1001 Mysteries...

[The_Warlock]

40. What Time Is It?

While traveling from one bastion of civilization to another, a tremor wracks the earth near the PCs, making it incredibly difficult to stand. The last party member to remain standing hears a terrible cracking and rushing sound, and a sinkhole collapses directly under them to the horror of their comrades.

The sinkhole PC rushes through a slick, abrasive, musty chute-like ride, eventually dumped into a damp, unlit oubliette - the rushing sound of the sinkhole behind them, but no feeling of any tremors or any continuing rush liquefied earth. The chamber is utterly stable, and completely dark.

As soon as the character takes any action to stand, speak, etc, a querulous voices sounds from every direction (except from the area of the rushing sound), "Sorry! SORRY! No, the fourth triad of elemental vortice matrices...damn, Sorry! Just a simple question...What year is it, if you please?"

The voice will dodge any questions directed at it as best as possible, becoming more concerned and worried as it tries to get the PC to answer it's question of year.

If the PC refuses utterly, the voice finally exclaims..."Oh, OH! NO, the OTHER matrix..." and the PC will suddenly feel a heavy weight in the chest as if they can't breathe...and then black out.

If the PC answers, "Well, hmm. Oh dear, no, no, that simply won't do at ALL. That's completely off. Who calibrated this measurement, this isn't even the correct ERA. I'm terribly sorry. With my appreciation..." and an unseen force unbalances the PC, causing them to pitch backward into the rushing sound.

In either case, the rest of the party will see, only seconds after he disappeared, the swallowed PC, reappear over the sinkhole, as the sinkhole refills in from below and any cracks in the earth undo themselves, as if the tremor never happened. Trees, vehicles, campsites, animals, and the remaining PCs still have any damage or injuries incurred by the initial earthquake.

If the swallowed PC refused to answer the question, they fall over, covered in terrifying wounds, as if skin and muscle was simply evaporated in various places (assume some form of temporary critical injury or disability), and covered with a variety of unidentifiable bits of grime, muck, slime, and such.

If examined quickly, expert healers, alchemists, or forensics find 1 to 4 small silver gelatinous bits of slime which waver and pules on their own. If they are touched with flesh, the mote disappears and the person who touched it receives a disjointed vision of what the swallowed PC experienced. If they are not captured and stored within a minute, they appear to evaporate.

Magical or alchemical research identifies them as some form of liquefied magical essence which reduces the effect, strength, or duration of a magical item or effect by half. A magically capable character who applies the silver gel can chose which attribute is halved, otherwise it is random. The halving lasts the target's new duration, or 1 minute (for effect or strength). If a magically capable character applies more than one mote for the same purpose to the same target, the target's duration can be halved for each application, or the reduction in power increases to 10 minutes, 1 hour, and finally 1 day for effect or strength.

If the swallowed PC answered the question, they find themselves standing, and unharmed, except for an odd musty smell. Hanging around their neck is a simple silver amulet on a silver chain. The amulet is a simple circle, divided into 5 pie slice sections by thin engraved lines. The PC instantly knows that if they remove a pie slice, it will disappear, and they will gain "time". (By game system it should be roughly the equivalent of gaining a Move Action)

Once all 5 slices are evaporated, the necklace the amulet is attached to evaporates as well.

No other marks or information presents itself. Attempting to determine the nature or history of the amulet results in the character making the attempt being either blinded, or knocked unconscious, and a pie slice disappearing.

 

[nedjer]

18) Anachronism

The party encounters a lost individual dressed as a wizard or psion. He asks them for directions to some mundane location, and if they help him he insists on paying them for their help telling them they have done more than they can know. If examined the coins he pressed upon them show an unknown but aged king whose name matches that of the ruleing king's youngest son.

Yeah, magic coinage = much fun.

Players seem to see the gold piece as some sort of totally reliable, fixed part of play. Soon as they go into a room and see the money's moved or changed it's always been 90%+ 'who messed with the money', because money can't go magic, form colonies and drown your lungs with liquid gold in the middle the night

Forgot the urban myth version of this before; which is a swallow - the piles of gold line up alongside the sleeping player and get longer over a couple of nights. It'#s like a snake seeing if it's large enough to consume you in one go yet.

 

[Iron Sky]

41 - Painted Prophecy

The players find or buy a canvas with the assurance/notes/rumor that anything drawn on it is created in reality or scenes painted will come true.

Presumably, they'll paint things they desire upon it (with maybe a skill check to see how well what they paint looks like the real thing). PCs are rewarded a small and diminishing amount of xp each time they use it.

