Spell: Subvert Control
Years ago in the pirate kingdoms, the wizard Deganous crafted this spell to use against King Kik’dak of the ice kobolds and his mechanical dragons. Along with Donal of Rockwell the wizard led a force to the ice kobolds’ fortress in the Barrar Mountains. When those that survived the trap-laden gauntlet reached the throne room where Kik’dak waited, Deganous used this magic to turn the kobold’s mechanical dragons on him, whereupon he was torn limb from limb.
Subvert Control
School transmutation; Level sorcerer/wizard 7
CASTING
Casting Time 1 standard action
Components V, S, M (a piece of bone and a piece of raw meat)
EFFECT
Range close (25 ft. + 5 ft./2 levels)
Targets up to 2 HD/level of constructs, no two of which can be more than 30 ft. apart
Duration 1 min./level
Saving Throw Will negates; Spell Resistance yes
DESCRIPTION
This spell alters the magic which powers constructs, which enables you to control them for a short period of time. You command them by voice and they understand you, no matter what language you speak. Even if vocal communication is impossible, the controlled constructs do not attack you. At the end of the spell, the subjects revert to their normal behavior.
Intelligent constructs will remember that you controlled them, and they may seek revenge after the spell’s effects end.
Posted in 3rd edition Dungeons & Dragons / d20 fantasy / Pathfinder, Spell and tagged sorcerer / wizard spell level 7, transmutation by Adam A. Thompson with no comments yet.
Aberoth
Welcome the throwback world of Aberoth, a cute little (55K) Javascript client that plugs in to what appears to be a fairly fleshed out world on the backend. It seems there are mobile clients and even one in Java (people still use Java?).
Hop online and enjoy some amusing times that will at least remind you of your old video game rpg playing days when you had more free time. If by a 1:million chance you run into me, I’m on there as Omeros.
Posted in Review by Adam A. Thompson with no comments yet.
Dungeon Robber
Last Friday, Johnn Four included a link to this fun little online dungeon generator/game, inspired by (and maybe cloned from) Gygax’s random dungeon tables. Yes, I’m just getting to fun RPG emails from last week nowish.
Screen capture of Dungeon Robber running in a browser. More adventure games should run like this!
Posted in Review, Video Game by Stephen Hilderbrand with no comments yet.
Shadow Sentinels
Those few mariners who have braved the ice isles and their frozen towers will encounter White Eye’s guardians throughout. These pale-eyed living shadows stand as sentinels in the catacombs beneath the towers, and add their victims to the ranks of gray ghouls on the shores.
Shadow Sentinels – CR 8
XP 2,400
N medium undead
Init +0; Senses darkvision 60 ft.; Perception +6
AC 17, touch 17, flat-footed 15 (+5 deflection, +1 Dex, +1 dodge)
hp 83 (8d8+47)
Fort +7, Ref +5, Will +8
Defensive Abilities incorporeal
Immune undead traits
OFFENSE
Speed fly 30 ft. (perfect)
Melee shadow claws +7 (1d6 and 1d6 strength damage)
Special Attacks draining gaze (DC 19)
STATISTICS
Str —, Dex 12, Con —, Int 10, Wis 11, Cha 20
Base Atk +5; CMB +5; CMD 22
Feats Dodge, Improved Initiative, Iron Will, Lightning Reflexes, Toughness
Skills Fly +9, Knowledge (history) +10, Knowledge (nobility) +10, Perception +18, Sense Motive +10, Stealth +9; Racial Modifiers +8 Perception, +8 Stealth
Languages Common
SPECIAL ABILITIES
Strength Damage (Su)
A shadow’s touch deals 1d6 points of Strength damage to a living creature. This is a negative energy effect. A creature dies if this Strength damage equals or exceeds its actual Strength score.
Draining Gaze (Su)
Those meeting the deathly green eyes of the Shadow Sentinels (range 30ft.) must succeed on a DC 19 Fortitude Save or gain 1 negative level.
Create Spawn (Su)
A humanoid creature killed by a shadow sentinel’s Strength damage or gaze attack becomes a gray ghoul under the control of its killer in 1d4 rounds.
Posted in 3rd edition Dungeons & Dragons / d20 fantasy / Pathfinder, Creature and tagged creature type: undead by Adam A. Thompson with no comments yet.
Free Download of Fourthcore Alphabet
In honor of Halloween, SVD Press has made their Fouthcore Alphabet available as a free PDF download from Lulu now through the dark holiday.
We have found this to be a valuable resource for generating new ideas for dungeons, denizens, and deathtraps! Each letter of the roman alphabet contains tables of 1d20 and 2d20 roll results with juicy elements to pick and choose in your deep or ad hoc dungeon design.
Go get your copy now before it’s too late. You’ll kick yourself if you don’t.
And as always, make it fun!
Posted in announcement by Adam A. Thompson with no comments yet.
Gray Ghouls of the Ice Isles
Once dwarven warriors, these ancient corpses were raised up again and given new life by the necromancer White Eye. The boatmen of the northern sea who have sailed too close to the ice isles therein call them “the gray ones” when they return to the shore to tell their stories. Ravenous for flesh, they will climb down out of the ice-encased towers naked save for tattered hauberks of chain mail, gather on the shores and wade out into the frigid water when boats come within sighting distance.
