly. From there the battle turns and the rats and wererats begin to fall. The last wererat retreats into a narrow side tunnel. The heroes follow but find they can only advance in a single file. Ahead they see another corridor entering and at the end of the passage is a portcullis which is down barring further progress. Carric finds himself in the lead and fighting the wererat desperately. A giant rat appears and attacks as well. Carric manages to kill the wererat using his sword. The giant rat is killed by Eathwund.

Carric checks the side corridor and finds a small room with a table, some stools, and a pair of crates. Ahead Eathwund spots the Rat King. The Rat King is an enormous 20-foot-long, 8-foot tall rat. As they approach the portcullis, the giant rat speaks to them. Inviting them in. The portcullis rises up and King Rat invites them in to talk, calling out Eathwund and Lakima by name. The Rat King dismisses Lakima’s question about his helping the necromancer Talmea. That was just business he states. They can now do business together.

They cautiously enter the chamber and see King Rat, an enormous rat resting on a mound of green, pulsating cheese. They also spot a huge pile of gold coins. Near King Rat is a human whom King Rat refers to as Nat in their conversation. The chamber is divided by an 8 foot deep, 4 ½ foot wide channel through which sewage runs. As Lakima and Eathwund keep King Rat talking they try to form a plan. The channel is too far for Eathwund to leap in plate mail armor. Lakima comes up with an idea. He sends Kal back to get the wooden table in the nearby chamber. After a quick discussion, Kal drops the table with one end leaning over the channel, Grimble steps on the table to keep it steady and then Eathwund rushes across the table and leaps for the other side. Eathwund lands directly in front of a startled Rat King in a pile of gold, silver, and copper coins. Kal follows Eathwund but he is a little short on his jump and he hits the far wall and falls into the channel. Then Lantosh runs and jumps but trips over a table leg and the entire table and Lantosh tumble into the channel. Grimble leaps aside just in time to avoid being catapulted into the channel with them.

On the other side, the human cleric casts a spell on Eathwund but it fails. Eathwund strikes at King Rat cutting him. The giant Rat bites and claws at Eathwund. Eathwund manages to stave him off with his shield. The cleric Nat casts another spell and appears to glow bluish slightly. Lakima casts Atanzabar’s Acrid Finger and burns Nat. Dag attaches his grappling hook to the portcullis and throws a rope down to Kal and Lantosh. The two men climb out of the pit. Eathwund continues to trade blows with the Rat King, all alone in his fight. The cleric, Nat tries to run away from the stream of acid coming from Lakima but the stream just follows him around. Dag hurls his grappling hook across the channel and it wraps around a pillar on the other side. He ties the other end to the portcullis and Lantosh shimmies across the pit to the other side.

Eathwund is now struck repeatedly but the Rat King and is badly hurt. Domago crosses the channel on the rope, runs to Eathwund, and casts Cure Light Wounds. Lantosh tries to attack the huge rat with his polearm but misses. Lakima’s acid stream finally kills the cleric who tumbles into the pit and lands face down in the sewage, unmoving. Eathwund finally finds an opening and slashes out the giant rat's throat. He is covered in blood and gore but the Rat King is dead.

The heroes take a moment to check the chamber. They find more than 40,000 coins but most of them are copper. They start bagging it anyway. Eathwund makes note of the giant, pulsating cheese but decides not to take a sample. They search the cleric’s body, finding his mace and a scroll tube.

Heroic Maps Black Mountain Hideout

I needed a map for my online campaign for some caves under a hill on which a cenotaph stood. I did not have time to create one in Blender so I purchased one of the VTT maps put out by Heroic Maps. They are really good quality and they include a version designed for VTT play. I made a couple of really minor changes to the map to fit my needs but otherwise, I used it as is and quickly wrote an adventure around it.

I think I still prefer creating my own maps but when you are in a pinch for time this works. Also, they serve as good inspiration. They do not come with any notes - you just look at the map and decide what will fit it. I used it for Session 22 of my Swords & Wizardry online game using Roll20.

Session 22: The Necromancer

Players: Lakima (Magic-user), Eathwund (Fighter), Carric (Elven Thief), Domago (Human cleric NPC), Crispin (Human Magic-user NPC).

