Help me enworld, I need sewer encounters!

[satori01]

I have a 1st level party that are going to explore the sewer systems of a large city, (sewers inspiried by the Cloaca Maximus of ancient rome). The sewers are an entry way to an older series of catacombs where a temple of ratman live,(shades of Lankmaar).

Alas, work problems have loomed and to make a long story short, I am far away from home, overloaded and fried. So if anyone has any creative monsters, scenarios, and devilish deeds they would wish to share I would be most appreciative. I am willing to take anything and am looking for at least one zany, odd creature or encounter that would be memorable in perhaps a non combat way,(of course combat good as well).

Thanks in advance, and remember, enworld, you are my only hope.

(end transmission)

 

[Olgar Shiverstone]

Rats, snakes, assorted vermin.

Some zombies, perhaps ... escaped from a local crypt.

Oozes ... maybe a shrine to an ooze god with an evil cleric or two.

An otyugh, as something big and nasty to run away from.

Perhaps the headquarters of the Halfling Mafia (TM).

An for zany ... how about a giant crocodile?

 

[Alcareru]

Rats, snakes, assorted vermin.

Some zombies, perhaps ... escaped from a local crypt.

Oozes ... maybe a shrine to an ooze god with an evil cleric or two.

An otyugh, as something big and nasty to run away from.

Perhaps the headquarters of the Halfling Mafia (TM).

An for zany ... how about a giant crocodile?

Oozes yes!

Lacedon-aquatic ghouls-perhaps a deceased sewer worker or boatman.

Large versions of frogs preferably posionous created by the mad wizard that lurks in the sewers bowls.

 

[Dark Jezter]

Sewers in D&D always contain an otyugh. Why do they? Well, people buy baby otyughs as pets because they are cute, but then they flush them down the toilet when they start to get too big.

 

[SteelDraco]

Thanks in advance, and remember, enworld, you are my only hope.

I'm not sure I'm actually physically capable of turning down that particular request for aid. Let's see here. I'll assume that your first level party is of normal size, so a CR 1 encounter should use up around 25% of their resources. A CR 2 encounter at that level is fairly challenging, and CR 3 is potentially deadly. With that in mind...

• Assassin Vine (CR 3) - the subterranean variety of assassin vine would grow very well in a sewer. Lots of food to eat, even if there aren't any tasty adventurers around.
• Choker (CR 2) - a critter like this would probably prey mostly on vermin in a sewer, occasionally snatching a sewer worker or a ratling. Think Gollum.
• Ettercap (CR 3) - you can play around with an ettercap's traps for quite some time, giving them the possibility to avoid the creature itself, though it would look for whatever disturbed its lair. Possibly a scary 'hunted through the dark' episode while they scramble for an exit.
• Ooze Mephit (CR 3) - a large sewer might create spontaneous gates to the elemental plane of Ooze, dumping surprised and angry (or desperate?) ooze mephits into the material plane. Note that these aren't necessarily hostile; perhaps it wants the PC's help to find a way home? An ooze mephit can navigate in places in a sewer PCs can't or won't go; what's down there that they might want to know about?
• Along the same lines, a Dragon magazine a while back had stats for genasi from the other elemental planes. An ooze genasi hermit would be very much at home in the sewers. Perhaps some sort of a sewer druid? Might be an interesting non-combat encounter.
• A smaller version of a shambling mound might be the result of magical run-off, if there's a wizard college or something in the area. Drop it to three hit dice or so, drop the stats and natural armor bonus, and it'd be an interesting little encounter, without stomping their heads in.
• Rat Swarm (CR 2) - while walking down the tunnels, the PCs hear frantic squeaking and chittering, and their torchlight falls across a furry carpet and seething red eyes as dozens and dozens of rats flee from the darkness. The rat swarm attacks the PCs, but what was it running from, and why?
• A (mated?) pair of troglodytes is enjoying the local stench when they run across the PCs. Do they attack? Watch and ambush later? Let them go by? Attempt to talk? For some reason, I love the idea of a pair of troglodytes honeymooning to go smell the human sewer.
• The PCs encounter a smuggler making his way through the sewers on a raft, singing as he poles through the sludge. He's very cordial, and offers to show them his wares, though if they look weak, he'll offer them something to drink and try to poison them.
• The group runs across a dying ratling. Do they kill it? Take it topside for questioning? Why was it dying, anyway, and what happened to the thing that killed it?
• The PCs find the body of a recently-dead official floating through the sludge, with the dagger that killed him still in his back. Around his feet, they find a frayed rope, which was once tied to a stone - he wasn't supposed to ever be found. Perhaps there's some way to identify his killer from the body, such as the dagger? Or is he not even known to be missing yet? Or has he been replaced by a doppleganger?
• Along the same lines as the previous, the PCs find a severed hand with a signet ring on it. The ring is magical, and can be used to create a verified seal, used for getting past customs and signing official orders. Do they turn it in for the reward, sell it to smugglers and thieves, or keep it for their own use?
• And then there are some more standard sewer monsters - snakes, dire rats, monstrous spiders, that sort of thing.

Hope that's helpful.

 

[Tonguez]

To add to the rest

don't forget methane gas - EXPLOSIVE methane gas that will be sparked off by say a unwary explorer with a burning torch

next fires - what do the PCs do when the tunnel behind them is now a raging fireball?

anykind of vermin and/or abberation is at home in a sewer - carrion crawlers perhaps?

or an Umber Hulk who has broken through from an unkown cave system

I had a PC find evidence of a lost civilisation (Yuan-Ti) when the wall of a sewer collapsed and he fell through into an ancient tomb.

The last time I used a sewer an unused part of it was home to a mad Genomancer (Monster Maker) who had created a 'Blood Crucible' which reinvigorated and dead flesh put in it and could be used to create monsters (by combining the bodies of two or more different creatures which combined into one and came back to life)

 

[Telperion]

Slitheren!

A Red Witch with some Maulers tossed in for the fun of it is all you need .

 

[Gnarlo]

Ok, weird and zany (though cliched probably):

The group is trudging through the sewer when they meet another group of 4 or 5 adventurers. This group appears to be very low level, their weapons appear to be made of wood, cloth padding(!), and very cheap metals; their armor looks very shoddy and possibly self-made. They speak in a foreign tongue unknown to anyone in the group. Depending on how you want the encounter to go they either appear lost, scared, and frustrated, or else they seem excited, aggressive but oddly friendly, and high spirited.

The former group is likely to approach the party with relief initially until they realize that the weapons and/or races are not costumes at which point they flee down a nearby tunnel screaming and eerily fading out into nothing. The latter group will gleefully "attack" the group with padded arrows and beanbags while very gleefully shouting and hooting, then quickly flee down a nearby dead end passage and through the solid wall at the end of it, insanely laughing and shouting the entire time. No matter how much searching or inspection (magical or otherwise) is performed, no secret door or passage can ever be found at the dead end.

 

[talinthas]

for what its worth, www.dragonlance.com just put up a link to the preview of the forthcoming Key of Destiny module, and a big portion of the mod is encounters in the sewers of the town, all scaled for level 1s...heck, the whole mod starts that low and builds up. You may wanna check it out =)

 

[satori01]

Hmm thanks for the replies,
they are all really great,

but keep them comming,
at this rate I can keep them in the sewers forever
{insert manical laughter here}