Underdark Trading Post contents...(possible Thunderspire spoilers)
WampusCat43
Explorer
My PCs are about to get into some trading arrangements with the underground, so I'm really loving this. Please keep 'em coming, thanks.
diaglo
Adventurer
str check needed to remove them would make them better than a brazilian wax job.
the Jester
Legend
Drugs:
Dzur- the dwarven equivalent of crack. A small orange crystal, heated to incandescence; the vapors are then inhaled. Long-term effects include terrible lung and throat problems (superheated vapor in the respiratory system is bad for you) and gradually becoming more and more cracked out until you collect kobold underwear to try to sell it for more dzur.
Psychedelic grubs- mmm, glow in the dark maggots that make you hallucinate! Fun times!
Dzur- the dwarven equivalent of crack. A small orange crystal, heated to incandescence; the vapors are then inhaled. Long-term effects include terrible lung and throat problems (superheated vapor in the respiratory system is bad for you) and gradually becoming more and more cracked out until you collect kobold underwear to try to sell it for more dzur.
Psychedelic grubs- mmm, glow in the dark maggots that make you hallucinate! Fun times!
Ydars
Explorer
A few more;
Items;
A barrel of fire-quenching quarrels; each of these crossbow bolts has a canvas bag tied to its end. When fired above a torch or shot at a small campfire, these bolts release a spray of powder as the bag ruptures on impact. This whitish powder releases a cloud of heavy gas when it burns that immediately blankets the fire, cutting off the oxygen, thus extinguishing it. These are beloved by thieves and rogues everywhere as a way of "turning out the lights".
An obsidian box of yellow "dust" is in fact a batch of dried Toothworm eggs; this Underdark worm lays its tiny yellow eggs in fungi that are then eaten by animals. The eggs lodge in the intestine and await a chemical signal to hatch, persisting for decades. This chemical is naturally found in Underdark lakes and is released when the host drinks water containing a species of blind cave fish. At this point the eggs hatch, kill the land host, eating their way out in minutes, and enter the water to infect the cave fish. The cave fish gives rise to the second stage larvae that kill the fish and cause it to rise to the surface of the lake where fruiting bodies spread thousands of tiny spores into the air to disperse this organism thoughout the Underdark. These spores germinate on Underdark fungi to form the third stage larvae that eat their way in and lay eggs inside the fungus and so on.....
The Duergar now use/sell toothworm eggs as a special blackmail/assassination tool. They infect surface dwellers with the eggs and then reveal what they have done at sometime afterwards. They then threaten to dope the infected person's drinks or food with the Underdark lakewater at some future date unless the person does what they desire. They plan to bring even royalty to heel with this plan since no poison taster could detect the chemical trigger as it is harmless to uninfected people. Their victims will therefore live in constant terror and cannot not easily hide from their tormentors; the blackmailers could poison the wells of an entire city by placing cave fish in them and in nearby streams and lakes and only kill those people they had previously infected. This also ensures that the Duergar are able to kill their intended targets no-matter how well hidden they are, as everyone drinks sooner or later.
Box of glowrocks; these colourless glass-like gem facets are used in the Underdark to create heat when there is no fuel. If a small amount of water is poured on them, they create a vast amount of heat for several hours flame as the minerals react with the water. They are useful, if dangerous fire-lighters or they can be used to cook on without producing any smoke.
A barrel of black treacle-like material in fact contains something the Duergar trade with the Drow for; Spidertar. This tar like substance is extracted from certain spiders and can be poured into moulds where it will harden after several hours contact with air. The Drow use this to make weapons with when metal is in short supply. The Duergar sell it to thieves guilds who like swords made of spidertar as the blades are very light and extremely silent; no noise of blade on blade to give them away during ambushes. The spider-tar is also slightly absorbant and so applied poisons enter into the substance of the blades and persist for twice as long as normal.
A large crate contains bags of dark red powder called Dragon's bile. This is a secret substance, discovered by the Duergar, that allows them to smelt (extract from ore) titanium and aluminium. This is added to the ores before melting and whereupon it removes the oxide from the ore to yield free metal. Note that in the the real world, no chemical can reduce these ores and it is done using electricity; hence why Al and Ti were never present before the modern age even though their ores are very common.
A small 1 ft by 1 ft box contains a shiny metallic powder called Glowfire dust. When put on a fire, this powder heats the fire up by a factor of 4, increasing the temperature of the fire but consuming fuel much more quickly. This is a slow reaction and so is no use in combat. Glowfire is used for smelting various metals e.g. aluminium and titanium to make lightweight armour. The Duergar call these metals Nordite and Galenium. They sell Glowfire to those interested in smelting or alchemy.
Items;
A barrel of fire-quenching quarrels; each of these crossbow bolts has a canvas bag tied to its end. When fired above a torch or shot at a small campfire, these bolts release a spray of powder as the bag ruptures on impact. This whitish powder releases a cloud of heavy gas when it burns that immediately blankets the fire, cutting off the oxygen, thus extinguishing it. These are beloved by thieves and rogues everywhere as a way of "turning out the lights".