Last time the players journeyed to the standing stones known as the Nine Men, ostensibly to deliver the wizard Malyn and the Black Ring to a person claiming to be his former mentor and Necromancer Mourne. The players are taking part in a double-cross bringing an imposter and a fake ring.

The players leave their hireling Nash with the horses and mules and descend down large stone steps in a tunnel under the hill on which the Nine Men stand. It actually appears to be more than five adventurers, the wizard Lakima has four Mirror images with him. At the bottom of the steps is a wooden double door that is barred on the opposite side. Carric uses a metal file from his thieves’ tools to push the bar up and out of the way. It clatters to the ground. The doors creak open revealing a charnel pit. Human and humanoid bones litter the stone floor of a cave. The walls are dark grey and covered in soot. A bubbling tar pit in one corner of the cave. Lakima tells young Cedric to use the Mirror Image Scroll he gave him. Cedric uses the Scroll and two more images of Cedric appear. He also asks Cedric how the black ring works. Cedric tells him he can animate the dead.

Moving past the bones they come to another wooden door. This one is a single door and it is held closed by a simple latch. Carric listens at the door and hears tar bubbling on the other side. Opening the door they see a long tunnel leading to another door at the edge of their sight. Two tar pits bubble in the chamber. As they watch a bubble in one pit burst and sprays hot tar over a 15-foot area. The group confers and Lakima and Carric agree they will wait for a tar burst and then run past the pits. The plan works and they get past the bubbling tar that seems to burst at regular intervals of time.

At the next door, Carric listens and hears the guttural language of ogres. He warns everyone and steps back. Eathwund and Domago move to the front and shove the door open. They see a large cave. A group of three ogres is seated around a rough plank table eating what looks like a large turkey. A stack of barrels is located behind them. Carric quickly sneaks into the chamber and hides in the shadows. The ogres take no notice of the heroes, the noise of the door opening being masked by the bubbling tar pits.  Growing impatient, Lakima shouts at the ogres from the doorway. One turns to look and spots them. It shrugs and goes back to its food seemingly unconcerned with their presence (the ogres are used to the men working for the Necromancer coming and going and they cannot tell them apart).

Lakima shouts some more asking questions about the man they are chasing and about the necromancer. The ogre responds in simple common that it does not care and does not know of any necromancer. Carric steps out of the shadows and into the line of sight of the ogres. The ogres see the elf and  immediately jump to their feet, “Elves, you not friends, you food!”

The three ogres move to attack but there is only enough room for two of them to get at the heroes. Eathwund and Damago move forward to block the ogres. There is a flurry of blows and both Eathwund and Damago are hit by clubs wielded by the ogres. Eathwund staggers to one knee badly injured but he manages to stand and stay in the fight. Domago casts Bless and Lakima casts Strength on Eathwund. Still, the fight continues to go badly. Eathwund and Domago are hitting the ogres but the ogres are not weakening. Meanwhile, both of the heroes are getting pummeled. Lakima casts Lightning Bolt and both Ogres in the fight are burned and fall dead. The third ogre is badly burned and turns to run shouting at the top of its lungs as it approaches a door leaving the cave. At this moment Carric leaps out from the shadows and stabs the ogre from behind killing it. The ogre's lifeless body topples to the floor in front of the door. Eathwund moves up to the door.

Carric listens at the door. He hears heavy footprints approaching. He reports this and the door is yanked open. A pair of surprised ogres are standing on the other side of the door. One of the ogres says something and then glances down at the dead ogre at Eathwund’s feet and the bloody sword in his hands. The ogre roars and ducks beneath the door lintel attacking Eathwund.

Eathwund manages to hold the single ogre in the doorway. The second ogre is unable to attack. But only Eathwund has room to get in the fight and it starts to go badly for Eathwund. Eventually, Eathwund manages to press the fight to the ogre and it retreats into the next cave. The second ogre can now get into the fight and it moves up. Both Eathwund and Domago are able to get onto the attack. Carric dashes up and spears the ogre while Lakima throws darts. Both ogres fall dead. By now the heroes are all badly injured and Eathwund has to consume a pair of Healing potions.

