Tomb of Horrors 3.5 post-game report (long post!)
OK, well I ran the 3.5 conversion of
Tomb of Horrors earlier this week. Our regular gaming night was cancelled as a couple of the players couldn't make it, so I offered to run this as a one-shot place-filler. I told the players to create 9th-level characters using a 25 point buy with 36,000 gp of gear. They were allowed to use any WotC or Malhavoc product to create the characters. After some on-line discussion, they elected to have one character from each of the four iconic slots and we ended up with the following:
Garm - Half-orc Barbarian (boar totem) 4 / Half-orc Paragon 3 / Bear Warrior 2
Mungo the Breed - Half-orc Barbarian 1 / Fighter 2 / Rogue 6
Alma - Human Evangelist 9 (from Dragon #311, with Air, Knowledge and Time domains)
Miniris - Irda Wizard (abjurer) 4 / Wizard of High Sorcery (white) 3
There was also supposed to be a standard cleric, but the player couldn't make it, leading to a fair bit of consternation, as the evangelist doesn't have Turn Undead
...
We got about halfway through the adventure before calling it for the night (it was getting late as we also squeezed in a viewing of "The Gamers" and some huuuuge pizzas before settling down to play). In the interest of smoother and faster play, I made a couple of small alterations to the adventure (and to balance those out, I also made a couple of alterations that were less pleasant for the PCs, heh heh).
Short version: it was fun and challenging. They played extremely well, quickly realising that this was a puzzle and trap-based dungeon and navigating it with extreme caution. As a result, despite a few mishaps and close shaves, there were no character deaths. We finished with the battle with the lich in the false crypt and will pick up from there (and face the really nasty areas of the tomb) when we next have time. The presence of 3e-style saving throws for certain effects only had a minor impact on the adventure, as clever play was able to avoid and evade the worst hazards. Much as with the 1e version (which I ran years ago) the system and rules are less important than player skill and I'm pretty happy with the conversion as a whole.
Long version:
We started the adventure off assuming that they had just arrived at the hill housing the tomb and they spent some time yomping about the palce trying to figure out how to get inside. Eventually Alma used her 10' pole to probe some of the fissures in the sandy cliff-face and discovered that some were deeper than they at first seemed. They dug away at the cliff, revealing the entrances and set about deciding which one to take. They settled on the central one (thus avoiding the truly horrible traps in the other two) and started down the tiled mosaic path like good little adventurers. It was also Alma who discovered the first pit trap in the hall (by falling into it) but her
ring of feather falling and a lucky Reflex save allowed her to grab the sides and Garm hauled her to safety.
They found the inscription with Acererak's list of clues and warnings and spent the requisite amount of time trying to decipher it, while Mungo proceeded to search the entirety of the hall for traps, navigating a safe route down to the end. They spent a good deal of time trying to decide what to do about the great green devil face and the arch of mists. They came up with a clever use of
clairvoyance to try and scry the area beyond the mists and, rather than stymie their attempts out of slavish adherence to the adventure text, I decided to reward smart play by allowing them to have brief glimpses of the possible destinations of the mists' teleport effects. Eventually they decided to enter the mists while staying on the red path and wound up in the room of the broken gargoyle statue just off the second great hall. After fiddling about with the statue to no effect, they headed into the hall (Mungo taking the broken fourth arm with him for some reason).
They realised that the inscription that they had found in the first hall might be more helpful than they had first suspected (although Mungo's player was certain that it contained nothing but a series of lethal red herrings). Miniris immediately proceeded to the black sphere painted on the wall of the second hall (deciding that this was the "night's good colour" and was thrilled to discover that it concealed a hidden passage). Mungo, meanwhile, located the one-way door leading into the hall from area 9 and was able to get it open. Unlucky rolling, however, prevented him from getting any further through the complex of secret doors and he gave up and rejoined Miniris and the others (probably a good thing, as he would only have ended up face-to-face with the 4-armed gargoyle).
