GM's Miscellany: Alternate Dungeons
GM's Miscellany: Alternate Dungeons
Pathfinder 1e
Mad Monk: The remnant of a priest who went insane as the result of his enforced departure from the temple where he spent his life.
The Hanged Priest: ?
The Nettling Demon: ?
The Hungry Nursery: ?
The Lonely Tavern: ?
Undead Frost Worm: ?
Anguish: ?
Dancing Decor: ?
Slamming Door: ?
Undead: Once per day, a feast materializes on a table in a communal room. Depending on the temple’s alignment, the food provides the benefits of the heroes’ feast spell or acts as create undead should a PC eating the food die within 24 hours of consuming it.
Allip: One of the many types of undead creatures that can arise in abandoned temples, allips were insane humanoids under the care of the temples’ priests who succumbed to their madness. The creatures also may have once been priests driven mad by the circumstances that led to the temple’s abandonment.
Ghost: Clergy who feel they had unfinished business or wish to see their temples restored remain to haunt these locations. Fully restoring the temple or destroying it puts these undead to rest.
Lonesome spirits, mere shades of what they once were. What better place for a ghost to haunt than a place so keenly reminiscent of its own tragic existence? Almost any undead creature might identify with the ruination of a once-warm and lively place, but ghosts—with their tendency to linger over unfinished business—are more likely than any other kind to haunt the places they knew best in life.
Powerful witches are able to leave lasting imprints upon the land with their final breaths, transforming themselves into powerful, incorporeal undead through extreme hatred and emotional distress. Often manifesting as ghosts, spectres or wraiths, these witches blight the land and cause strange murders and ill fortunate to beset the locals until they move away from the site of the curse.
When a creature dies, any intense emotions it experiences at the time of death are often left behind as a psychic footprint. Fear, anger, hatred and sorrow are by far the most powerful of these emotions and often causes the most dangerous and destructive haunts to manifest. It should come as no surprise an act as evil as murder, which often comprises all three of these emotions and more, is a leading cause of the creation of powerful supernatural entities. Ghosts, spectres, wraiths and poltergeists are all commonly created in this manner, and when created they seldom stray far from the place where they were murdered.
Huecuva: Many times, a religion fails due to betrayal by its supposed leaders, or a cleric may do something that is anathema to his or her deity to spite those forcing out worship of the deity. In such cases, the fallen return as huecuvas that infest the temples in which they used to minister.
Skeleton: The negative energy surrounding the temple’s demise either brings unholy life to the corpses interred at the temples or draws mindless undead to them. While skeletons and zombies are the most common undead, ghouls, spectres and vampires also lair in deserted temples.
Zombie: The negative energy surrounding the temple’s demise either brings unholy life to the corpses interred at the temples or draws mindless undead to them. While skeletons and zombies are the most common undead, ghouls, spectres and vampires also lair in deserted temples.
Ghoul: The negative energy surrounding the temple’s demise either brings unholy life to the corpses interred at the temples or draws mindless undead to them. While skeletons and zombies are the most common undead, ghouls, spectres and vampires also lair in deserted temples.
Spectre: The negative energy surrounding the temple’s demise either brings unholy life to the corpses interred at the temples or draws mindless undead to them. While skeletons and zombies are the most common undead, ghouls, spectres and vampires also lair in deserted temples.
Powerful witches are able to leave lasting imprints upon the land with their final breaths, transforming themselves into powerful, incorporeal undead through extreme hatred and emotional distress. Often manifesting as ghosts, spectres or wraiths, these witches blight the land and cause strange murders and ill fortunate to beset the locals until they move away from the site of the curse. When a creature dies, any intense emotions it experiences at the time of death are often left behind as a psychic footprint. Fear, anger, hatred and sorrow are by far the most powerful of these emotions and often causes the most dangerous and destructive haunts to manifest. It should come as no surprise an act as evil as murder, which often comprises all three of these emotions and more, is a leading cause of the creation of powerful supernatural entities. Ghosts, spectres, wraiths and poltergeists are all commonly created in this manner, and when created they seldom stray far from the place where they were murdered.
Several decades ago the inhabitants of Saltspray, a small coastal village, were all but wiped from existence by the appetites of a band of sahuagin. Although the monsters were eventually repelled, over half the villagers were murdered, their half-devoured corpses left to rot in a grotto built atop a nobleman’s summer home. In the following years, the manor has become a haunt filled with dozens of lost spirits, the most notable of which is the manor’s former owner. Now a powerful spectre, it is said the owner’s wailing can be heard long into the night once a month as the full moon rises.
Vampire: The negative energy surrounding the temple’s demise either brings unholy life to the corpses interred at the temples or draws mindless undead to them. While skeletons and zombies are the most common undead, ghouls, spectres and vampires also lair in deserted temples.
