RangerWickett
Legend
TL;DR
[sblock]There's a ruined city in a collapsed canyon, where undead and a few fiends serve a medusa necromancer who guards the first book of Creation. Help me freak out my 6th level party.[/sblock]
Vignette One: Orcs ambush the party in the mountains two days outside of their home town. The PCs manage to kill one before he leaves the tree line. They finish the rest of the battle, treat their wounded. When they go to loot the one orc in the woods, they find his body has been dragged away.
Vignette Two: Weeks later, en route to a ruin they want to explore, the party spots a white figure across a river. It's too far to catch up to, but they end up crossing the river and camping. They can't find any tracks of the figure. That night they wake up as a skeleton walks through their camp, dragging the body of a dead kobold. They destroy the skeleton.
Vignette Three: Prospecting for silver ore in the wasteland south of their home town, the party spots a 'white mountain,' and as they approach it they see a figure holding something in its arms. When they get closer they find a walking skeleton carrying a white cloth wrapped around a (non-animated) infant skeleton. They destroy it, then find the 'mountain,' actually a pile of bones - thousands of dead bodies. Scattered around it are a few recently-dug graves with only slightly decomposed corpses.
The Adventure: The party needs to find an ancient book so they can find the true name of a demon lord and banish him and his minions. A sage points them to the ruined city of Chathus, in the wasteland to the south.
The History: The city-state of Chathus was ruled by a long line of earth mages who found a great treasure buried on a hillside: an ancient wooden boat, hundreds of miles from the sea, which contained artifacts crafted by the first creator deity. A carving inside the ship - the words glowing with divine light - read, "Rain shall fall until only My chosen people survive." And tellingly, rain constantly fell in the interior of the ship.
Originally a nomadic culture of horse-riders, the Chathans settled above this treasure, which provided them an unending supply of drinking water, though they kept the source secret. Over the following centuries the royal family used a primitive book they found in the boat to decipher other glowing writing on its walls, including things like "Waxing wroth, I destroyed the earth my hand shaped." They covered up everything except "the earth my hand shaped," and they gained the ability to reshape stone with a touch.
One passage read, "Obey this commandment: cherish thy God." They chipped away the part of the wall after 'commandment,' and found that if they brought someone in front of that wall and gave an order, any order, the person so ordered would have to try to obey it.
They used this power to summon demons and bind them into unending servitude. The words of Creation, it turns out, are unyielding.
The royal family's earth mages built complex subterranean irrigation channels and erected huge edifices of stone to mark their might. Their demon binders raised horrific armies, and they ruled cruelly.
The Cataclysm: Four centuries ago, after a long war the mighty city-state of Chathus fell to the armies of the Ragesian Empire. The emperor allowed the monarchy to remain in power as long as they pledged fealty to him. A few years later, though, the emperor's son visited the Chathan queen, Dhyra, on a diplomatic mission. She used these divine words to seize control of his mind and send him back to assassinate his father. He failed, and emperor had to kill his own son. The emperor retaliated and gathered his army, intending to march on the city and kill the queen's children in front of her.
The army approached and smashed through the walls of Chathus. In desperate fear, Dhyra summoned the elemental prince Ogremoch, demanding the power to spare her children from death. Twisting her words, he transformed her into a medusa, and when she gazed upon her children she turned them to stone. Driven mad, not willing to go on living, she rushed to the catacombs of the ancient ship, petrifying every one of her guards along the way.
There she uncovered the full text of one passage: "Waxing wroth, I destroyed the earth my hand shaped."
With single sweep of her hand, she collapsed the entire city, dropping it into a massive canyon. Thousands of her people died, the Ragesian army was driven back, and all she ever loved was destroyed. She expected to be crushed too, but when she finally came to her senses she found the ark had resisted the quake. She wept, surrounded by the rain that would never end.
Encounters in the City
Here's where I could use help. I know what I want the finale of the party's exploration to be -- entering the queen's subterranean palace, where she is attended by skeletal minions and is surrounded by thousands of petrified children she has collected over the centuries -- but what else should the party face along the way?
I have a lot of backstory, but I don't want to infodump it. I'd like them to see clues of what happened so they try to piece it together. If they're smart, perhaps they'll even realize how horrifying a Legendary Medusa Necromancer with lair actions is going to be, and they can prepare for her.