Gray Ghoul – CR 3
XP 800
N medium undead
Init +0; Senses darkvision 60 ft.; Perception +6
AC 19, touch 10, flat-footed 19; (+4 natural, +5 armor)
hp 36 (4d12+4)
Fort +1, Ref +1, Will +5
Immune cold, undead immunities
Speed 20 ft.
Melee 2 claws +6 (1d4+4) and bite +4 (1d4+4 and Frigid Bite (below))
Space 5 ft.; Reach 5 ft.
Str 18, Dex 10, Con -, Int 7, Wis 14, Cha 12
Base Atk +3; CMB +7; CMD 17
Skills Climb +8; Perception +6
Feats Toughness, Toughness
Frigid Bite (Su)
Those bitten by the gray ghouls must succeed on a DC 14 Fortitude save or become paralysed for 1d10 rounds, during which time they take 1d3 points of cold damage per round.
Posted in 3rd edition Dungeons & Dragons / d20 fantasy / Pathfinder, Creature by Adam A. Thompson with no comments yet.
Room 7: Athganazar’s Laboratory
This area is a separate level that can only be accessed by the methods described in Room 6: The Crucible.
As the arcane mist dissipates, you appear in what looks to be an ancient laboratory which while dusty and archaic, has seen recent use. Tables along the walls and shelves set into alcoves in the walls are filled with various alchemical apparatus, half-completed mixtures and parchment. In the center of the room is a stone bier upon which rests a body draped in silken robes. A cracked flask with what remains of a dark, viscous liquid is on the floor nest to the body.
Athganazar is not actually dead but is instead a Proto-lich who has so far failed in the attempts to achieve the full undead status and abilities he desires.
This laboratory is where Athganazar’s soul has been awaiting new bodies to possess and attempt to finish his transformation into a lich. His dead body is what is lying upon the bier while his soul has moved into his phylactery (a plain seeming stone jar upon the top shelf along one wall of the room. It will appear as magical to detect magic, despite its otherwise plainness. The jar is tiny and has 40 hit points, hardness 20, and a break DC of 40) from which he will attempt to possess (via magic jar spell) the character that has seemed the most resourceful in solving the challenges up to this point.
His plan is possess one of the players and attempt to have them drink the remains of the liquid in the flask to attempt to create a new lich body for himself. If he succeeds then he will go ahead and kill the party.
Failing that, he will attempt to kill as many characters as possible, leaving the possessed body if it is slain to return to the jar and to possess another, continuing this until there is only one character left. When only one remains, he intends to possess that body and to use it to make another attempt at successful lich creation.
To defeat him, the party will need to locate and destroy the phylactery (thus leaving him no avenue of egress) and to either kill the character which he has currently possess of to find a way to otherwise force him to leave that body. If forced to leave or the possessed body slain after the phylactery is destroyed, (and there is no active Proto-Lich body ready for him) Athganazar will be destroyed.
The flask of dark liquid in the flask is the remains of the lich creation potion that Athganazar drank which killed his body but left it in a state of perfect preservation. If a PC tastes the dark liquid then they must save or die (Con DC 30). If they succeed they then take 20 pts of damage. If they fail their body becomes a new, empty proto-lich ready for Athganazar to possess. Likewise, if they spill or apply the liquid to the body lying upon the bier then that body will also become a revitalized proto-lich vessel suitable for possession as well.
Posted in 3rd edition Dungeons & Dragons / d20 fantasy / Pathfinder, Encounter, Magic Item and tagged Fantasy, The Tomb of Athganazar by Stephen Hilderbrand with no comments yet.
Room 6: The Crucible
The Word “Crucible” is carved above the doorway into this room. In the room, a large fire elemental is seemingly contained by the magic circle upon the floor. Between you and the elemental is a large marble bowl set upon a stone base.
DM Notes: The bowl is literally the crucible needed to re-forge the broken key. For this challenge the party will need to place all four of the key fragments into the bowl and then free the elemental and lure it into engulfing the crucible. Once that happens the elemental will be consumed and the key will be restored. All four fragments must be in the bowl for this to work. Any less and nothing happens.
If the elemental is instead slain by the party it will reappear in the circle one round later (and the circle will be restored of any damage it may have taken as well) effectively resetting the encounter.
Once the key has been re-forged, a keyhole will appear in the north wall of this room. Once the key is placed into the keyhole and turned, the tumblers will wail and the party will be teleported to the actual “tomb” of Athganazar. If lured into the crucible:
The elemental lumbers into the crucible, arms surrounding the rim, legs dropping into the heap of keys. Its eyes stretch downward as if tears and its gaping maw crackles with embers. A fiery blaze fills the crucible, the elemental disappearing among the smokeless flames. Suddenly, the warm light of the fire is extinguished. Among the ashes you see an ivory key.