After numerous attempts, they give up, probably discarding/giving away/selling the canvas.

Months or years (many sessions) later, they start discovering the things they painted - horribly disfigured, mutated, or warped in the case of poorly painted objects, creatures, or environments - have come/are coming true, come to life, or been created they just didn't happen where the PCs were at where and when they painted it.

Now where the hell has the canvas gotten to!?

 

[ghostcat]

42 Wizards Duel

The party is travelling through a ravine or canyon when a figure suddenly appears on top of the left hand canyon wall several hundred yards in front of them. The figure leans forward, hands on knees apparently taking deep breaths. About half a minute later a second figure appears on top of the right hand wall and sends a lightning bolt at the first figure. The first figure retaliates with a fireball and promptly disappears. The second figure soon follows leaving nothing but the smell of scorched earth and ozone.

43 Thus Spoke the raven

An oldie but it fits right in here

The party is staying in an inn. About midnight there is a tapping at the window of the party's room. This tapping persists until the window is opened. On the window sill sits a raven. The raven says "Nevermore" and flies off before anyone can grab it.

 

[The_Warlock]

44) The Grue

At some point when the party has entered a dungeon or cave system, the find a section which has all normal ways of entry collapsed except for through an underground stream which passes into the section, with a swim just long enough to tax the breath holding capabilities of the least physically adept members of the party.

They will notice claw marks on the stone near the stream in the collapsed section, and occasional 4-toed clawed foot prints in section of sand or dirt - but never more than three foot prints.

The section is a confusing nest of passages, as well as natural and worked rooms. Any statuary in the worked rooms has had the head removed, nowhere to be seen, and the chest where the heart should be clawed and scratched out. Minor treasures and loot, some scattered, some trapped, is still to be found in these idle chambers.

So long as the characters are within the full radius of a light source, nothing attacks them. However, after the first 10 minutes of exploring the area, they will occasionally hear the click of claws on stone, or feel a slight breeze as if something moved past them.

Adventurers in shadowy light will feel a hot breath on the backs of their necks every so often. After the third breath, they will be struck for damage easily equal to a longsword, as if from nowhere. Wounds always appear as if from a four-taloned hand or paw.

No amount of mundane or magical vision will reveal the enemy before, during, or after the attack. A being with some form of truesight looking at the victim at the time of the attack, will see the briefest pulse of 4 glowing red eyes, and nothing else.

A creature who suffers damage from the attack becomes vulnerable to the attacker, even if healed or a long period is spent in light. Each successive attack on a previously struck victim suffers a greater amount of damage (based on system and balanced as the GM sees fit), and more claw marks are left behind with each attack.

A victim who is knocked out or killed by the attack is grabbed by some force and dragged out of the light into the darkness.
While the attacked cannot be trailed, the bloody marks of the victim can be followed.

Similarly, if a character finds themselves in complete darkness (the entire party has darkvision for instance) - the attacker strikes, but starts with damage equal to two longswords. If multiple characters are in complete darkness, it picks random targets for it's attacks. A character in complete darkness must also make a Reflex save or equivalent, or be dragged screaming off into the darkness.

The attacker strikes no more than once per minute. If a victim is being dragged off, the attacks stop for 30 minutes.

Whether by accident, or following the screams or blood trails of a comrade, the party can find a tunnel, hidden behind a long fallen boulder which needs the strength of at least 3 people to move. The tunnel stinks, and the walls and floor are crusted with filth. At the tunnel's end is a large room, with high ceiling and impressive buttresses, and arcane sigils carved and inlaid into the walls. Also set to the walls are strange-looking torch or lamp sconces, all of which have been broken and shattered.

The floor is covered with filth coated skeletons, and the missing statuary heads. Any victims or comrades are on the top of the pile. If it has been more than 30 minutes since they were taken, the only way to identify them is by the shredded clothing and scattered gear, as all flesh and organs are gone, replaced with a steaming red-black filth.

Less than that, and the body is intact (alive if dragged off in the complete dark), with an unseen and unknown force playing with and picking at the victims hair and clothing.

If light is brought toward the room, it dims further and further until even magical light is nothing but a candle's worth once the source is fully in the room.

Once the room is lit even feebly, there is a terrifying shriek (save vs fear) in the room, and any conscious creatures in the room are each attacked once per round until they leave or fall to the attacks.

This may be enough time to grab the unconscious comrade, and flee backward where the light will regain it's strength.

At no point is there ever a target to fight. If magical attacks which create light in an area are used, they will cause another Fear causing shriek, but the attacks will stop for a minute or more, depending on the power of the magic. But the skittering claws, and the occasional wheezy breath will still be heard at the fringes of the light for the remainder of the PCs movement through the catacombs.

