WizarDru
Adventurer
[note to mods: I don't see a sub-forum for this plots/monsters/etc any longer? If I've missed it, please move this thread to the appropriate location. Thanks!]
So, I've been sort of coasting this year. Our games have been spaced out more and with a bunch of personal issues cropping up (heavy workload, house sale, drama), I haven't thrown as much time at our game as might have liked. This previous session ended early so everyone could get some sleep for a change, but I need to develop the idea of the adventure a trifle more.
So here's the central nugget:
The players are members of the Arbokguard, sworn monster-hunters in the service of the King. Over the course of the first 10 levels of the game, they have stumbled across a conspiracy run by a group known as the Cruel Wizards...and discovered they have what are essentially evil counterparts in the form of the Storm Legion. After two blistering attacks at their hands, the guard's senior captains decided enough is enough and dispatch the party to find and infiltrate an identified Storm Legion base in a dangerous area known as the Riftlands. After some dangerous maneuvers, they do so by posing as new recruits to the Legion.
They are taken to the fortress of Doman'sass ("little shadowed house") and discover it is actually an ancient fortress that predates written history, with signs that it has been constantly reused over the millennia. Doman'sass proper is a highly-secured installation at the top of a mountain, where the Legion's academy rests. And among it is a ruined tower where applicants are tested; those found wanting never emerge once they have entered. The players are unexpectedly ushered there on their second day.
They see signs that the Storm Legion has been hiring interdimensional allies, specifically Slaad mercenaries. While being led in, they kill their guard and then find an unexpected ally when a blue slaad emissary reveals their duplicity and then refuses to lift a finger to help the remaining guards when the bodies start hitting the floor. The players end up taking a long elevator down, deep into the mountain.
And that's where we broke. The players are expecting a few things, based on their intel. That some cruel wizards are here, one of whom has a staff that can control some ancient guardians located above (think easter island heads that animate...or the guardians from Disney's Atlantis movie). Somewhere they know there is a mace named 'Hate Blossom' that is located on the premises. They know some form of testing is done in this complex. And finally they know that this place is like no other place they've seen.
When I considered what this place was, I decided it was one of four or five waystations. The walls are done in stone lattice and designs that occasionally illuminate with colored energy. If you ever seen the internal workings of the Laputa in Miyazaki's movie, you'll get the idea. In my game, it's been established that the Aewyn are largely considered to be the 'First Folk', the first race that the Divine created. It turns out that this wasn't true. The Aewyn (basically the Eladrin) were preceeded by the Suelwyn, who are horribly imperfect creatures. They were the first attempt to create a race, and look more like silly putty monstrosities. But if I established that this place predated THEM....what would that mean.
I decided (as you've surely guessed) that the Divine created the Modrons before them and used them to actually BUILD the Irth (i.e the Prime Material Plane). They would be creations of Derra, god of Earth and crafters (and father of the dwarves) and they would have assembled the Irth from the raw stuff of the firmament. However, I want the modrons to be somewhat otherworldly and different.
My operating theory is this: The Divine (at that time numbering 28, before they would split into two separate groups) decide to create the Irth. To that end the commision Derra to create tools for them to do it. Those tools are the Modrons. The modrons first created some of the demesnes of the Divine. Then they travelled to the Prime and created installations as factories and planning offices (of a sort) from which to launch their construction project. When that project was completed, they dispatched units about the Irth, left behind some Modrons to maintain the facilities and the great number of them left for further projects.
The Divine then set about creating a race to inhabit their world. But they are divided and their race shows it. The Suelwyn are a dish with too many cooks and have so many versions and makers that they have no true identity save for chaos itself. Though they master the Irth and form empires, they are a bitter people, often divided amongst themselves. Their failure to be what the Divine had hoped and what to do with them leads to dissension, disagreement and eventually fragmentation.
The Divine split into two factions, The Watchers Above and The Greater Sidhe. The Greater Sidhe create their own race: the Aewyn. The Aewyn are everything the Suelwyn wished they could have been...so much so that they ignore their own accomplishments and see only their failures and perceive only betrayal from their makers. They don't resent the Aewyn themselves and oddly enough don't see the inherent goodness of that fact. As a final act of defiance, they discover the Far Realms (also known as the Plane of Dread) and travel there en masse, certain that if they are creatures of chaos, to chaos they shall go.
This becomes the final straw for the Greater Sidhe, who travel to their plane, the FeyWild...and take their subjects, the Aewyn, with them. The Watchers Above now create other sapient races with abandon, populating the Irth with Humans, Elves, Dwarves and others. As time passes, they too form empires and societies. Some of them eventually discover the modron stations; eventually some of them are assualted and in the case of Doman'sass, the modrons are captured, analyzed and some are even experimented on.
So that brings us to the present: the players are about to set foot in this former waystation. The Legion has named it "The Horned Hold", but it's proper name (which the players have just discovered) is "Ingress Development Station Prime" (refering to the fact that the modrons used it as an inbound waystation to the prime and point of departure for construction projects). What I need to do now is actually put stuff in this dungeon. Cool stuff. So I look to you guys for suggestions.
My thinking is that Doman'sass fell into the Cruel Wizards hands in the last hundred years. During that time, they managed to subjugate the place and reinforce it's defenses. One of the things that the Modrons left behind were a ring of 'statues' around the facility entrance that are actually modron defenders. One cruel wizard, Anachronox, bears a staff with a cog at the top that can command them, although somewhat poorly. They have not fully subjugated the facility, but have sealed off the areas they couldn't handle and repurposed what they could.
The dungeon needs to have three things:
Any ideas are welcome.
