What do you find in a city of aberrations?

[shilsen]

Very nice suggestions, folks! Keep 'em coming.

The words "cyclopean" and "non-Euclidean" geometry come to mind.

Good point. I believe there's a non-Euclidean template out there somewhere. Anyone know what book it came out in?

and lots and lots of tentacles and eye stalks............

Of course. That would, however, make the PC alienist (and probably his NPC friend) quite happy. Let's just say that he carries around tentacles from creatures they've killed for a handy snack.

and nubile anime girls...

...

...

what?

Unfortunately, the only girl in the party is the shifter druid, who's in many ways more masculine (and not just because of the sideburns] than some of the male PCs. On the other hand, Evard's Tentacles of Forced Intrusion could probably make them scream like some.

 

[shilsen]

Long hallways that turn you inside out as you walk down them, yet don't actually harm you.

Chains attached to monstrous beasts by hooks hanging overhead, rusted and nasty.

A pool of fluids that congeals at points and forms hideous facial expressions, with sigils around the pool's edge that when deciphered reveal that this is what remains of a small daelkyr-worshiping cult

Nice. I especially like the hallway idea, though I'm quite fine with it harming them too

There was a Beholder city in a 2e module (which I don't remember the name right know it was in a beholder trilogy).
It had great ideas, like building that could only be entered by flying through a tube and doors made of some magical material that could not be opened but that vanished when the middle eye was active on them...

¿Maybe some Beholder ghetto in the city?

Beholder ghetto ? There's probably going to be a beholder or two there, and I like the idea of architecture that's designed to dovetail with their unique abilities/anatomy. I like to use that approach but sometimes forget to get descriptive about it to the players.

Weird Gravity. You know that M. C. Escher drawing with all the staircases, or the scene from the Labyrinth. Something like that.

Ah, yes. I know exactly what you mean. And I wonder if throwing in Jim Bowie as a singing mindflayer would completely melt their minds.

This cries out for a Shoggoth or two (See if you can find a copy of the story "At the Mountains of Madness" by Lovecraft. Skip to near the end).

It's been a long time since I read that one, but I think I recall what they looked like. Time to go check out Lovecraft online.

 

[wedgeski]

A pool of fluids that congeals at points and forms hideous facial expressions, with sigils around the pool's edge that when deciphered reveal that this is what remains of a small daelkyr-worshiping cult

S'very good.

 

[shilsen]

...

Damn, that's good! *starts scribbling notes*

The Seal itself has probably been surrounded in something made to look like the living heart of the city, or like some kind of soulcage containing all those who died in the city, or like some kind of mondo aberration with really tough hide. Anything to incite the adventurers to level their best destructive abilities towards it, and inadvertently break or disrupt the Seal within.

Very nice. The dimensional seals are effectively immune to physical damage in my campaign, but the PCs coincidentally happen to be carrying an item that can "unlock" dimensional seals. It'll be interesting to see whether they end up inadvertently using it.

Sections of the city probably look like living structures, living floors, and living pillars or whatnot, grotesqueries of alien flesh, bone, sinew, and guts, pulsing and oozing and bleeding and making for unusual, unexpected traps ("What the?! The floor just spit poison at me?!" or "AGH!! Did that pillar just stab me with a TONGUE?!").

Resident hobgoblin or bugbear children may have been turned into ghouls with most of their skin and muscle torn off, and gaps in their bones, revealing rotten, throbbing organs, oozing brains, squirming intestines bloated with worms, and such. Goblins in the area may have been twisted and mutilated into chokers, their arms and legs unnaturally lengthened, their heads somewhat squished, covered in sores and pustules and vestigial limbs and scabs....

Now you're reading my mind. There's a concealed hobgoblin tribe in the area (including bugbears and goblins too) which has hopes of liberating the city someday. The PCs have discovered minor signs of their existence and I was planning to have them encounter mutated goblinoids that have been captured and 'modified'.