Should the party reach the stream, the attacks will cease completely so long as light reflects off the water.

If the light is put out, the party member nearest the water will be pushed down and held underwater with unaccountable strength, but the 7 gnarled limbs and twisted face which mixes that of a beautiful woman and a locust will be seen as an empty "bubble" in the water by those with darkvision.

Attacks with fire, light, or silver can actually hit the beast where it's limbs plunge into the water, which causes it to scream and flail, but not release it's target, unless it is hit by three such attacks in one round, or by one such attack for a critical or maximum damage.

Should that occur, the drowning character is released, and the beast flees, invisible and invulnerable again.

Blood stains from the attacks upon it pool by the edge of the stream, and can be collected.

If the party chooses to stay in the catacombs, the stalking and attacks will begin again in no more than an hour.

Once outside, any treasure they looted from the chambers is still their's and appears to be free of any curse - though whenever such is used (whether weapon, coin, or magic item), they feel a hot breath upon the back of their neck.

Attempts to divine anything about the blood reveal nothing about the beast or it's lair, only that the blood is that of a virgin.

If the PCs ever return to the dungeon where they found the Grue, the entire collapsed section is missing, and in fact, the dungeon as they knew it has a section they never investigated.

However, months or years hence, when investigating a different dungeon, they may come across another strange collapsed section, a stream, and a nest of chambers with a new set of weird worked chambers from a wholly different culture or tomb - but with the heads of the statues knocked off...

And then, the hot breath on the back of their necks...

 

[The_Warlock]

45) This One Ring

In some hidden ruin, or treasure hoard, there is a skeletal hand wearing a simple unadorned ring. To anyone with the ability, it detects as powerful magic. Attempts to detect a curse, or what the ring can actually do, fail. Divinations carefully phrased may eventually suggest that the power of the ring is to "Return".

If the ring is worn, there are no obvious benefits, though enemies who fumble when attacking the wearer seem to specifically strike themselves or their allies.

The wearer of the Ring has regular vivid dreams of an ancient seeming and extravagant empire, specifically in beautiful palace grounds, gardens, and similar upper class locales but with a verdant sky and strange red plants.

After some weeks, other party members may notice changes to skin tone or hair color on the wearer. At this point, the wearer of the Ring seems to have a knack for getting better accommodations, meals, or when bartering for goods or services.

At this point, the wearer may or may not notice that he or she feels more vigorous, wanting to eat and drink more, and of foodstuffs of higher quality.

The dreams continue - always feeling like the wearer belongs, but never able to see his own self in the dreams.

If there are no other possibilities, and the wearer perceives the ring as the source, he or she may take it off. If it is placed anywhere on their person, the next time they look at their hand, the Ring is back in place on their finger.

If they throw the Ring away, it stays gone, until the next time the character wakes from sleep - and finds the Ring once more on their finger. At this point, the Ring allows the wearer to call a single item to hand that he/she possesses and carries with but a thought (Free action, or equivalent). Items already in hand are dropped.

If they sell or give away the Ring, it stays gone for a week...but upon waking after that period, they find the Ring back on their finger, and the cleanly severed hand of the person they sold or gave it to laying on their chest.

If they try to destroy the ring, it is easily shattered, and appears back on their finger the next morning.

If they cut off their own finger with the Ring on it, and throw it away or destroy it, the next morning, the find that they have regrown the finger, with the Ring on it.

The changes to face, hair, body and skin tone continue to progress slowly, though the hand wearing the ring remains unchanged.

The next dream finally allows the dreamer to see himself in a mirror, a strangely inhuman looking humanoid, admiring it's alien wardrobe - and then flexing one of it's hands - clearly of another race, bearing the glinting golden ring. Before it smiles a shark-like smile as the dream ends.

If the character chooses to continue to bear the Ring, one month later, as teeth have slowly gotten sharper, and body hair begun to fall out, the rest of the party wakes to find the Ring bearer utterly gone - except for his cleanly severed hand still bearing the Ring.

If instead, the character cuts the entire hand off at the wrist, a shriek emanates from the ring, and the whole hand scuttles off like a spider, never to return.

The character's next dream is of the shark-smiling humanoid, now emaciated and grimacing from an elaborate throne. One of it's hands clearly that of the dreamer. While it's lips move, there is no sound as the dream fades further and further into a hazy yellow mist.

