1001 Mournland Horrors

[RealAlHazred]

Originally posted by sorcerer:

163) A school house with a floor covered in writhing maggots. (they will not leave the room). Wading thru the maggots deals damage (not much, say two points a round). Fire spells can burn them away but they drop from the ceiling like rain a few moments later...

164) A looted sorcerer's tower. The treasure is not the sorcerer or his tower, but whatever the looters bear (the last group did not get out). A living spell calls this place home (it should be nasty enough to threaten the PC's).

The last group of adventurers wear the magic items/treasure for the encounter, and will groan as the items are pulled off--making looting the dead a rather gruesome affair. One may verbalize..."No that's mine!" or "I wanted to give that ring to my son." Or an accusation, "Thief!" One dead body near the exit calls after the party, "Thieving Ba*****'s!"

165) One of the bodies (from 164) is rather attached to his possessions. And the body keeps turning up wherever the party travels to in the Mournland.
If this is not played out right, it could be comical, so you may not choose to do this.

BUT, the PC with the looted item sees the same body lying amidst the dead at least once a day. Perhaps he is the only one to see it, and the other PCs may begin to question him. If he opens a book, he will see the word, "Thief" on every page (no one else will). Paintings will look at him disapprovingly and mouth the words, 'thieving Bas****!"

Little things like that happen as long as the PC is in Cyre. Nothing bad will happen, but played right the PC should get a growing feeling of menace. Like when the party wakes up and EVERYONE sees the corpse lying just outside the party campsite!

The haunting stops when the party leaves the Mournland. But the PC just might willingly give up the item. Placing it back on the corpse ends the haunting--for that PC. Now a new PC starts getting visitations...

 

[RealAlHazred]

Originally posted by zombiegleemax:

166) The Lights of South Eston, a village located in Southern Cyre, was a major tourist draw. The entire village was surrounded by a forest enchanted by hundreds of permanent dancing lights. Since the Mourning, However, Will-o-the-wisps have invaded the forest, making it impossible to know whether you were surrounded by a benign glowing ball of magic or a hateful fey luring you to your death.
Strange things go on in South Eston these days as well. A monster of fearsome strength has moved in, and the Mourning has turned him invisible, however, when touched by rays from the light of South Eston, it becomes perfectly visible. The monster is working in concert with the will-o-the-wisps, having them draw prey to satisfy in unseen hunger.

 

[RealAlHazred]

Originally posted by zombiegleemax:

167) characters crossing an open field near an abandoned military camp when one of the players makes a search check with a DC 20 sees a Spell mine or sets off if failed (Firetrap cast 3rd level) the players have walked into a spell field {physical description it a small 4 inch soft brass disk with a spring loaded lid that springs open if the player steps on it setting off the Fire trap spell}

168) The players moving along the edge of the mourn lands will notice if they make a (Save vs. Will DC 30) a 4 foot high monolith made of Astral Driftmetal capped with a Khyber Shard covered in ancient Draconic runes. The monolith flickers in and out of the astral plane. If someone makes the will save they can view the monolith without forgetting it is there. Other wise they forget it is there and do their best to avoid the monolith or view it.

169) the players come across a small caravan outside the Mournland that is camped for the night. If the players investigate the find it very quiet in fact they walked into the area of a living silence spell the only problem is it’s friends the Gibbering Mouthers that are hunting down the caravans populace.

 

[RealAlHazred]

Originally posted by Ra-Tiel:

Hi.

Just to add my own nightmares to the collection:

(170)
The characters come to a lonely village. The only sound they hear are screams of lust and pain mingled together. It's coming from a single house, near the town square. When the characters investigate, they'll find a young man and woman, engaged in the act of loving. What the characters see will be too much for them (DC 30 Will Save or panicked): The flesh of the couple has been fused together, and worms and maggots are eating their ways through the bodies. But each second, the flesh heals, and the wounds the parasites cause close again. The couple is captivated in pleasure and torment, for all eternity.

