D&D 5E Adventures In the Astral Sea?

[Mistwell]

We are about to end Tomb of Annihilation, which has been a fantastic adventure. Likely we're ending (spoilers ahead):

Spoiler

We killed the Hags, the Soulmonger, and the Atropal. Which summoned Acererack. We're too weakened from the prior battles to beat him. And there is nowhere to flee as there is no escaping the Tomb without going through the room with Acererak. So, rather than die we're hoping to nope out of there...

We're going to intentionally put a bag of holding in a portable hole, create a gate to the Astral plane, and intentionally get sucked into the Astral Sea to escape certain death.

The question is, does anyone know of a good adventure that takes place on the Astral Sea for a party of about 11th level (non-optimized) PCs? We have 2 fighters, a rogue, bard, druid, and cleric. Our plan is to arrive (hopefully together - we will grab onto each other), then probably open our folding boat and shelter in that for a night. Then our cleric will probably cast Planar Ally and try and cut a deal to do a mission for whatever celestial being his deity sends in exchange for sending us back home.

So, we'd need an adventure for a celestial being, at least starting on the Astral Sea, for around 11th level PCs (though sightly lower level probably works OK with our group).

 

[pukunui]

Am I correct in assuming you're one of the players rather than the DM?

First is a question about your current adventure:

Spoiler

When you say you're too weak to confront Acererak -- do none of you have any of the trickster gods possessing you? Both times I've run ToA, I found the bennies from having trickster gods possess the PCs made Acererak a bit of a pushover. 50 THP every round plus a few other goodies is crazy! Acererak was whooped both times, despite the PCs being weakened by previous encounters.

Second: although the final Part 4 of the Spelljammer adventure, The Light of Xaryxis, is meant for 8th level PCs, I bet it could be beefed up so it's suitable for non-optimized 11th level PCs without too much trouble. I think you could also play through that part without having played through the previous parts just fine, and I can easily see a way to have a summoned celestial say, "Here's a job for you! Get on this Spelljammer and go deal with the Xaryxian astral elves!"

The other option would be to depower "The Lambent Zenith's Last Voyage" chapter from Vecna: Eve of Ruin. It's set in Wildspace, but it's meant for 12th level PCs. I think it would be fairly simple to depower it so it's more suitable for 11th level PCs. That said, you could probably get through it just fine with no adjustments - numerous people have said Eve of Ruin errs on the "too easy" side after all.

You could even keep the macguffin in there - the celestial sends you to retrieve it in exchange for sending you home to Toril afterwards.

 

[MatthewJHanson]

If I can plug my own product, my company published a book called Graveyard of the Gods. It's an anthology of site-based adventures, with each one set on the corpse of a different dead god floating in the Astral Sea.

There's two in the book that are around your level:

The Crushing Hand – Years ago, an asteroid city collided with the hand of an ancient god. Now the hand is slowly crushing the city. Anybody who could leave has. Heroes might try to rescue more survivors, broker peace among the city's many factions, or fight the planar parasites spilling over from the dead god. (Level 9-11)

Dreams of Astral Evil – On the corpse of a god of storms, four factions representing air, earth, fire, and water have each claimed a portion of the cavern within the god's body. These factions maintain a tenuous balance...one the heroes could easily upset. (Levels 12-14)

 

[Mistwell]

Am I correct in assuming you're one of the players rather than the DM?

Yes I am a player so no spoilers for the Astral Sea suggestions (please), just something I am passing on to our DM to check out.

First is a question about your current adventure:

Spoiler

When you say you're too weak to confront Acererak -- do none of you have any of the trickster gods possessing you? Both times I've run ToA, I found the bennies from having trickster gods possess the PCs made Acererak a bit of a pushover. 50 THP every round plus a few other goodies is crazy! Acererak was whooped both times, despite the PCs being weakened by previous encounters.

Spoiler

We just don't have the firepower to take him down and survive. He gets three legendary actions per round AND his turn, and he can cast 3rd level spells with his legendary action. Our DM replaced his spells with better spells, so he's tossing as many as three fireballs at us and then something horrifying like Power Word: Kill or another high level spell. Those 50 temporary hit points just don't last the round.

Our backup plan, if the Astral plan fails, is to cast Silence, Fog Cloud, and try and grapple him into both fields to shut down most of his spells. And then just pound on him, mostly with the rogue who has blindsight. But I suspect our grappler will die before the Lich does.

Second: although the final Part 4 of the Spelljammer adventure, The Light of Xaryxis, is meant for 8th level PCs, I bet it could be beefed up so it's suitable for non-optimized 11th level PCs without too much trouble. I think you could also play through that part without having played through the previous parts just fine, and I can easily see a way to have a summoned celestial say, "Here's a job for you! Get on this Spelljammer and go deal with the Xaryxian astral elves!"

The other option would be to depower "The Lambent Zenith's Last Voyage" chapter from Vecna: Eve of Ruin. It's set in Wildspace, but it's meant for 12th level PCs. I think it would be fairly simple to depower it so it's more suitable for 11th level PCs. That said, you could probably get through it just fine with no adjustments - numerous people have said Eve of Ruin errs on the "too easy" side after all.

You could even keep the macguffin in there - the celestial sends you to retrieve it in exchange for sending you home to Toril afterwards.

Thank you those are great suggestions!

 

[Mistwell]

If I can plug my own product, my company published a book called Graveyard of the Gods. It's an anthology of site-based adventures, with each one set on the corpse of a different dead god floating in the Astral Sea.

There's two in the book that are around your level:

The Crushing Hand – Years ago, an asteroid city collided with the hand of an ancient god. Now the hand is slowly crushing the city. Anybody who could leave has. Heroes might try to rescue more survivors, broker peace among the city's many factions, or fight the planar parasites spilling over from the dead god. (Level 9-11)

Dreams of Astral Evil – On the corpse of a god of storms, four factions representing air, earth, fire, and water have each claimed a portion of the cavern within the god's body. These factions maintain a tenuous balance...one the heroes could easily upset. (Levels 12-14)

That sounds great thank you for the recommendation I will pass it along

 

[Zardnaar]

Lich Queens Beloved in 3.5. Dungeon magazine 100 iirc.