Once the key is lifted from the ashes, they will notice that the head of the key is carved into the head of a skeleton:
As you turn the key over in your hand, you note that the skeletal head of the key has reflective eyesockets, iron fangs, and a crown inset with six prismatic gems – ruby, topaz, sunstone, emerald, sapphire, amethyst. Iron fang-like prongs jut out into the darkness at jagged angles.
Once the key is inserted and turned:
The eyes of the key ignite in a bright burst as the floor swirls into a rainbow portal. You fall in.
Posted in 3rd edition Dungeons & Dragons / d20 fantasy / Pathfinder, Encounter and tagged Fantasy, The Tomb of Athganazar by Stephen Hilderbrand with no comments yet.
Word Up to the Columbus Free Press
With a shout out to the Columbus Free Press, I have to give props to Damp Heat’s The Lich.
http://columbusfreepress.com/article/%EF%BB%BFwith-hand-vecna-damp-heat-brings-nerdcore
Review by Gerry Bello.
Posted in announcement, Editorial by Stephen Hilderbrand with no comments yet.
Room 5: Monster Summoning Trivia
As you enter this room you feel a coldness as if a frigid vapor sucked the life out of the room. Then you see a nebulous cloud of energy which seems to be contained within a summoning circle engraved upon the floor. The 5’ square tile directly before the circle glows with an opalescent silvery sheen.
A plaque set into the floor reads:
“How well do you know the creatures that you may face? You will be asked questions about the creatures that you will see before you. A correct answer defeats the beast. Answer incorrectly and the beast may defeat you.”
Once a character steps upon the colored square, the energy in the circle will resolve into the image of one of the following creatures and a disembodied voice will ask a question related to the specific monster. A correct answer will cause the image to disappear and the voice to say “Correct!” With an incorrect answer, the creature becomes corporeal and is unleashed upon the adventurers.
DM Note: Choose a number of questions based on what you know about your players’ preferences, the session time and how well the players have answered the questions (for instance, you may not want to play out five successive combats). In my experience, players tend to answer 5 or 6 correctly and then end up fighting 1 or 2 combats. Once the creatures/questions are defeated (one way or the other), a fang key fragment will appear in the center of the circle. If you want your players to be presented with another challenge, explain that the circle is still active and see how they retrieve the key without being telefragged.
Sample Monster Trivia
Wail from this undead creature causes hearers to die on the spot • Banshee
Slimy scavenger that can flow through narrow openings and lives underground • Black pudding
Teleporting canine • Blink dog
Distant relatives of halflings; also name of a delicious desert • Brownie
Also known as the ‘landshark’ • Bulette
Half man, half horse • Centaur
Tiny creatures that drain psionic abilities • Cerebral parasite
Rooster-like creature whose touch turns flesh to stone • Cockatrice
Arch-enemies of devils • Demon
Humanoid shape shifter • Doppelganger
Can belch forth a cloud of scalding steam • Dragon turtle
Leaves eggs in creature’s head which hatch and eat host • Ear seeker
Giant-like creatures with two heads • Ettin
Purple mushroom with tentacles that cause flesh to rot • Violet fungi
Indistinguishable from ghouls except for their carrion stench • Ghast
Hyena-like humanoids • Gnoll
Magic servants made of clay, flesh or iron • Golem
Slimy horror that resembles wet stone or sedimentary cave formations • Gray ooze
Fire breathing dog • Hell hound
Larger tribal cousins of goblins • Hobgoblin
Multi-headed reptilian monster • Hydra
Evil Intelligent manta rays • Ixitxachitl
Jackal able to assume the form of a man • Jackalwere
Half woman and half animal, touch drains a creature’s wisdom • Lamia
formerly ultra powerful magic-users now non-human and non-living • Lich
Reptilian humanoids that dwell underwater • Lizard man
Disguises itself as part of the ceiling • Lurker above
Worm-like fish with poison spines • Masher
Psionic humanoid forth brains with its tentacles • Mind flayer
The ‘Wraith of the deep’ • Morkoth
Big cousin to the Otyugh • Neo otyugh
Water sprites/pixies • Nixie
Giant amoeba that is golden and sludge-like • Ochre jelly
Fiercely competitive bullies made popular by LOTR • Orc
Half owl and half bear • Owlbear
Lower bodies of birds and the upper bodies of stags • Peryton
Dragon-like with a flexible sting-equipped tail • Pseudo dragon
Giant polar worms • Remorhaz
Lives in poo, but burrows into live flesh • Rot grub
Humanoid eats ferrous metals such as iron, steel, and steel alloys • Rust monster
Fiery magic amphibians • Salamander
Half lion and half fish • Sea lion
Slimy, ambulatory, intelligent heaps of rotting vegetation • Shambling mound
Screaming fungus • Shrieker
Mosquito-like magical beast • Stirge
Horrid carnivore able to regenerate damage taken • Troll
Magical equine woodland creature • Unicorn
Feeds upon the life force of dying beings • Will o’ wisp
Undead with chilling touch that drains life energy • Wraith
Magically animated corpses • Zombie
Posted in Encounter and tagged puzzle, The Tomb of Athganazar by Stephen Hilderbrand with no comments yet.