Location: Harpy Point – Pirate Cove
Eventually, the party makes it out to the pirate cove, an abandoned smuggling port underneath Harpy Point. This is close to where this Old God holds dominion.
The sour smell of fermented seaweed assaults your nostrils as you enter the chamber. The boat shifts from a rough ride into a calm float, and you’re forced to paddle if you wish to move. Strangely dressed black lizard folk are loading crates into a ship that’s docked at the main dock.
The crates are the archaeological remains of an ancient civilization that the lizardmen have been unearthing under the sea. Think Atlantis. The goal is to remove all evidence of the ancient humans to solidify the old gods’ place in the world.
In the undersea, the party discovers demonic creatures in stasis, protected from the sea by bubbles. Here, they lie in wait, unaging, dimly seeing until they are awoken. What awakens them? Once they awaken, their full plan is revealed. What is it?
(this too is old, so we’ll have to go through it and update it as the story develops)
CURRENT NOTES:
possible encounters:
-colony of harpies
-colony of gargoyles / party of gargoyles – with some levels of f / s / r / rng ?
Posted in Uncategorized and tagged Horror of the Old Ones, Location by Stephen Hilderbrand with no comments yet.
Location: Thorp of Talook
Nestled at the foot of the Cyrűk mountains, the thorp of Talook’s stone hovels are visible for many miles down the road. Tiny plumes of smoke rise from each of the huts set close together for protection.
When the party arrives, the citizens are busy setting up a makeshift celebration to honor St. Zelnyeki the following weekend.
Population: 58
GP Limit (price of most expensive item available in thorp): 40gp
Ready Cash: 116gp
Power Center: conventional (Anna Červená), LN (with good tendencies)
Highest Level Locals:
Adept: 1st
Barbarian: 1st
Cleric: 1st – Caretaker of the tiny wooden chapel that is the spiritual center of the town.
Commoner: 5th
Expert: 5th
Figher: 4th – Orlay Petronova – older man, appointed by the Baron’s father as magistrate of Talook. Orlay supports Anna as the last legitimate authority for the region.
Monk: 1st – An ascetic who has taken a vow of silence and lives on the church grounds tending the communal gardens.
Ranger: 2nd
Warrior: 2nd
Posted in Uncategorized and tagged Horror of the Old Ones, Location by Stephen Hilderbrand with no comments yet.
Location: The Temple of the Freed Slave
This temple was founded many years ago by a former galley slave who became a worshiper and priest of Kord.
As a galley slave the ship he was rowing was breached and began to sink. As he and all the galley slaves began to be pulled under the frothy salty water the ship’s wheel, broken from it’s place, was pushed against his chest by the rushing waters. The wheel broke such that all that was left were eight of the spokes, in the shape of the holy symbol of Kord. The slave felt a sudden rush of strength and broke the chains dragging him and his rowing-mates to the briny deep. They floated on the wreckage until they washed ashore. Praising Kord for their freedom and their lives, the galley slave founded a temple on the spot.
Over the years the temple has become famous throughout the region because the priests of the temple will give sanctuary to any slave that comes to their temple. Many eventually join the clergy there, others eventually leaving, with help from the priests, to start new lives once they are no longer sought after.
Locations
1 Steps and Entrance
The huge open face of this temple is supported by strong marble pillars and looks our over the sea to the horizon. The sandy beach leads to large steps that rise to the huge chapel.
2 Hall and Exercise Room
This large room’s lofty ceiling is supported by large marble pillars. The sight, sound and smell of the unstoppable sea fill this hall from one end, while a wide set of steps lead up to a chapel to Kord, at the end of which light streams through stained glass windows, tinted red and gold.
Often this room is host to groups of worshipers, priests and slaves given sanctuary. They spend their time discussing the merits and philosophy of Kord and engaged in physical contests such as wrestling.
3, 4 Chapel (EL 10)
An open archway leads into a small serene chapel decorated with holy symbols and icons of various good deities. A life-sized bronze statue stands on a pedestal near the archway.