An obsidian box of yellow "dust" is in fact a batch of dried Toothworm eggs; this Underdark worm lays its tiny yellow eggs in fungi that are then eaten by animals. The eggs lodge in the intestine and await a chemical signal to hatch, persisting for decades. This chemical is naturally found in Underdark lakes and is released when the host drinks water containing a species of blind cave fish. At this point the eggs hatch, kill the land host, eating their way out in minutes, and enter the water to infect the cave fish. The cave fish gives rise to the second stage larvae that kill the fish and cause it to rise to the surface of the lake where fruiting bodies spread thousands of tiny spores into the air to disperse this organism thoughout the Underdark. These spores germinate on Underdark fungi to form the third stage larvae that eat their way in and lay eggs inside the fungus and so on.....
The Duergar now use/sell toothworm eggs as a special blackmail/assassination tool. They infect surface dwellers with the eggs and then reveal what they have done at sometime afterwards. They then threaten to dope the infected person's drinks or food with the Underdark lakewater at some future date unless the person does what they desire. They plan to bring even royalty to heel with this plan since no poison taster could detect the chemical trigger as it is harmless to uninfected people. Their victims will therefore live in constant terror and cannot not easily hide from their tormentors; the blackmailers could poison the wells of an entire city by placing cave fish in them and in nearby streams and lakes and only kill those people they had previously infected. This also ensures that the Duergar are able to kill their intended targets no-matter how well hidden they are, as everyone drinks sooner or later.
Box of glowrocks; these colourless glass-like gem facets are used in the Underdark to create heat when there is no fuel. If a small amount of water is poured on them, they create a vast amount of heat for several hours flame as the minerals react with the water. They are useful, if dangerous fire-lighters or they can be used to cook on without producing any smoke.
A barrel of black treacle-like material in fact contains something the Duergar trade with the Drow for; Spidertar. This tar like substance is extracted from certain spiders and can be poured into moulds where it will harden after several hours contact with air. The Drow use this to make weapons with when metal is in short supply. The Duergar sell it to thieves guilds who like swords made of spidertar as the blades are very light and extremely silent; no noise of blade on blade to give them away during ambushes. The spider-tar is also slightly absorbant and so applied poisons enter into the substance of the blades and persist for twice as long as normal.
A large crate contains bags of dark red powder called Dragon's bile. This is a secret substance, discovered by the Duergar, that allows them to smelt (extract from ore) titanium and aluminium. This is added to the ores before melting and whereupon it removes the oxide from the ore to yield free metal. Note that in the the real world, no chemical can reduce these ores and it is done using electricity; hence why Al and Ti were never present before the modern age even though their ores are very common.
A small 1 ft by 1 ft box contains a shiny metallic powder called Glowfire dust. When put on a fire, this powder heats the fire up by a factor of 4, increasing the temperature of the fire but consuming fuel much more quickly. This is a slow reaction and so is no use in combat. Glowfire is used for smelting various metals e.g. aluminium and titanium to make lightweight armour. The Duergar call these metals Nordite and Galenium. They sell Glowfire to those interested in smelting or alchemy.
Ydars
Explorer
Sorry; some of these need editing down but I am too tired to do it now. In the cold light of day, some will not work, I just wanted to create some Underdark commodities that were not the same old boring stuff but at the same time would not be SO useful to the PCs. Apologies if I fall short.
JustKim
First Post
NO. Webbing is not intrinsically sticky! The stickiness of a capture web is due to a glue applied from a spider's aggregate gland, which is found only in orb weavers. Even in an orb weaver's capture web, however, [SIZE="-2"]not every silk strand is adhesive. The orb weaver uses only enough adhesive to snare a meal-sized insect and lets the elasticity of the webbing do the rest tangling up the insect. The matrix of adhesive application is common to all spiders of a species and what's fascinating is that the pattern of adhesive is also designed to reflect ultraviolet light in a way that resembles a flower when seen through the eyes of an insect. Since humans cannot perceive ultraviolet light, the web doesn't resemble anything to us, but they are truly amazing and wonders of evolution that we still don't fully understand and just recently there was a story on BBC you might have seen about a prehistoric missing link spider previously thought to have been the first orb weaver, which is very exciting but what's also interesting is that it may have used its silk as a drag line, which begs the question of why modern species of dragline spiders have coterminously evolved spinnerets capable of bla bla bla bla bla bla[/SIZE]
Thank you all. These are great, and right in line with stuff I was expecting, Ydars!
MacMathan - Well, it was the end of last session that they took the post, so there hasn't been anytime to see any repercussions. I did make it clear that the mages kept a close eye on the whole hall. It's not going to necessarily affect them in a negative way, though. (in fact, it'll get them "recognized" so Orontor can give them his hook for a quest.)
I also came up with a odd item -
Grekta - translated loosely from deep speech as "death powder," this thick, purple powder is taken from a rare moss deep in the cave fissures of the underdark. It has the property of luring Umber Hulks from miles away, and aggravating them when they get close, making them hostile to anything nearby. It's currently packaged in some other spices to keep it from luring Hulks to the hall.
MacMathan - Well, it was the end of last session that they took the post, so there hasn't been anytime to see any repercussions. I did make it clear that the mages kept a close eye on the whole hall. It's not going to necessarily affect them in a negative way, though. (in fact, it'll get them "recognized" so Orontor can give them his hook for a quest.)
I also came up with a odd item -
Grekta - translated loosely from deep speech as "death powder," this thick, purple powder is taken from a rare moss deep in the cave fissures of the underdark. It has the property of luring Umber Hulks from miles away, and aggravating them when they get close, making them hostile to anything nearby. It's currently packaged in some other spices to keep it from luring Hulks to the hall.
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