They followed the little passage all the way to the wonderfully-named Chapel of Evil. After some initial examinations, Alma opened the urn, releasing the first of the bloodmote clouds (I had placed one in each urn, rather than them both in the same urn). She ran away and these promptly attacked Mungo, draining him of vital Constitution and not a few hit points. Thinking fast, Alma whipped out a
wall of air spell, confining the swarm and Miniris unleashed a
crackling sphere (DL spell like a electrical
flaming sphere). This finished the first swarm off and Mungo, suspecting that the other urn might also contain one, hefted the second urn (he had Str 20) and threw it through the
wall of air, smashing it and releasing the second swarm. Unfortunately, the delay caused by moving the second urn across the room meant that Miniris'
crackling sphere ran out shortly thereafter and, with Alma's Wall of Air only a few rounds away from expiring also, the party realised that they were now in danger of having the second swarm escape. They ended up hurling flasks of oil and
burning hands spells at it, wasting precious resources but finally being able to defeat it.
As an addition to the adventure from the original, I really liked the bloodmote clouds, as they added an immediate threat to the Chapel and spiced up the flow of the adventure. We had been playing for about an hour at this point and, after crunching through trap after trap and puzzle after puzzle, the players were happy to be able to unleash some firepower and deal with a tangible foe. A good addition to the adventure, imho, and much needed in order to keep the game fun while still being challenging.
They then turned their attention to the archway of glowing mists and started using their
clairvoyance trick again. Having cut them some slack at the first arch, however, I decided that here I needed to redress the balance. Rather than have the mists change effect each time the same person passed through them, I altered this so that they changed effect each time
anything went through them. The party had been throwing copper coins through in an attempt to scry their destination and were certain that they had discerned a pattern as to where the mists took you. Mungo volunteered to head through first... and promptly found himself shivering and naked back at the entrance of the tomb, his gear stripped and sent to Acererak's vault.
Once the hilarity had settled down, he hurried through the dungeon to catch up with his companions (fortunate that such a route indeed existed). The others, meanwhile, were consulting their notes from the inscription, trying to decide what the "loop of magical" metal was they they had to sacrifice in order to proceed. They decided that it was the
periapt of wound closure that they had found in one of the urns and that it needed to be sacrificed on the altar. Miniris placed the periapt on the altar, unfortunately grazing the altar with his hand in the process. He was standing off to one side and so was quite relieved to see that the ensuing bolt of lightning shot down the central aisle and missed him completely. His relief was short-lived, however, when the entire altar exploded. Garm and Alma were over by the arch and escaped the blast, but poor Miniris took a large amount of damage and was pretty sorely injured. Mungo, naked as the day he was born, arrived back on the scene shortly thereafter and managed to cadge some spare gear from the other characters.
A more thorough search of the chapel revealed the hidden door opposite the arch and the little slot with the ring inscribed above it. Realising its significance, the group decided ro try and find a way around the problem. Alma used
stone shape to carve a hole through the wall (I saw no real reason to disallow this smart use of resources and abilities, as only the stone plug was magic-resistant and not the wall itself) and the group crawled through, over the 4' high stone plug and into the hallway beyond.
By this point, they were expecting more pit traps, having consulted their notes of the inscriptions, and so were not greatly surprised when Garm almost fell into the first one in area 15 after bashing the first stuck door open. This is the only area of the adventure where I felt that the introduction of saving throws in the 3e conversion made any real difference. He was able to avoid falling into each pit trap (especially once he knew they were there and was being held from behind by his party members). However, as these pits actually serve as diversions more than real hazards, I didn't feel that it was too much of a problem. They dutifully searched the bottom of each pit, as advised in the inscription, and found the secret door at the bottom of the third pit (more 10' pole goodness!)