(171)
Near a tree, the characters find the corpse of a human girl. Next to the corpse, a slain horrid rat lies there. From the tree, the body of a human soldier hangs, softly swinging in the breeze. He holds a letter in his hand, reading "Forgive me my daughter, that I couldn't save you."

(172)
The characters come to a river that is flowing red with blood and they see some people in it. When they get closer, they see that the adults are bound, while a young girl walks up and down before them. In front of each adult, she stays and slits their bellies open with a long knife, saying "Please forgive me dad", "Please forgive me, mom", "Please forgive me, uncle", whatever is appropriate. After she has maimed all of her family, she walks up and down again, this time pouring her tears on the wounds, which then heal. Then she continues to slit her relatives open again...

(172)
Each night, each character finds a single bone in his hand when waking up. On the bone is a single word inscribed: "Help"

(173)
After a night of rest, suddenly each character is alone. Each character is incorporeal, and made improved invisible by the strange magic of the Mournland.

(174)
The party discovers two wizards, one from Cyre, one from Breland, both separated from their troops and engaged in a magical duel. The whole scene is as if frozen in time, with one wizard discharging a lightning bolt, and the other one trying to raise a lesser globe. Both casters have a macabre mirror image: instead of whole images, only parts of their bodies are mirrored; the skeleton is one image, as is the nervous system, the muscles, and the blood vessels, also the internal organs form a different image for the spell.

_Ra-Tiel.

 

[RealAlHazred]

Originally posted by zombiegleemax:

175: The scene is a moderately sized town, or perhaps a smaller part of a large town.

Everyone is dead, as you'd expect. All the coins in the area have been changed. The head side no longer bears the traditional image (usually Galifar I) but instead the face of whoever last touched the coin. The expression matches that held at the moment of the Mourning.

The coins are of course no longer legal tender. If several are melted down, an audible scream can be heard coming from the metal. If only one or two are melted at the time, the screams are inaudible to all but the keenest ears.

A few places and faces:

• A man lies fallen in the street next to a stall, the coins which fell from his hand all bear a horrified expression.
• A changeling shopkeeper, slumped over his counter, has some coins under his hand. The face is that of a bored but handsome half-elf.
• In a tavern, a man's corpse at the bar carries coins in his purse. In the right light you can see his tipsy expression blush in the copper's shine.
• The Cyrian Society for Peace was collecting for their charity on a street corner. The coins in the bucket show dozens of faces from around the town.
• In the home of an explorer, there is a chest full of ancient coins from the Dhakaani empire. While the uppermost coins bear the face of the explorer (who was halfway through a haircut at the time) the deeper coins bear hobgoblin skulls. Some of them are broken and some of them show nothing more than specks of bone.
• At an interrupted funeral, the casket is still lying open, and the old woman inside has a serene expression, which is matched by the gold coin on each of her eyes.
• In a safe, the party finds a purse of platinum coins bearing the face of the person who hired them to go look at the town. All of the faces are laughing. Did he happen to hear a hilarious joke at that moment, or is something more sinister going on?

Of course, this could be useful as a clue if your players are looking for someone who passed through here before the day of mourning.

 

[RealAlHazred]

Originally posted by timothyx:

(176) A roaming band of Warforged Scouts (6, cr 2) are scavenging a Warforged fighter unit that became inert. Taking thier heads, arms and even hacking apart the bodies of their fallen brethren, taking weapons, and armor, and anything of any value.

Have they gone mad? or there something else going on here? Who is the cloaked figure in the distance the Scouts run to when they hear a whistle revealing the approaching party?

(177) Along the river across from Loom Keep, the party see's a woman in pearlescent robes walk towards the last few trees living on the edge of the Mournland. She kneels before it, and brings it down with a single swipe of her Scythe. She brings her scythe down on the remaining 20 trees. The screams in the wind begging for help can be heard for the next 3 days, and 3 nights.