The group splits up and searches the chamber but they find only stolen human supplies. Nothing of real value. They head north into another chamber with bubbling tar pits. The incessant smoke starts to get to their eyes making vision difficult. Carric opens another door and sees another cave with a bubbling pool of tar in the center. They decide to turn and go another way. Carric leads the way down the tunnel and steps on a tarp covering a pit trap. As the tarp tears and drops him into the pit, he manages to grab the edge and pull himself up. Carric climbs out of the pit and makes his way to another door. Listening at the door he hears movements and the rattling of chains. The rest of the heroes skirt around the pit in the floor and stand by this door. Carric opens the door and they see a small cave. In the cave are seven animated skeletons. Some of the skeletons are manacled to the wall with chains. Domago tries to turn undead and a few of them run from his sight. Others attack but Eathwund makes short work of them. All of the skeletons are destroyed by Eathwund with some help from Domago. Lakima and Carric have a discussion and convince themselves there must be a secret door in the chamber but they are not able to find any sign of one.

Since this appears to be a dead-end, the group heads back to the door leading to the chamber that was filled with thick smoke from a tar pit. Two more exits leave this chamber. Carric spots something shiny on the other side of the tar pit and goes to investigate. He finds an unsheathed longsword that is strangely clean with no sign of rust. The hilt of the sword has been shaped with the form of an unlidded eye on both sides. Cedric offers to cast Detect Magic and does so. He detects that the sword is magical, both improving the welder's skill and some sort of hidden watchfulness.

They head to the right and open a wooden door into a small cave that is clear of smoke and refreshingly cool. Eathwund checks the floor and finds some tracks made by a man who was running. They take the time to rest in this chamber and those whose eyes were red and sore manage to recover. Once the rest is over, they head north through another door. They enter another cave with a bubbling tar pit. The wall to their far-right is bricked up with stone blocks. Carric is immediately suspicious and locates a secret door but he cannot figure out how to open it. Everyone searches for a trigger with Lakima finding a floor stone that can be depressed. The stone wall slides open to one side.

Carric motions for everyone to wait and then silently, and carefully moves into a hallway beyond. The passage is man-made with stone block walls and floor. On the floor, he spots metal chaos symbols that he is immediately suspicious of and warns the others. Then he sees a tripwire crossing between two stone skulls on either wall about one foot above the floor. Carric points it out to the other adventurers still waiting at the secret door. He continues down the hallway and spots another tripwire. Just then two men emerge from around a bend in the hallway and fire arrows at Carric, missing.

Eathwund charges down the hallway to Carric’s defense and Carric retreats toward the secret door. Unfortunately, Eathwund’s sword sheath snaps one of the tripwires, and a gout of flame blasts both he and Carric. Still, a burned Eathwund manages to reach the two men and attack. One of the men appears to be a tall warrior and the other looks like the man they chased from the stone circle on the hill above. The warrior moves forward and strikes Eathwund with his sword. Eathwund groans and falls to the floor unconscious. Domago and Carric race forward to defend their fallen companion followed closely by Lakima. While Carric keeps the warrior at bay, Domago pours his last potion of healing down Eathwund’s throat reviving the fighter. Carric stabs the other man and that man turns and runs away. The warrior yells, “Kert, get back here!”

Eathwund and Domago move in on the man but he backs away. As they follow around the turn in the hallway they see the smaller man has returned and is helping the injured man. Domago and Eathwund advance on them. Seeing that he cannot get away, the injured warrior pushes the man he called Kert away and tells him to flee, “I will hold them, get help!”

Kert vanishes down a side passage and a door can be heard opening. Domago and Carric try to get around the wounded warrior but he blocks them. So with Eathwund they all attack the man and kill him. After the fight, Lakima tells Cedric to use the Black Ring on the man. Domago bristles with anger, “Blasphemy!” Cedric uses the ring anyway and animates the corpse of the warrior into a zombie. They send the zombie through the door that the man Kert had passed through. They do not find Kert in the room beyond but they do see five bedrolls, several crates of supplies, and a large traveling trunk. In the trunk, they find a lot of clothes and some basic weapons.