Creatures: Bronze Golems (1 or 2). These sentries guard the inner areas of the temple in the wings. If they detect strong evil in those entering they will leap down off their pedestals and seize the interlopers, wrestling them to the ground until the priests of the temple can come and decide their fate.
5, 6 Storage
Bags, barrels, crates and shelves hold the supplies of this temple.
7 Priest’s Offices
8 Requilary & Treasury
9 Novice’s and Guest’s Rooms
10, 11 Priest’s Quarters
12 Chapel
This chapel features a smooth altar to Kord carved from red-veined marble, with Kord’s wheel engraved on the front. Tall stained glass windows fill the back and sides of the room with a soft light. The windows depict the galley slave being granted the strength to save himself and his shipmates by the benevolence of Kord, their tenacity drifting on the open sea, and the founding of the temple on the sands, along with other scenes glorifying Kord.
Note: this temple is based on stories from the ancient greeks. The greek’s first historian retells the existence of a temple to Herecles which stood on the shores of Egypt that had the same policy of sheltering escaped slaves. As such it can be changed to suit your game world by dedicating it to whatever gods of strength or freedom you choose, or altering it in any other way.
Posted in Encounter and tagged Location by Adam A. Thompson with no comments yet.
Location: Castle Stieglitz – 2nd and 3rd floors and Cellar
2nd floor:
1 Hallway
The light makes a shifting patchwork on the floor as the party passes through the broad halls.
2-7 Quarters
The quarters are full of eight slashed beds. It appears that anything of value has already been removed from these walls.
8 Petry’s Room
A single small window looks out to the grounds at the back of the Steiglitz property. Like all the other areas inside this castle, the room has been completely looted. The mattress of the bed has been slashed open and its innards lie strewn across the floor. A chair lies on its side and the desk has several deep gashes as if struck by a handaxe or other small chopping tool.
9 Yevgeny’s Room
This room contains a large bed which has been turned on its side. Dusty hay and down litter the corners of the room, which without exterior windows is cast in a deep earthen shadow.
10 Karl’s Room
This room contains a thrashed bed and some broken furniture. The small window has been smashed. A breeze blows into the room, bringing with it the smell of grass and cedar.
11 Anna’s Room
This windowless room has a single bed that has been gutted like the rest. A vanity and wardrobe shows signs of vandalism. Their contents have long since been looted. Someone with the initials “K.U.” has carved crude remarks about a woman named Anna and her questionable heritage into the wood grain of the furniture.
12 Baron’s Suite
The room has a distinctly foul odor to it. In the shadowy light that streams through the windows, a humanoid form with withered and whitened hair slithers from a throne, shakes his fists defiantly and charges up the iron spiral staircase at the far end of the room. A sitting table flanked by two chairs fills the north end of the room under the window, atop it an unlit candelabra. Three chests line the south wall, upon the center one rests a notebook and a silver pitcher.
When the party enters the baron’s suite, he will flee up the spiral staircase.
3rd floor:
1 Baron von Stieglitz’ Bedchambers
In this round chamber high above the valley, bright spotlights from the five circular windows illuminate silver cobwebs draped like tule about the five-poster bed in the center of the chamber. A small table leans against the west curved wall, and a dresser against the east curve. A spiral staicase at the south end of the room leads down into the darkness.
Beneath the cobwebs in the bed is a long-dead servant girl, the object of desire that drove the Baron into madness. (more description here, probably a read-aloud, something to the effect of)
Sinewy strands of flesh bind the woman’s mouth, and a festered and rotten slit is visible under her chin.
The windows offer views of the surrounding valley, making the tower a perfect lookout spot and the castle well-defended.
Creatures: Baron von Stieglitz, wight (CR12) who has likely fled to this location from the room below. In addition, many bats (20-40) live in the rafters beneath the tall ceilings of this tower. They will fight on the baron’s side.
If the party survives the fight, the Baron’s parting words:
I have failed you Katherine! I have failed you father, grandfather, uncle Jakob! I now know in death what you thought of me in life.