Any suggestions?
[sblock]There's a ruined city in a collapsed canyon, where undead and a few fiends serve a medusa necromancer who guards the first book of Creation. Help me freak out my 6th level party.[/sblock]
Vignette One: Orcs ambush the party in the mountains two days outside of their home town. The PCs manage to kill one before he leaves the tree line. They finish the rest of the battle, treat their wounded. When they go to loot the one orc in the woods, they find his body has been dragged away.
Vignette Two: Weeks later, en route to a ruin they want to explore, the party spots a white figure across a river. It's too far to catch up to, but they end up crossing the river and camping. They can't find any tracks of the figure. That night they wake up as a skeleton walks through their camp, dragging the body of a dead kobold. They destroy the skeleton.
Vignette Three: Prospecting for silver ore in the wasteland south of their home town, the party spots a 'white mountain,' and as they approach it they see a figure holding something in its arms. When they get closer they find a walking skeleton carrying a white cloth wrapped around a (non-animated) infant skeleton. They destroy it, then find the 'mountain,' actually a pile of bones - thousands of dead bodies. Scattered around it are a few recently-dug graves with only slightly decomposed corpses.
The Adventure: The party needs to find an ancient book so they can find the true name of a demon lord and banish him and his minions. A sage points them to the ruined city of Chathus, in the wasteland to the south.
The History: The city-state of Chathus was ruled by a long line of earth mages who found a great treasure buried on a hillside: an ancient wooden boat, hundreds of miles from the sea, which contained artifacts crafted by the first creator deity. A carving inside the ship - the words glowing with divine light - read, "Rain shall fall until only My chosen people survive." And tellingly, rain constantly fell in the interior of the ship.
Originally a nomadic culture of horse-riders, the Chathans settled above this treasure, which provided them an unending supply of drinking water, though they kept the source secret. Over the following centuries the royal family used a primitive book they found in the boat to decipher other glowing writing on its walls, including things like "Waxing wroth, I destroyed the earth my hand shaped." They covered up everything except "the earth my hand shaped," and they gained the ability to reshape stone with a touch.
One passage read, "Obey this commandment: cherish thy God." They chipped away the part of the wall after 'commandment,' and found that if they brought someone in front of that wall and gave an order, any order, the person so ordered would have to try to obey it.
They used this power to summon demons and bind them into unending servitude. The words of Creation, it turns out, are unyielding.
The royal family's earth mages built complex subterranean irrigation channels and erected huge edifices of stone to mark their might. Their demon binders raised horrific armies, and they ruled cruelly.
The Cataclysm: Four centuries ago, after a long war the mighty city-state of Chathus fell to the armies of the Ragesian Empire. The emperor allowed the monarchy to remain in power as long as they pledged fealty to him. A few years later, though, the emperor's son visited the Chathan queen, Dhyra, on a diplomatic mission. She used these divine words to seize control of his mind and send him back to assassinate his father. He failed, and emperor had to kill his own son. The emperor retaliated and gathered his army, intending to march on the city and kill the queen's children in front of her.
The army approached and smashed through the walls of Chathus. In desperate fear, Dhyra summoned the elemental prince Ogremoch, demanding the power to spare her children from death. Twisting her words, he transformed her into a medusa, and when she gazed upon her children she turned them to stone. Driven mad, not willing to go on living, she rushed to the catacombs of the ancient ship, petrifying every one of her guards along the way.
There she uncovered the full text of one passage: "Waxing wroth, I destroyed the earth my hand shaped."
With single sweep of her hand, she collapsed the entire city, dropping it into a massive canyon. Thousands of her people died, the Ragesian army was driven back, and all she ever loved was destroyed. She expected to be crushed too, but when she finally came to her senses she found the ark had resisted the quake. She wept, surrounded by the rain that would never end.
Encounters in the City
Here's where I could use help. I know what I want the finale of the party's exploration to be -- entering the queen's subterranean palace, where she is attended by skeletal minions and is surrounded by thousands of petrified children she has collected over the centuries -- but what else should the party face along the way?
I have a lot of backstory, but I don't want to infodump it. I'd like them to see clues of what happened so they try to piece it together. If they're smart, perhaps they'll even realize how horrifying a Legendary Medusa Necromancer with lair actions is going to be, and they can prepare for her.
Any suggestions?