Carric moves to a door to the south and listens but hears nothing. He opens the door and they let the zombie pass through. Immediately, the zombie is blasted by a magic missile and collapses in a heap. Carric and Eathwund rush into the next room and come right on top of an older man wearing chainmail, holding a sword and a shield. Just behind the man is an old robed woman holding a staff. Nearby, they see a pair of wooden double doors and the man Kert before them. Before they can attack, the woman chants words of magic, and a sticky, almost impassable web fills the room trapping Eathwund and Carric. Domago tries to help and also gets trapped in the sticky strands. Standing in the doorway, Lakima casts Charm Person on Kert and convinces him to attack the old woman. The older man tries to stop Kert but the sneak thief gets past him and stabs the woman. Lakima also casts magic missiles at the woman from his wand. The old warrior attacks Eathwund who is caught up in the webs. Kert stabs and kills the woman and Lakima yells at him to attack the warrior. Kert turns and shouts, “Sure, I was just working for these guys” Lakima also goes around to the back of the webs and casts Aztazibar’s Acrid Finger. The stream of acid burns through the webs and strikes the old warrior. The warrior moves over to the double doors and pounds on them, “Talmea! Let me in. We are under attack out here!” But the doors remain closed.

Realizing the situation is hopeless, the old warrior drops his sword and surrenders. He volunteers little information about himself or who is beyond the doors. But Kert tells them it is the necromancer Talmea Pak on the other side of the doors. He also tells them that the older man is Bragor Stannon, the leader of a group of Adventurers from Makaar Mor. Searching the man they find some loot and a Writ of Adventuring issued by a Baron Raalston of Makaar Mor. The warrior they killed earlier, the old woman, and the old man also all have a strange black mark on the inside of their right wrists. Lakima asks Kert about it and the cheerful thief proudly shows them his unmarked wrist. Lakima asks Cedric to animate the dead body of the old woman. Domago looks shocked. But Cedric tells him he does not want to use up the Ring's charges on an old hag. Bragor looks at Cedric in surprise. “That is not the Black Ring! And you are not Malyn!” He yells it out through the door, “Talmea, they are imposters!” They decide to tie up Bragor and open the doors. Carric finds the doors are latched from the other side but he manages to jiggle the latch loose and open the doors.

The double doors open into a large chamber, a 20-foot square metal chaos symbol lies flat on the stone tiles in the center of the floor. Stone skulls decorate the walls. Several dark alcoves lead off from the chamber. On the other side of the chamber, they see a throne decorated with human skulls. The young woman they met at the standing stones sits on the throne smiling at them. The woman waves them into the room. “Welcome, I am Talmea Pak, and you are imposters!” Cedric winces on hearing that. “You are not Malyn!” She points an accusing finger at Cedric. Cedric sort of half-waves and steps behind Domago.

Lakima steps into the center of the room and then accuses Talmea in turn. “You are not the Necromancer from the letter! So if we are all here on false pretenses we might as well go our own ways.”  Talmea considers this and smiles, “You may go. Leave immediately and unhand Kert and Bragor.”  Lakima tells Talmea that they could kill her. She laughs at his bravado and motions to his right, and an enormous black bear steps menacingly out of a darkened alcove and paces towards them. “Easy Chambra,” she says, “Now you see who is in danger here.”

Lakima agrees to withdraw, and they start to back out of the room taking Bragor with them. Kert races from the room and down the hallway. Then, Talmea casts a spell and the room is dropped into darkness. Only Eathwund is outside of the darkened area leading Bragor the prisoner. They hear the bear pacing through the darkness and a roar followed by a yell of pain from Domago. Lakima and Carric stumble out of the darkness into the hall. They see Eathwund and Bragor but Kert has vanished. Cedric and Domago do not appear at first. Then Domago stumbles from the darkness bleeding from a fresh claw wound to the shoulder. The heroes back away from the darkness, they can hear the bear thudding about in the dark. Lakima asks for a torch and Eathwund pulls one from his pack. Lakima lights the torch and waves both the torch and the Continual Light Staff into the darkness but both cannot penetrate the magical darkness. Just then the bear lunges out of the darkness. Eathwund races to block it from killing Lakima. Lakima drinks a potion of animal control and settles the bear. Lakima spends some time trying to give directions to the bear. He sends it back into the darkness to kill Talmea but nothing happens and it does not return.

Lakima shouts Cedric’s name a few more times and then gives up. The adventurers confer and decide to leave the dungeon. They head back to the secret door and find it closed but opening it from the inside proves fairly easy. They then make their way back through the caves and out into the sunlight. Even with the valley covered in smog, it is much brighter and clearer outside than in the caves. A short distance away, Nash is waiting with their animals, unharmed. He sees how battered and bleeding they are and nervously asks after Cedric. Lakima tells him Cedric was eaten by a bear. They put Bragor on a horse, still tied up, and then head out of the valley. On the way they see skeletons moving about aimlessly, no longer under control apparently. Lakima asks Bragor if the old woman controlled the skeletons but he shakes his head and says, “Talmea”.

