Help me run Curse of the Mummy's Tomb!

[RedFox]

I'm a relative newcomer to running D&D 3.5e, having just run my second session of a new game. The characters started at second level in a campaign world of my own design, and consist of an adventuring company of four PCs:

• Himian: CG Elf Rogue 1 / Half-Dragon (gold) 1 using the WotC savage progression template
• Lorana Starfire: LG Elf Fighter 2 with an emphasis on archery
• Liam Dorn: NG Human Cleric of Valen 2 (Domains of Travel and Luck)
• Lucien Silverleaf: LG Elf Wizard 2

They're currently in a large Budapest-style city at the edge of a vast wasteland called Akrasia, and have just completed their first job: Rescuing a missing child from a snake cult. They tracked the child down to a bunch of viper-men (monsters of my own design) in a desert grotto, fought a giant snake, and rescued about a dozen kids. So they now have something of a reputation.

They also hit level 3, though they'll be leveling up in the beginning of next session.

To follow-up on the rather cliche snake cult, I thought I'd have a prominent person in the city ask the PCs to investigate the apparent lack of progress of an excavation in the wasteland to which he'd given his patronage.

When the PCs arrive, they'll discover that the dig has stopped due to a vault deep within a pyramid having been breached, unleashing undead guardians. The capstone of the adventure would be a mummy. It's a CR 5 challenge for a 3rd level party, so quite a fight! But I figured if I restricted the mummy to a final vault area and gave the PCs time to prepare and clues (fire bad!) it would be a fair final boss.

So I'm asking for advice, particularly in making an interesting and entertaining map / dungeon with a pyramid / Egyptian / undead theme. As I said, I've nearly 0 experience running D&D before so any advice, no matter how basic, is welcome.

Elements I'm thinking of including:

1. A few different factions in the camp, including perhaps a greedy thief (or ring of grave-robbers) who breached the cursed seal, native workers who are not superstitious but not at all eager to delve into an undead-infested dungeon, and gnomish scholars who could provide answers about puzzles in the dungeon if they weren't so busy trying to keep the workers on-site.
2. Themed traps that require more than a mere Skill roll to figure out. i.e. puzzles.
3. A cartouche, probably worked into a trap or puzzle.
4. Secret passages and chambers.
5. Rewarding passages of hieroglyphics that can provide clues or directions with Decipher Script.
6. Undead guardians resetting traps that the archaelogists had already bypassed or disabled.

So any advice, maps, encounters, traps, or whatnot?

 

[Frostmarrow]

You seem to be on top of things. Your game sounds a lot of fun! The only thing I find lacking from your planned encounters is a negotiation. Negotiations are lot of fun.

Perhaps they can meet a sphinx who is willing to trade knowledge for entertainment?

 

[senodam]

Hey RedFox, not seen you round these parts before (I'm dungeonmeister on RPGnet).

As for the adventure-
The classic flooding room trap is always a must in pyramid dungeons. Especially when you have undead tomb guardians lurking in the depths...or maybe delaying the PCs escape as the room fills with water.

A room bearing several canopic jars, each of which bears some organ of the main Mummy in the tomb. If opened, they reveal organs that still ooze blood, a beating heart etc...enough to creep out the PCs and hint that something old is still lurking down there.

A pit trap that dumps the PCs into a pit swarming with scarabs/locusts/insecty doom...that's always a nice freak out in a game.

 

[RedFox]

Well I already had the PCs swarmed with monstrous centipedes and monstrous scorpions in the snake cult adventure, so I think that's run its course a little.

One thing I was considering was Constructs. Problem is, even the weakest golem (clay) is beyond their capabilities. So then I thought I'd make one up on my own, and the idea struck me of making a Sand Golem. Maybe give it DR 10 / Bludgeoning.

Before I went to sleep last night I was also thinking about puzzles and the like and I came up with the following idea:

A room with a statue of a prince, probably the royal buried in the tomb. He's lavishly painted and decorated, though gems including his eyes have obviously been pried out long ago by grave robbers. His right hand lays palm-open upon his thigh, the other clenched in a fist before him.