Is it the Trees wailing? Or did the trees have a Fae bound to it, and those are the screams of the dying dryads. Who is the woman in the robes and why does she only come out during the height of the full moon?

(178) Angwar Keep is under attack by a small army of Warforged (1 Human Artificer, 16 Warforged Fighters, 3 Warforged Scouts, 2 Warforged titans) across the river. Their siege engines hurling rocks, and fire are buffeting the walls. In the mist covered mornings the sounds of something being built can be heard. For 2 days and nights the onslaught continues unabated, until from the mists can a bridge be seen. Large enough for the titan's to cross and level the Keep. It will be less than a full day before the bridge is completed.

Can the Party defeat the Warforged? What's really going on? Is the bridge a diversion or the vanguard of a much larger force testing the resistance of the Keep's Tactical Position?

(179) A young girl is to marry another man, but she is kidnapped from Vathirond by a jealous House Heir whom she'd previously rebuked his advances. During the flight with his personal soldiers, they cross into the Mournland. A day later, the Heir's horse rides alone back out, blood splayed with arrows in its barding.

Is the girl alive? is the heir alive? Is this an elaborate ruse by the party's arch-nemesis to capture or kill them?

The Father and the House representative both (without knowing) hire the party to find the girl and the Heir. The captain of the guard however, offers an additional reward to leave the girl in the Mournland. Is the tracker that comes along with the party working for the Father or the House? Or is there something more sinister afoot?

(180) A jeweled necklace is for sale by a traveling halfling merchant who skirted the Mournland, but doesn't speak nor read common. Engraved on the back are the Royal House of Cyre's family crest.

Who did it belong to? Where did he get it? Tracing his steps for the last few weeks brings up more questions than it answers. Maybe someone sold it to him, maybe he killed someone for it. Maybe the royal family member is still alive.

 

[RealAlHazred]

Originally posted by oorlof:

Great stuff here! Just saw that my DM posted here...poor me and my party...

Anyways, my addition to the Mournland:

(181) Investigating the ruins of a Cyran village, the PCs find no trace of the normally ever-present undecaying corpses. The Mourning wiped the corpses from the face of the earth (or maybe a carcass crab collected them). Now, the restless spirits of the villagers crave bodies and sensations. They start hounding the PCs, trying to merge their incorporeal forms with the PCs' bodies and fooling themselves that they're incarnating. Apart from a cold tingle, and the creeping idea that an undead apparition is somehow moving inside you, following your every movement, this does no harm...or does it?

 

[RealAlHazred]

Originally posted by zombiegleemax:

(182) Two Colossal pseudo-natural jellyfish who fly through the air like they would through water find each other before the PC's eyes and begin mating. The female bears millions of eggs. (Just think about it)

(183) An obsidian black unicorn lies near her mate: a nightmare. Both are watchers over a grove of trees which mysteriously flourish. They are quite mad and the trees need blood to flower...

 

[RealAlHazred]

Originally posted by oorlof:

(184) In a sudden warp of life-energy, the PCs are losing vital fluids, suffering bruises that come out of nowhere, growing wrinkles, losing hair, all whilst they feel stabbing pains in the gut. Meanwhile, their gear is absorbing the lost life-energy: wooden arrows start to grow buds and leaves, leather items become bloody patches of skin that look like they've just been ripped off the animal.

(185) Some of the PCs' gear loses corporeality overnight. (Of course, the party is attacked in the morning!) Once every couple of rounds, the afflicted items turn incorporeal (still visible as a dense patch of mist roughly shaped like the item) or back corporeal. Or maybe the items behave once every few rounds as if they've got the Ghost Touch ability?

 

[RealAlHazred]

Originally posted by lapson:

186. The battlefield of one of the last confrontation in the Last war. Except that instead of the normal nations, three factions are engaged in eternal battle: The skeletons of the soldiers, their zombified flesh and their animated armor and weapons.