Mindflayers (dolgaunts or whatever, is that what they're called in Eberron?) may be around the Seal to use mind-influencing abilities on anyone who approaches, to make them think the Seal is something else, something that needs to be destroyed. Or maybe a goblin alienist, or a psionic blue.

They're definitely going to run into a couple of spellcasting enemies who can summon pseudonatural creatures, as well as a few pseudonatural enemies that dwell in the city. The alienist is a heavily summoning-focused character, using the UA conjurer variant to be really, really good with summons. Time to be hoisted on his own petard - or tentacle, in this case.

 

[shilsen]

Any suggestions for interesting treasure that the PCs might recover?

I'm quite happy to have my PCs well ahead of the wealth/power curve (all of them are walking around with between 45-60,000 gp of equipment each), so I'm thinking about having them recover some powerful items, with the downside that these items are designed by aberrations for their own use. So there would be certain negatives to their use. I'm hoping to hit a balance where they'll be attractive enough to use but the PCs will have to think twice about them.

And non-magical treasure that might be valuable in certain ways but again be, well, aberrant enough to make them say, "Damn - do I really want to take this?" is also on my list of things to have.

Any ideas?

 

[DMH]

Good point. I believe there's a non-Euclidean template out there somewhere. Anyone know what book it came out in?

The Book of Templates (Deluxe Edition) has it. The 3.5 version renamed it mindbender.

If you have Morningstar, I suggest you look at the aberrant signature.

As for other creatures, how about incorporeal things that have no ability to affect the real world- they are used to scare the locals without knocking down the city and as watchdogs. When the daelkyr is threatened, it snaps its fingers and they all become corporeal.

 

[Nebulous]

I agree about the Lovecraftiain approach. Anything with slimes, tentacles, eyestalks and non-euclidian geometry should work well.

As far as monsters, if you're a monster manual fan (like me) have you thought about cracking open all your books and just tagging every "abberation" entry? You'll end up with a hundred cool monsters that will have story-material written all over them. You could have an entire section of the city populated by just one kind of abberation, and work in thematically why that is.

I'm quite happy to have my PCs well ahead of the wealth/power curve (all of them are walking around with between 45-60,000 gp of equipment each), so I'm thinking about having them recover some powerful items, with the downside that these items are designed by aberrations for their own use. So there would be certain negatives to their use. I'm hoping to hit a balance where they'll be attractive enough to use but the PCs will have to think twice about them.

An old adventure i ran once had a man they found dead in an alley. Wrapped around his wrists were twin gold serpent bracelets with ruby eyes. When someone tried to remove the "treasure" the snake lashed out, they failed a save, and the thing bit into his wrists and wrapped around the forearm. It wouldn't come off no matter what, and sapped a point of Con from intravenous feeding. But his Strength was boosted as an offset.

You could adapt weird semi-living entities that parasitically create a disadvantage while offering an advantage. I think the Fiend Folio has good rules for Grafts too, which abberations are typically fond of.

 

[domino]

Ah, yes. I know exactly what you mean. And I wonder if throwing in Jim Bowie as a singing mindflayer would completely melt their minds.

I THINK you mean David Bowie.

 

[Cam Banks]

I THINK you mean David Bowie.

No, the inventor of the Bowie knife, as a mind flayer. Even more creepy.

Cheers,
Cam

 

[WhatGravitas]

An old adventure i ran once had a man they found dead in an alley. Wrapped around his wrists were twin gold serpent bracelets with ruby eyes. When someone tried to remove the "treasure" the snake lashed out, they failed a save, and the thing bit into his wrists and wrapped around the forearm. It wouldn't come off no matter what, and sapped a point of Con from intravenous feeding. But his Strength was boosted as an offset.

Ooohhh... great thing... reminds me of Chaositech by Malhavoc - also contains some stuff for an aberrant city. The mutant template could fit on several creatures, that were mutated by chaotic energies within the city.
Plus: There are very much creepy equipment.