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Message: <blockquote data-quote="jbear" data-source="post: 5001710" data-attributes="member: 75065">I liked the added comment about the entertainers (they're good people though). Hahaha. Has this not been the case in your wider experience? Sorry, that tickled me as i'm an entertainer in real life. Maybe the raucus party that the entertainers have as they camp for the night awakes the countryside itself, some gargantuan earth giant who is irked at being awoken after thousands of years of slumber. it begins with what seems like an earthquake, but the earth itself comes alive beneath their feet. Maybe you could even drop a few clues about the place they camp, stoney outcroppings that look like a giant ear, that happens to be easily protected and safe to make it attractive to camp in.  As he shakes himself from the earth, earth motes are thrown up around him and his hive of blind Stonecarvers race out from his tunnels, wrinkles and cracks to defend their master/home. Skill test leaping from the giants ear, across floating earth motes towards the ground with a horde of angry hive-minded creatures hastening their escape. A skill test to calm the irked giant and restore calm amongst the hive. And always the opportunity for an epic battle with a very exciting terrain and a very large hazard to avoid at all costs (and let's not forget entertainers to protect or even acrobats to help the less dextrous escape). Before that occurs, nearby, as the sun slowly sets, they could hear a rather warbled singing from the copse of trees nearby. A wild, red haired man smeared with ash sits there chained by the leg to a semi burnt tree inside a cage made of thorns. He will stop the PCs if they attempt to free him, screaming madly that he will turn to ash!! He mutters and rambles madly. He then recites a poem over and over again looking into the distance with a glassy stare.  No door, no roof, his home aloof,Mother sits in the house she knitsChildren inside they all abideThey don't walk out, but noone's aboutWhen winter comes. If the pCs are clever they will notice he is staring towards the campsite (more specifically the giants nostrils). If the PC's solve the riddle of his poem and bring him his nest, stuck in the giant's nostril (protected by some nasty burrowing beast or one of the hive?) then he turns back in to his original form of a phoenix, bursting forth from the cave. He becomes sane and thankful. he could be a valuable ally in the encounter with the slumbering giant, maybe the phoenix's imprisoner? Maybe he offer's transport somewhere avoiding the giant altogether, or a feather to each PC. If they keep it and are killed by fire they rise from the ashes a day later, the feather crumbling to ash. The Giant and his hive could use fire attacks. You could make the encounter totally lethal, destroying the party completely no holds barred, the giant in his fury burning them to ash with molten rock. Hearts in their throats... thinking they are  dead, suddenly they are reborn amongst the ash. The Giant is asleep once again. There is no sign of the entertainers, except the gaping hole of the giants nostril that leads deep inside the earth, where a broken mandolin lies smashed  outside the entrance to the cave... This riddle is from Riddle Rooms 2 Wilderness Puzzles and Perils. I was thinking of including it somewhere in my own game so that if the PCs bother to solve it they can be rewarded by a phoenix flight to their next destination, and maybe in the future a very valuable ally. Searching through the insides of a massive living earth giant could be pretty awesome too. The thorny bars of the cage are magical, dazing and confusing anyone who strikes them. A small amount of the madness inflicted upon the phoenix. The roots of the cage go very deeply to prevent him being dug out of the cave. Anything the players give the madman bursts into flames. The cage and the madman are immune to fire, the only noticeable effect being that it covers the man in even more ash. When the spell is broken the cage turns into a normal plant.</blockquote>

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