Afterwards, the former Ring wearer never suffers the dreams again. If they are able to find a way to regrow or regenerate the hand, the hand is a pale, yellowish-skinned, elongated thing with an extra knuckle on each finger, and the ring finger looks like it has the mark of a ring recently removed with indecipherable text scarred into the skin. The character retains the ability to call small worn or carried items to that hand with a thought.

If the character does not have the means to regrow the hand, the alien hand will appear to have grown from the stump overnight after waking from sleeping under the next New Moon.

 

[The_Warlock]

46) Shadow Boxer

In a dungeon, tomb or ruin, in a once intricately carved and furnished room, there is a marble pedestal which is carved out of the wall or floor, and not easily removable - the top of which is carved to resemble a mighty hound of some kind, standing ready to rush to the hunt or combat.

Upon the pedestal is archaic text, which, once deciphered, says "Ever watchful, Ever faithful, For those who treat well."

Should the PCs look closely, there is a slightly stained indentation on the pedestal just forward of the hound's front paws. If they put something of value to them on the pedestal, it will roll into the indentation, and that will appear to be the end of it. However, if they look away and look back, or when then leave the room, the hound statue will be laying down, gnawing on some unidentifiable treat between it's paws, and the valuable placed there will be gone.

So long as the statue is otherwise left alone, that will seem to be the end of it.

However, the next time the character who put the valuable on the pedestal would be ambushed or surprised, there is a low growl, and a portion of his shadow will detach, race away, and knock over the ambusher targeting the character or closest to the character before the ambusher can act. The hound shadow will then disappear. This will happen once for each valuable given to the hound statue.


If any of the characters instead damage the hound statue or it's pedestal, or break it's foundation to remove from it's crypt the hound statue will be seen to have dropped into a threatening stance, or at the very least that the remains of it's head have bared teeth.

For so long as the pedestal/statue is gone from the room, and until each character involved in the defacing of the statue provides a valuable to the statue once it is returned to the room, anytime the characters responsible enter a dangerous situation, a shadow hound will detach from one of the characters shadows, and attempt to knock down, trip, or push a random character into danger always at least as strong/capable as the character it is accosting. The only warning, a low, hateful growl.

Should vandals of the statue offer valuables once all the pieces of the statue are back in it's room, the shadow attacks will stop. In addition, if after placing the tribute they look back, or come back to the room some time later, the statue will be whole and once more in good condition.

Vandals can never receive the guardian benefits, no matter how much they give to the statue, though given valuables will disappear just the same.

 

[d3k0y]

Bit of necromancy and all, but I just found this on StumbleUpon and wanted to add to it.

47) What House?
When the players are in a small-ish town, or city. More than just a farm village, but not exactly an urban sprawl there is a house. Perceptive players might notice that the house is slightly out of sorts looking. There are lights on inside, and the closer player get to it the stronger the smell of almost a huge feast being prepared. They can hear movement inside if it is quite out and they listen closely, but nobody can see anything through the windows, which are oddly foggy and at best they can only make out the vague shapes of furniture. Knocking on the door presents no answer, calling through the door only results in the player yelling receiving some off looks from the townsfolk. The door is locked fast and no amount of effort will open it or scry through it.

At this point someone may notice the architecture of this one house is similar to the houses near it, but not exactly the same and the whole place just seems slightly wrong. Nobody in town seems to notice the house in any way, nobody looks at it, nobody talks about it, if inquired about townsfolk have no idea what you are talking about, there is just an empty field there and always has been. If inquired further they will find that anytime someone tries to put something there, no matter how sturdy it may be, it always falls over taking much more damage than would be expected. Even simple rocks and boulders will be found on the side of the lot the next morning with massive cracks in it. Anyone that attempts to stay away to watch this event happen is never able to witness it happening, with a single blink the rock will be moved from the lot.

After the party first interacts with the house, the player that interacted with it the most will wake up the next morning with a very very old key at the very bottom of their least open pack, as if it had been there for ages with the contents on top of it completely undisturbed. If the player decides to go try the key on the house, the door unlocks easily and swings open with almost zero effort, surprising for how locked in place it was while locked.

From the outside the opening to the house looks like one would expect a house in this area to look, but with small things being incorrect on it. Candles seem to all be leaning heavily toward the very center of the house, with the flame being perfectly straight with the candlestick, despite the lean. Rocking chairs don't rock, flat chairs have heavy wobbles toward the center of the house. The smell of food seems fresh and wonderful at one moment, then sick and rotten with another breath. The air seems to come to a complete stop once it reaches the door no matter how windy it may be outside.