On the ride out of the valley to a campsite, Carric talks with Bragor for a while. The man is now a little more forthcoming. He tells Carric he is part of an adventuring company from the Kingdom of Makaar Mor to the north. Carric learns that he is from the area beyond the Valen Peaks that is thought to be a wasteland full of undead. It is known as the Kingdom of the Ghouls to people on this side of the peaks. Lakima asks about the name and Bragor calmly talks about the rebirth as undead that comes to all people in Makaar Mor. The undead creatures live among them. All beholden to the King Lorrgan Makaar. Once they are out of the Valley they make camp. The sun is still well up in the sky but everyone agrees that a rest is needed.

Appendix A: Random Dungeon Generation

The first Roleplaying Game book I ever owned was a Christmas gift of the AD&D 1st edition Dungeon Master’s Guide in 1981.  I had never been part of a D&D game and had no background on it so I struggled to understand the DMG. I ended up learning by reading the Moldvay Basic rules. But in the back of the DMG, I found Appendix A: Random Dungeon Generator which I used to create my second dungeon (my first dungeon was a continuation of the Haunted Keep in the Basic rules). I posted the maps of the dungeon not that long ago and even rewrote it.

Being forced like most people to stay at home right now I got the impulse to try out the Appendix A Random Dungeon Generator to play the game solo. I actually decided to use the Swords & Wizardry Core rules which are a sort of simplified AD&D 1st edition.

I needed some heroes so I took four, first-level humans from the back of B1: In Search of the Unknown:

Farned of the Great Church (cleric 1)

Alho Rengate (Fighter 1)

Nickar (Magic-User 1)

Luven Lightfinger (Thief 1)

I had them all start at their maximum class hp because I know how brutal 1st level dungeons can be on OSR heroes. This turned out to be not enough.

The random dungeon generator is a series of tables that let you design and stock a dungeon. The tables come with very little explanation. The key table is the first one. Table I the Periodic check is the table you roll on whenever the heroes advance. It then directs you to more tables. These can be doors, corridors, chambers, rooms, traps, stairs to another level, or wandering monsters. Continue straight for 60’ is only supposed to come up 10% of the time but I seemed to keep getting this result so I ended up with a very long dungeon. For monsters, you are supposed to use random monster tables in Appendix C.

As I was playing solo I made some changes. The traps that came up I reduced the damage to 1d6. For the monsters, I reduced the number appearing to 2-4. I also ignored the “human” result on the monster table because it generates an adventuring party which is just too much work to put together. Instead, I just re-rolled on the table.

Everything started out pretty quiet for the four heroes. They traveled down a long, stone dungeon hall and had a minor mishap with a flaming oil trap. They did not find any rooms until their first encounter and they found no treasure. The first encounter against kobolds went well. They dispatched them easily. Then they ran into some shriekers (and in S&W the shriek causes damage) and ran in the other direction. The shriekers appeared to have alerted more kobolds because they encountered four more in a hallway. Again they managed to kill the monsters with only light damage.

Then they ran into trouble. They got by a pit trap because they now had Luven out in front. But they encountered a door and Luven did not hear anything on the other side. They opened the door, entered a room and were confronted with four goblins. Really, four goblins should not be that big of a problem. But the dice went cold. Farned, Alho, and Luven all missed. Nickar expended his one spell and killed a goblin with a magic missile. Now it was four against three. But the goblins fight desperately and on the first round, Alho and Farned who were in the front were both injured.

On the next round, everyone but Nickar missed again. And Nickar hit a goblin with a dart doing 1 point of damage. The goblins pressed their attack and both Alho and Farned were killed The next round Luven was struck and killed with a single blow. That left Nickar, who only had 3 hit points and no spells. There was no point in running so he attacked with his dagger and missed. The three goblins surrounded him and slashed him to the ground.  A total party kill.