Haunt: Temples deserted under negative circumstances, or those that carried out vile rites, attract spirits that cannot manifest as incorporeal undead. This makes them no less dangerous.
If tragedy befell the village, undead citizenry might haunt the adventure site.
Haunts are typically created by restless souls or pervading evil, but an abandoned village can almost have a “spirit” of its own.
Powerful witches are able to leave lasting imprints upon the land with their final breaths, transforming themselves into powerful, incorporeal undead through extreme hatred and emotional distress. Often manifesting as ghosts, spectres or wraiths, these witches blight the land and cause strange murders and ill fortunate to beset the locals until they move away from the site of the curse.
Manors are often at the apex of these death knell curses because a witch’s vengeance is directed at an individual or specific group of people, who quickly perish from her supernatural vengeance or flee from their homes for fear of a grisly demise. Products of a witch’s death knell curse last for hundreds of years and typically are not stopped until someone is able to find the spirit and slay it, destroying its strange hold upon the building and the surrounding region.
When a creature dies, any intense emotions it experiences at the time of death are often left behind as a psychic footprint. Fear, anger, hatred and sorrow are by far the most powerful of these emotions and often causes the most dangerous and destructive haunts to manifest.
In many ways, a haunted house is created by suicide in the same way it is created by murder, though sorrow and self-loathing often fuel the supernatural entities born from suicide rather than fear, anger or hatred as is true with murder.
When it comes to planar magic, mages are often tinkering with forces they scarcely comprehend, let alone control. A single misspoken word or a stray line within a magic circle can cause a spell to backfire with tremendous force, calling an outsider into the mortal realm. In rare circumstances, the outsider may be physically unable to leave the place it was summoned within for reasons even it is unlikely to understand. Perhaps the mage’s home is inscribed with warding runes as a fail-safe or the magic is unstable, preventing the creature from straying far from its point of summoning. Even more horrifying are the outsiders who possess unfettered access to the Material Plane, retreating to abandoned structures by daylight only to prey again on mortal flesh come dusk.
Any event causing a suitable amount of negative emotion can create a haunt, whether this tragedy is a massive fire at an orphanage, the demise of a family or the deaths of an entire neighbourhood from an epidemic.
Several decades ago the inhabitants of Saltspray, a small coastal village, were all but wiped from existence by the appetites of a band of sahuagin. Although the monsters were eventually repelled, over half the villagers were murdered, their half-devoured corpses left to rot in a grotto built atop a nobleman’s summer home. In the following years, the manor has become a haunt filled with dozens of lost spirits, the most notable of which is the manor’s former owner. Now a powerful spectre, it is said the owner’s wailing can be heard long into the night once a month as the full moon rises.
Fifty years ago, a vile witch attempted to summon a powerful demon by offering it the soul of a local baker’s girl. Although the witch was caught, tried and hanged thanks to the efforts of a party of adventurers, with her final breath she scorned the city and its people, promising to return to drag all of their souls to the depths of the Abyss.
On the night of the first full moon after the witch’s death, eerie lights and sounds began to plague her victim’s home. In fear, the family left the city and moved into the hamlet of Greenborough to escape the horror. Unfortunately, the haunting followed the family and they all died in their newly constructed manor within one moon of their arrival. Local legends claim the witch’s angry spirit now holds the family’s souls captive within the manor with the assistance of a malevolent force from outside the mortal realms.
Attic Whisperer: An attic whisperer is the spirit of a small child who met his or her end as a result of neglect.
Wraith: Powerful witches are able to leave lasting imprints upon the land with their final breaths, transforming themselves into powerful, incorporeal undead through extreme hatred and emotional distress. Often manifesting as ghosts, spectres or wraiths, these witches blight the land and cause strange murders and ill fortunate to beset the locals until they move away from the site of the curse.
When a creature dies, any intense emotions it experiences at the time of death are often left behind as a psychic footprint. Fear, anger, hatred and sorrow are by far the most powerful of these emotions and often causes the most dangerous and destructive haunts to manifest. It should come as no surprise an act as evil as murder, which often comprises all three of these emotions and more, is a leading cause of the creation of powerful supernatural entities. Ghosts, spectres, wraiths and poltergeists are all commonly created in this manner, and when created they seldom stray far from the place where they were murdered.
Poltergeist: When a creature dies, any intense emotions it experiences at the time of death are often left behind as a psychic footprint. Fear, anger, hatred and sorrow are by far the most powerful of these emotions and often causes the most dangerous and destructive haunts to manifest. It should come as no surprise an act as evil as murder, which often comprises all three of these emotions and more, is a leading cause of the creation of powerful supernatural entities. Ghosts, spectres, wraiths and poltergeists are all commonly created in this manner, and when created they seldom stray far from the place where they were murdered.