There are many rooms off the first hallway, so you can only see a few features without entering the house completely. The player with the key can enter unrestricted, but all the other players may notice a very small bit of pressure or effort needed to breach the doorway. If the party separates, the player with the key will seemingly disappear from everyone else once they lose sight of him/her like the house is trying to tear them away from the rest. No amount of looking around the house will turn up the keybearer to the party, or the party to the keybearer once separated.

The party finds the that most of the house looks to be centered around the keybearer. His vague likeness is found in all of the pictures, many of the linens are of the players favorite color, and their favorite activity seems to be catered to; bards have a music room, fighters have a small armory, clerics a shrine. Any writing in the house is in illegible jibberish to everyone except the keybearer, who can read what appear to be memories about them from a third-person PoV.

Whenever the party decides to leave, they always find the keybeared waiting outside before they get there.

The keybearer always exits and find the road completely empty. Nobody in town anywhere, anytime the keybearer opens a door to another house, he enters through the front door of the original house. If he leaves the house, and enters no doors and just comes back to the original house, the keybearer finds the party leaving the original house and suddenly the entire town kind of rushes back into existence for the keybearer and the party has no idea what happened.

The next day the key and the house is gone, and the person to had it finds a strange marking on a random part of them, and any time they are in the dark they feel as if they are being watched, followed by the smell of their favorite food being prepared or the occasional jingle of an old key.

 

[Hand of Evil]

48) The Hum (based on true mystery) there is a location where people hear a hum. The sound is isolated to the area and people that hear it gets angry and angrier.

 

[Andor]

Holy Thread Necromancy Batman!

Reap what you sow

The PCs are traveling and come to a small village holding a festival. The PCs are welcomed to jon in the festivities. If they accept give them a days worth of activities to do and a feast. Track how well the PCs treat the villagers and give them plenty of opportunities to interact.

Suggested events:
-Contests of Skill or strength such as wrestling or stone throwing. Are the PCs good sports? Do they cheat or use magic?
-Tale Telling. The PCs are travelling adventurers. Do they spin tales or disdain the locals?
-The Thief. A small boy, 9 or 10, tries to steal a trinket from the PCs. Do they react with good humour or anger?
-The Maiden. A 16 year old girl has an obvious crush on the exotic and powerful PCs. Do they treat her gently? Spurn her cruelly? Take advantage of her?
-The Hunt. A scavanger hunt in the local wood. The locals will have an obvious advantage over the PCs unless they use magic. Signs of orc presence may be found in the woods.
-The Blessing. A PC Cleric is probably much more powerful than the local priest. Will they spend a spell slot to invoke a blessing on the feastival? If the PCs are oddball worshippers do they respect local customs or show disrespect?

After the feast, as night falls, a dirty and bloodied runner staggers in from a distant farm babbling of Orcs. Knowledge checks will show this is bizarre since Orcs haven't been an organized force in these parts since the fall of the last great Khan 300 years earlier. The raiders banners match those of the last great khan. (Alter the race of the raiders as appropriate to local campaign history.) Soon the village is attacked by a large and well armed force, far greater than the PCs can possibly cope with. Do they try to protect the villagers or themselves? Fight or flee? Organize a retreat? In any event the village will be destroyed and burnt to the ground.

If the PCs die in battle trying to protect the villagers they will wake at dawn in the road. The village is gone as are their wounds. If they investigate they will find some overgrown heaps of stone that match the layout of the village as well as a few ancient and worn bones. The local altar from the blessing lies overturned in a field.
-If they bury the remains and restore the altar it will take the remainder of the day. When night falls the ghost of some villagers they interacted with most prominently will appear and thank them. If the PCs were kind to the villagers they will tell them where to dig up some level approriate loot the orcs had missed looting. If they were asses the villagers will thank them but not reward them.
-If they move on without investigating or investigate but do not bury the locals the PCs will dream about the ghosts of the villagers. If they treated them well the ghosts will tell them of a local quest target the PCs can investigate but they'll need to fight for their loot.

If the PCs run away and survive the battle then when they pass back through the village in the morning they again find it gone and abandoned but otherwise as above. If they treated the villagers like crap AND leave their remains to rot they may be attacked by some form of undead when night falls.

If the PCs manage to save some of the villagers by leading them away from the Orc attack and protecting them through the night, they will fade away at dawn. When the PCs return to the village they will find it much changed, but the temple will be recognizable. The PCs will be recognized immediately by the disbelieving villagers who tell them the legend of the strange adventurers who appeared and saved their ancestors only to disappear the next day. (Perhaps an elf villager is actually still alive to recognize them!) The PCs will find statues to themselves in the town square and be gifted with level appropriate loot and an offered base of operations that always welcome them back.