Appendix A Map

My solo adventure debacle took about 2 hours to run and had four fights with monsters. Some of this time was spent drawing the map in paint.net. I did not use graph paper so the dungeon could grow in any direction to any size. Unfortunately, the entire party was killed. It was still fun, although I could see it getting boring if I ran this all of the time.  I would like to look at customizing the charts to remove some of the odd results, tone down the trap damage and increase the number of rooms. I would also like to come up with new random monster charts. These could be tailored for each adventure. So if you were entering a wizard’s lair you might have the wizard and his kobold guards and a few random dungeon creatures. I could even have a Finale room worked into the charts.

I did spend time online looking to see if anyone had taken these charts and turned it into a random dungeon maker. I did not find any.  Which is odd, I would have thought it was a natural for this. I do have some other rules systems that are similar. Darkfast Dungeons has a solo option and strikes me as being a little bit similar. But Appendix A gives you the opportunity to play D&D in a solo manner which is really great. It also can be used for its intended purpose which was to generate a dungeon for a DM for a regular tabletop game.

In Search of the Unknown

"WHO DARES ENTER THIS PLACE AND INTRUDE UPON THE SANCTUARY OF ITS INHABITANTS?" 

"ONLY A GROUP OF FOOLHARDY EXPLORERS DOOMED TO CERTAIN DEATH!"

TSR Adventure Module B1: In Search of the Unknown is an introductory module designed to help teach novice gamemasters. Back in the 1980s, just about everyone who played D&D had run it at some point because there were so few modules and because it was in the blue box version of the rules.*

I did not drop it into my B/X campaign until my player’s characters were around the 4th level so rewrote it more than most. But everyone rewrote B1 because it has the unique feature that most of the dungeon stocking was up to the DM. A list of 25 monsters and 34 treasures was made available for stocking the dungeon (not all of which was designed to be used) so everyone’s dungeon would be slightly different.

In the published In Search of the Unknown, the players find a map to the lair of a pair of famous adventurers of questionable reputation who are reputed to have died far to the north some time ago. Hints in the text suggest that their stronghold, Quasqueton, may have been abandoned up to three decades ago. All that remains now are some of the former inhabitants, human berserkers, orc slaves, and kobold slaves and creatures that have wandered into the caves.

When I ran the adventure using the B/X Moldvay rules in 1982 I stocked the dungeon for levels 3-6 (the original was for levels 1-3) and I had a background plot to make sense of the monsters that the players came across.

I also redrew the maps. I do not remember exactly why I bothered because looking at a copy of the maps now they are not a lot different.  I am posting my maps here.

My Version of Quasqueton

The big difference in the plot in my version was that the owners, Rogahn and Zelligar, had very recently returned. But in their absence, the stronghold had been overrun by Orcs belonging to a tribe the pair had been fighting in the north. The orcs trapped the pair in a magical vault in the cavern level of the stronghold. It was up to the player’s characters to discover that the pair had returned, what had happened to them, and how to release them.

Reading through my version of the adventure I am not very impressed. If I was to redo it now, and it occurs to me that I might, I would go back to something closer to the original plot. Perhaps the kobolds worked for Zelligar and the orcs worked for Rogahn. When their bosses disappeared the Orcs wanted to take over but the kobolds remained loyal and blocked access to the upper levels. Now the orcs use the lower level secret entrance as the main entrance (it is two way now). The orcs have been raiding the local valley and the players’ characters follow their trail up into the hills to the lower level entrance, not even aware that this was once Quasqueton. They have to fight past orcs and then kobolds to gain access to the best treasure in the upper level of the stronghold.

Perhaps it would make something interesting to run online now that we are all trapped indoors because of the pandemic. It would certainly be easy to write up.

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*I was lucky enough to purchase a copy of the 1979 printing in the 1990s when I bought a battered blue box version of the rules at auction.

The Blade of Bizhan

The Blade of Bizhan - an adventure using the Advanced Fighting Fantasy Rules

On the continent of Allansia in the foothills of the Icefinger mountains north of the town of Fang resides a tomb carved from black stone. It is known as the Tomb of Bizhan and appears on many treasure maps traded for silver in the taverns and back alleys of nearby towns and villages. The warlord Bizhan is a local legend. If he existed it was many years in the past. By reputation, he was a fearsome warrior. But he also has a cursed reputation as a man who killed friend and enemy alike.