So, I've been sort of coasting this year. Our games have been spaced out more and with a bunch of personal issues cropping up (heavy workload, house sale, drama), I haven't thrown as much time at our game as might have liked. This previous session ended early so everyone could get some sleep for a change, but I need to develop the idea of the adventure a trifle more.
So here's the central nugget:
The players are members of the Arbokguard, sworn monster-hunters in the service of the King. Over the course of the first 10 levels of the game, they have stumbled across a conspiracy run by a group known as the Cruel Wizards...and discovered they have what are essentially evil counterparts in the form of the Storm Legion. After two blistering attacks at their hands, the guard's senior captains decided enough is enough and dispatch the party to find and infiltrate an identified Storm Legion base in a dangerous area known as the Riftlands. After some dangerous maneuvers, they do so by posing as new recruits to the Legion.
They are taken to the fortress of Doman'sass ("little shadowed house") and discover it is actually an ancient fortress that predates written history, with signs that it has been constantly reused over the millennia. Doman'sass proper is a highly-secured installation at the top of a mountain, where the Legion's academy rests. And among it is a ruined tower where applicants are tested; those found wanting never emerge once they have entered. The players are unexpectedly ushered there on their second day.
They see signs that the Storm Legion has been hiring interdimensional allies, specifically Slaad mercenaries. While being led in, they kill their guard and then find an unexpected ally when a blue slaad emissary reveals their duplicity and then refuses to lift a finger to help the remaining guards when the bodies start hitting the floor. The players end up taking a long elevator down, deep into the mountain.
And that's where we broke. The players are expecting a few things, based on their intel. That some cruel wizards are here, one of whom has a staff that can control some ancient guardians located above (think easter island heads that animate...or the guardians from Disney's Atlantis movie). Somewhere they know there is a mace named 'Hate Blossom' that is located on the premises. They know some form of testing is done in this complex. And finally they know that this place is like no other place they've seen.
When I considered what this place was, I decided it was one of four or five waystations. The walls are done in stone lattice and designs that occasionally illuminate with colored energy. If you ever seen the internal workings of the Laputa in Miyazaki's movie, you'll get the idea. In my game, it's been established that the Aewyn are largely considered to be the 'First Folk', the first race that the Divine created. It turns out that this wasn't true. The Aewyn (basically the Eladrin) were preceeded by the Suelwyn, who are horribly imperfect creatures. They were the first attempt to create a race, and look more like silly putty monstrosities. But if I established that this place predated THEM....what would that mean.
I decided (as you've surely guessed) that the Divine created the Modrons before them and used them to actually BUILD the Irth (i.e the Prime Material Plane). They would be creations of Derra, god of Earth and crafters (and father of the dwarves) and they would have assembled the Irth from the raw stuff of the firmament. However, I want the modrons to be somewhat otherworldly and different.
My operating theory is this: The Divine (at that time numbering 28, before they would split into two separate groups) decide to create the Irth. To that end the commision Derra to create tools for them to do it. Those tools are the Modrons. The modrons first created some of the demesnes of the Divine. Then they travelled to the Prime and created installations as factories and planning offices (of a sort) from which to launch their construction project. When that project was completed, they dispatched units about the Irth, left behind some Modrons to maintain the facilities and the great number of them left for further projects.
The Divine then set about creating a race to inhabit their world. But they are divided and their race shows it. The Suelwyn are a dish with too many cooks and have so many versions and makers that they have no true identity save for chaos itself. Though they master the Irth and form empires, they are a bitter people, often divided amongst themselves. Their failure to be what the Divine had hoped and what to do with them leads to dissension, disagreement and eventually fragmentation.
The Divine split into two factions, The Watchers Above and The Greater Sidhe. The Greater Sidhe create their own race: the Aewyn. The Aewyn are everything the Suelwyn wished they could have been...so much so that they ignore their own accomplishments and see only their failures and perceive only betrayal from their makers. They don't resent the Aewyn themselves and oddly enough don't see the inherent goodness of that fact. As a final act of defiance, they discover the Far Realms (also known as the Plane of Dread) and travel there en masse, certain that if they are creatures of chaos, to chaos they shall go.
This becomes the final straw for the Greater Sidhe, who travel to their plane, the FeyWild...and take their subjects, the Aewyn, with them. The Watchers Above now create other sapient races with abandon, populating the Irth with Humans, Elves, Dwarves and others. As time passes, they too form empires and societies. Some of them eventually discover the modron stations; eventually some of them are assualted and in the case of Doman'sass, the modrons are captured, analyzed and some are even experimented on.
So that brings us to the present: the players are about to set foot in this former waystation. The Legion has named it "The Horned Hold", but it's proper name (which the players have just discovered) is "Ingress Development Station Prime" (refering to the fact that the modrons used it as an inbound waystation to the prime and point of departure for construction projects). What I need to do now is actually put stuff in this dungeon. Cool stuff. So I look to you guys for suggestions.
My thinking is that Doman'sass fell into the Cruel Wizards hands in the last hundred years. During that time, they managed to subjugate the place and reinforce it's defenses. One of the things that the Modrons left behind were a ring of 'statues' around the facility entrance that are actually modron defenders. One cruel wizard, Anachronox, bears a staff with a cog at the top that can command them, although somewhat poorly. They have not fully subjugated the facility, but have sealed off the areas they couldn't handle and repurposed what they could.
The dungeon needs to have three things:
- Some form of test or testing chamber that the Storm Legion uses on recruits to make them members
- Modrons, some twisted by Cruel Wizard experiments
- An emergency escape route of some sort
Any ideas are welcome.