Heiroglyphic script above the statue reads (with a DC ?? Decipher Script check):

Prince Am-sher loved Goddess Sekhmet
Yet he was not yet one with Ra
The Gods were angered
The desert itself was called against us

Prince Am-sher took Ankh in hand
Rivers of sadness in his eyes
Prince Am-sher took flame in hand
Heat of anger in his eyes

Prince Am-sher walked through shadow
Prince Am-sher walked through flame
Prince Am-sher faced the desert
Prince Am-sher was lost to us

His legacy remains
Through flame and darkness
In death he had captured Sekhmet's heart
Beware, lest you unleash your own torment

The PCs would have to find three objects elsewhere in the dungeon: A stone ankh (to place in the statue's fist), a red gem (for its left eye socket) and a blue gem (for its left eye socket). They'd also have to light a sconce in its right hand.

Once they did that, a wall would slide open, revealing a jar twice the size of a person. Pictures on the jar would show people with shovels filling it with sand. If the PCs fill the jar with sand, there will be a "click" and it drains, and a section of the floor will slowly grind open revealing stairs down into a new part of the tomb.

There would be a dark passageway beneath, and I'd probably have some sort of additional problems dealing with "shadow" and "flame," before they reached a room where the last few grains of sand would be falling from the ceiling. Then they would animate into a "Sand Golem" that would prevent anyone from progressing further.

I'm not sure what the Legacy of Am-Sher would be, but it would probably be a magical treasure worth all the effort of this side quest.

What do you think, sirs?

 

[Kafkonia]

One thing I was considering was Constructs. Problem is, even the weakest golem (clay) is beyond their capabilities.

This is where animated objects come in handy. They make nice low-level constructs, and they have a broad variety of appearances/abilities.

That being said, I quite like your sand golem idea. It sounds very flavourful and could make for a very memorable encounter.

 

[RedFox]

This is where animated objects come in handy. They make nice low-level constructs, and they have a broad variety of appearances/abilities.

That being said, I quite like your sand golem idea. It sounds very flavourful and could make for a very memorable encounter.

Oh, I forgot all about animated objects. I'll have to throw one or two in elsewhere in the dungeon for sure. Thanks!

 

[Kafkonia]

Oh, I forgot all about animated objects. I'll have to throw one or two in elsewhere in the dungeon for sure. Thanks!

np -- I just found myself in a similar situation, which is why they were so quick to come to mind.

Do you have Sandstorm? It's a very good desert environment book.

 

[RedFox]

np -- I just found myself in a similar situation, which is why they were so quick to come to mind.

Do you have Sandstorm? It's a very good desert environment book.

No, but I've considered it due to the game location. The city itself is on the edge of a vast, hostile wasteland bordering a mystical elven forest (fantasy geography, gotta love it).

I'm trying to insert a kind of over-plot involving armies of undead encroaching from the wastes, which would come to a head in the mid-levels with a Rakshasa being behind it for some reason or other.

 

[RedFox]

You seem to be on top of things. Your game sounds a lot of fun! The only thing I find lacking from your planned encounters is a negotiation. Negotiations are lot of fun.

Perhaps they can meet a sphinx who is willing to trade knowledge for entertainment?

Well as I said I was thinking of having some different factions in the excavation camp. Some things I thought of but haven't really fleshed out:

• The leader of the expedition having a kind of "rosetta stone" for the heiroglyphs he's been working on, that could give a +5 or more bonus on Decipher Script attempts if the PCs take the time to study it (perhaps one day?)
• A rough sketch of the tomb, showing the area the excavation has explored but leaving out lots of regions that they haven't gotten into yet due to time constraints, traps they couldn't bypass yet, or simply secret areas they haven't uncovered.
• Grave robbers who ended up trapped in one of the rooms or levels and can't get out. Who've possibly unleashed the mummy and undead in the first place.

 

[Kid Charlemagne]

The classic flooding room trap is always a must in pyramid dungeons. Especially when you have undead tomb guardians lurking in the depths...or maybe delaying the PCs escape as the room fills with water.

Just to add to this - I did this once, but made the room fill up with sand - people may memorize waterbreathing but sandbreathing? Not so much.

RedFox - I really like the overall setup you've got going. One idea I might add is a possessing spirit. I'm imagining the greedy thief possessed of the spirit of some sort of evil being - another denizen of the tomb or a devil/demon. He can be the snivelling guy who turns into something worse...