Adventurers have returned from the tomb in the past. They report that it is fairly easy to enter. However, they were confronted with a featureless stone pit with no openings. Finding nothing, they could not confirm any of the legends about the tomb or for whom it was actually built.

One of the legends about the tomb is that it holds the legendary sword carried by Bizhan. The sword, the name of which has been lost to history, was known as a magical slayer of men.

I wrote this short adventure for the Advanced Fighting Fantasy rules. I sketched out the concept as I was reading and posting about the rules. But it took me a few months to actually finish the writing of the adventure. It would be suitable for starting adventurers. I placed it on Allansia from the published Titan setting but it could be easily placed just about anywhere.

The Stone Shaft in the Black Stone

The Black Stone

The Tomb of Bizhan is located in the foothills of the Icefinger mountains. In the winter months, the area is generally buried under a few feet of snow. In the spring the area is muddy and boggy in the low lying areas. But in the summer it is dry and easy to reach. However, the summer months also bring swarms of biting insects which make camping out in the area uncomfortable.

The black stone tomb is 5 by 6 meters in size and 5 meters tall. A large door on one side of the tomb can be slid aside to reveal a single chamber. In the center of this chamber is a 3-meter square stone shaft descending deep into the earth. The only light in the tomb comes from any light sources the adventurers bring with them. The entry chamber will be lit by natural light coming through the door as long as the door remains open.

Aside from the pit in the center of the chamber, there are four statues, 2 meters tall, one in each corner of the chamber. The statues are carved from a light grey stone and are fairly simple in construction depicting a man holding a spear. Despite looking ominous the statues are inanimate.

The shaft descends a total of 20 meters into the earth. The sides of the shaft are made from stone blocks with nearly invisible gaps between them. There are four doors in the side of the shaft, all at different depths from the main chamber floor. There is one door on each shaft wall. The doors are so well constructed they are hard to see. Players need to make an Awareness Special skill check to spot a door. One door is easily visible because it is propped open by a small brick. The space the door is cracked open is too narrow for an adult human to squeeze through.

The doors can be slid to one side fairly easily once they are noticed (Skill check). Each door is 3 meters square. Adventurers trying to access the doors in the shaft will need to use a rope to climb down to the doors. The walls of the shaft do not have enough handholds to allow climbing without a rope. Even with a rope it is a difficult climb. Adventurers need to make a Skill check every 5 meters they descend the rope. If they fail a check they do not move that turn. A double 6 fumble means they slipped and lost hold of the rope falling to the bottom of the shaft. A falling adventurer must test for Luck, with the score reduced by 1 for every 5 meters he falls. Acrobatics Special skill can improve this. If unlucky the adventurer will lose 1 Stamina point plus a number of points covered in the Falling Damage table.

North Tomb

The door to the north tomb entrance is slightly open. The door was blocked open with a small stone brick. The door is located 4 meters below the main chamber.

The door leads to a long hall which is 9 meters long and trapped with swinging blade traps. An Awareness check (roll 2 six-sided dice if the result is less than or equal to Skill) allows an adventurer to spot the trap. The trap is activated by stepping on the floor. Each trap is a large, ax blade that swings out of the ceiling and continues to swing for 1 minute before resetting. There are three blade traps located under three pairs of pillars holding up the ceiling of the hall. The first trap is 1 meter into the hall, the second is 4 meters and the third is at 7 meters.

If a trap is activated an adventurer must make a Luck check to avoid a trap. Also possibly the Dodge Special skill. The blade damage is as follows:

Dice Roll 1 2 3 4 5 6

Damage 2 3 3 4 4 5

The tomb at the end of the hall is entered through a stone archway. The chamber is 4 meters square and has a simple stone crypt in the center of the room. Against the east wall is an ornate mahogany chest. The chest is held shut with a simple latch. Inside the chest is a layer of sand and three gold coins partially obscured by the sand. The adventurers were beaten to this chest by earlier treasure hunters.

The large crypt appears undisturbed. A pry bar is needed to lift the lid off of the crypt. A skill check is needed possibly aided by the Strength special skill. Inside the crypt is a skeleton in tattered leather armour holding a sword. If the crypt is opened the skeleton will animate and attack.

Skeleton

Skill 6, Stamina 5, Attacks 1

Weapon Sword

Dice Roll 1 2 3 4 5 6 7

Damage 2 3 3 3 3 4 5

Skeletons have resistance to edged weapons they take only a single point of damage from edged or pointed weapons.