Soon after, the Stieglitz ghosts arrive and carry his body down to the mausoleum for burial. Then they sink back into their sarcophagi and disappear from sight.
An alternate ending is that the party parlays with the Baron and works with him to restore his name and honor.
Cellar:
Development: If the party heads down into the trapdoor, and they haven’t met the servants, the servants close the trapdoor and drag the table back atop it, trapping the party in the cellar. Cries for help will eventually bring the remaining servants to investigate. They will not open the trapdoor until they verify the party means them no harm, which may require the party disposing of the undead.
The party must succeed at a DC 25 strength check to lift the trap door open (5 round action) if the servants do not help. They can also cajole the servants to open the trap door. This requires a DC 25 Diplomacy check (10 round action) to change their initial attitude from Unfriendly to Friendly.
1 Food Storage
This 5’ x 10’ room is musty and ridden with cobwebs. Shelves that look as if they once held dry goods now only display rat droppings.
2 Equipment Storage
This is another 5’ x 10’ room that contains mops, brooms, balls of rags, buckets, feather dusters, and other custodial equipment. They have not seen use in quite some time.
A DC 5 Search check will allow to party to find 5 large bars of soap.
3 Wine Cellar (EL 8)
This unlit earthen room is filled with narrow rows of shelves, stocked with bottles of wine. Several dead men in mail lie on the ground amongst broken bottles of wine in the tight spaces between the shelves, weapons still in their rotting hands.
Most of the areas in this cellar are 2 1/2 feet wide, which means that medium sized creatures will have to squeeze to move through these areas. Squeezing characters move at half speed and receive -4 to their attack rolls and AC.
Violent activity while squeezing adjacent to the wine racks has a 50% chance of sending wine bottles crashing to the ground. This fills the space the character is in with glass-caltrops as above.
Creatures: Mohrg, HP: 85 and Zombies (3) HP: 15, 18, 15 AC: 16
Several months ago the kennel master, a cruel and coarse man, was caught by a servant girl getting drunk on the Baron’s wine here. Enraged, he slit her throat and drunkenly violated her. Shortly afterwards the Baron leapt upon him and slew him. The taint of his evil has lingered and now his body stalks the cellar as a Mohrg.
Afterwards, during the looting of the castle by the Baron’s factious underlings, several men-at-arms came to the basement to steal the wine. The mohrg slew them and they now serve him as zombies. The zombies will lie still on the ground until the mohrg begins it’s attack, at which point they will rise up and join the fray.
All of the undead, being dead and suffering no pain, are unaffected by the wine-caltrop effect.
Tactics: The Mohrg will attempt to hide until it can attack one of the party from such a position that they must face it one-on-one. The zombies will rise up to sew confusion once the attack has begun, grappling and slamming. The mohrg will tenaciously attack one foe until it is dead or paralyzed, then move on to the next, until it is slain or has slain everyone. If defeated it expels vile curses with it’s grotesque tongue as it falls, calling it’s defeaters mongrels and dogs in Wyndm.
Treasure: The three zombies are wearing serviceable suits of chain mail and their heavy maces lie on the ground. In addition, there is a large sack of loot they had taken before meeting their fate here. It contains 500 gold worth of accouterments including a candelabrum worth 100 gp, most of a 8 seating set of silverware worth 80gp and various other valuables. Finally, the wine on the racks amounts to 80 bottles of various quality and vintage. Their values range from 2 sp to 10 gp each, and average at 4 gp each. A DC 20 search check along with a DC 15 appraise check will allow characters to discover a 50 year old bottle of fine brandy worth 100 gold.
Development: If anyone moves the obstacles and enters the cellars without speaking with the remaining servants first, they will come and replace the obstacles at the first sound of battle, or before if they happen upon the open hatch. As noted above, opening the hatch with the table and rubble piled on it requires a DC 25 strength check, or convincing of the former servants that the trapped people mean them no harm via diplomacy or bluff.
Ad Hoc XP Adjustment: +10% XP for difficult terrain and zombies.
Posted in Encounter and tagged Horror of the Old Ones, Location by Stephen Hilderbrand with no comments yet.