They followed the hallway down to the mist-filled area, avoiding its fear-effect through some stupendously lucky rolls. Garm burned the webs filling the entrance to the false crypt with his
flaming greataxe and the group surveyed the chamber beyond from the top of the stairs. They deduced that the corpse-like figure on the divan was "some kind of greater mummy" that would come to life when they entered the room or touched the mace or fiddled with the jade coffer. Alma cast
hide from undead on the group and she and Mungo cautiously entered the room, stepping over the mace at the bottom of the stairs.
The lich on the divan sprang into wakefullness and uttered his line about "who dares disturn Acereraks rest". The party freaked, sure that this was Acererak himself. The lich made his saving throw against
hide from undead easily and initiative was rolled. Alma went first, shooting a
searing light at the lich. It responded with a
disintegrate, which she in turn saved against, taking only moderate damage. Miniris used
summon monster IV to summon C'leo (his celestial lion... C-Leo, get it? get it?) Mungo ran forward and grabbed the jade coffer and began dragging it towards the stairs, while Garm leaped forward (using a leap attack/power attack combo) and smote the lich for a huge amount of damage - only to see much of it be sucked up by the lich's damage reduction of 15/bludgeoning and magic.
Alma cast
haste on the whole party as C'leo appeared and charged into battle. Using a pounce and smite combo, the lion unleashed more or less full damage against the lich, but dealt none at all, being completely unable to bypass its DR. Miniris, quite upset about this, hurled a
Dalamar's lightning lance at the lich. He rolled well and the lich took the 3d6 impact damage from the lance, but completely ignored the additional electricity damage, much to Miniris' growing frustration. Mungo began heaving the coffer up the stairs as Garm hammered the lich even more with a succession of power attacks. The lich followed up with a
cone of cold (easily making its Concentration check against Garm's attack of opportunity). C'leo was killed outright, Alma stripped down to 7 hit points, Garm moderately injured and poor Miniris was felled (down to exactly 0 hp) despite making his saving throw, weakened due to damage suffered from the exploding altar. Mungo avoided all damage through his evasion ability.
Alma ran over to Miniris and use a cure spell to revive him, Mungo managed to get the coffer into the hallway and Garm used his attacks to kill the lich. Only lasting three rounds, the combat had sorely depleted the group's hit points and spell resources. They were unable to savour the victory, however, as the illusion of the chamber collapsing promptly began. Alma cast
gaseous form on herself and Mungo (and the loot), Miniris cast
fly on himself and Garm started running at haste-enhanced barbarian speed.
As it was now almost 2am, I decided that this was a satisfying point to call the session. With no immediate escape route, I ruled that the illusion of the collapsing chamber died off once they were back in area 15 (thus allowing for the continued exploration of the tomb at a later date). The group, flushed with success at defeating the lich, soon realised that it could not have been Acererak himself, as their trusty inscription showed that there was still much more exploration to come. We ended the session, therefore, with the party still deep in the tomb, low on resources and hit points and weighing up the risks of camping out here to replenish their arsenal of spells.
The players themselves all enjoyed the game. They had been a little surprised to see so few creatures (and got stuck in with relish into those that they could battle) but were also pleased with the chance to explore a dungeon where wits, skill and problem-solving was at the forefront. One more than once ocassion I heard utterances along the lines of "I
hate this place" and "who
builds these things??" - all in a good-natured tone and sign that the adventure was having its desired effect. The players also enjoyed seeing elements that became cliched in later adventures, here in their original format (teleporting arches, cursed altars, collapsing chambers etc). Most of all, though, they were pleased with themselves at having been able to think their way through the dungeon, both through good use of the clues in the inscriptions as well as through thinking on their feet from moment to moment. I mentioned that the deeper areas of the tomb, past the false crypt, contain much worse challenges and a good few monsters to fight - it remains to be seen when we will next find the time to play the remainder of the adventure. If it's not too long and there is interest, I'll post another report once we are done. Can't wait to see how they handle the juggernaut...
![:]](http://www.enworld.org/forum/images/smilies/devious.png "Devious :]")