Opening a Crypt

East Tomb

The east tomb is 8 meters below the main chamber above. The door to the hall to the tomb is closed and hard to detect. But once it is detected it can be slid to one side. A short, 3 meters long, hall leads to an open archway. There are runs carved above the archway that state that the tomb belongs to Bizhan but the language is long forgotten.

Past the archway is a 4-meter square chamber. Along the north and south walls of this chamber are three standing sarcophagi. A total of six sarcophagi. Jutting out from the east wall is a closed stone crypt. The symbol of a crown is carved into the end of the crypt.

 In each sarcophagus, there is a skeleton armed with a sword. If a sarcophagus or the crypt are distrubed the skeletons will push the lids to their resting place aside and attack.

Skeleton

Skill 6, Stamina 5, Attacks 1

Weapon Sword

Dice Roll 1 2 3 4 5 6 7

Damage 2 3 3 3 3 4 5

Skeletons have resistance to edged weapons they take only a single point of damage from edged or pointed weapons.

In the Crypt is the desiccated corpse of a tall man. The bones can be seen in some places but the corpse has most of its skin and hair. The Corpse wears a simple band of gold on its head. The corpse holds an ornate sword in its right hand. A blade of dark metal and a gold hilt. The creature is a zombie of the corpse of Bizhan.

Zombie

Skill 6, Stamina 6, Attacks 1

Weapon Sword

Dice Roll 1 2 3 4 5 6 7

Damage 2 3 3 3 3 4 5
Zombies are particularly susceptible to damage from Holy water.

The sword that the zombie holds is not Bizhan’s blade. It is an ornate fake. The weapon is poorly balanced and gives a -1 to attack rolls. It is worth 200 gold coins.

West Tomb

Eleven meters below on the west wall is the closed door to the west tomb. Beyond the door is another short hallway (3 meters) leading a single tomb chamber (4 meters square). This chamber is different. There is no crypt. Instead, there is an enormous stone statue of a demon covering the west wall of the chamber. The statue’s head nearly touches the ceiling. The statue has the appearance of a seated, enormously fat humanoid with outstretched arms. The demon has large horns on its head and its hands are open and the palms are facing upward.

On the north wall is a carved frieze showing a human warrior losing a battle to his enemies. The human retreats to a cave and bows before a huge demon that looks like the statue in this chamber. In return for offerings the demon hands the human a sword.

The eyes of the statue are stone but seem to follow adventurers as they walk about the chamber. If the statue is touched, deep, rumbling laughter will be heard that appears to come from the statue. Everyone who hears the laughter must make a Luck save. Those failing the save must roll a 1d6. On a 1-2 they attack their fellow adventurers, on a 3-5 they stand still and are unresponsive, and on a 6 they have free action. The effect lasts 3 rounds.

If an offering is placed in either of the demon’s hands it will disappear and any adventurers currently suffering from the effects noted above will have it dispelled. If an offering of at least 100 gold is made to the statue, the Blade of Bizhan will appear in the demon’s hands.

The Blade of Bizhan, a sword of human-slaying doing double damage against humans.

South Tomb

The door to the south tomb hallway is 15 meters below the floor of the entrance chamber. Again there is a short hallway leading to an archway and a 4-meter square tomb chamber. In this chamber are two stone crypts. On the west wall is a mahogany chest and six, sealed clay jars. The chest is latched closed and can be easily opened. Inside is a pile of small gems. A total of 200 gems worth a total of 4,000 gold coins. The clay jars are sealed with wax. Inside are dried out human organs.

Like the other stone crypts, it will take a pry bar to open them. Inside the crypts are a pair of small corpses. The corpses appear to be those of children. Possibly a boy and a girl. The two corpses are actually ghouls.

Ghouls (2)

Skill 5, Stamina 5, Attacks 2

Weapon Claws

Dice Roll 1 2 3 4 5 6 7

Damage 2 2 2 3 3 3 4

If a ghoul makes a successful attack the victim must make a Luck save or be paralyzed and unable to take actions for 2 rounds.

The ghouls are the children of Bizhan who Bizhan killed with his Blade while in a fit of madness. Afterword he entombed himself alive in this place.

Map of the Tomb