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Message: <blockquote data-quote="(un)reason" data-source="post: 8719688" data-attributes="member: 27780">Dungeon Issue 56: Nov/Dec 1995part 3/5A Watery Death: Don't mistreat your summoned minions, or if you do, be very careful not to give them a chance to betray you. Now there's a lesson they have to reteach us every few years. This time it's a water weird and a nereid that managed to kill their master, only to find that didn't solve things and they're still stuck in the vicinity of his treasure vault for spoileriffic reasons. They want their freedom, but obviously don't trust humans after years of magical enslavement, so when an adventuring party happens by, they'll try and separate your wizard from the rest of the party and get you to free them with threats. Will you fight to the death, comply reluctantly, stall them until the rest of the party can catch up and kill them, or manage to talk to them long enough to find out the backstory, become sympathetic to their plight and solve the problem in a less antagonistic way? A pretty interesting little encounter where the enemies aren't villains and don't want to kill you, (or at least not all of you) which forces them to use unusual tactics. This both looks decent to play and gives you plenty to think about on a philosophical level, how adventurers and the intelligent monsters they deal with are trapped in a cycle of revenge handed back and forth down the centuries, and a lot of unpleasant adventures simply wouldn't happen if they didn't go around summoning and mind controlling things from other planes in the first place. If you talk before you resort to violence, it's surprising how much of this you could avoid and who knows who might benefit from the butterfly effect in years to come because of one act of kindness.The Bigger They Are: Mmm, quicklings. Now there's a monster you can really troll the players with, reminding us that speedster is one of the most dangerous superpowers, so they have to nerf it compared to media in nearly every RPG. The PC's wander through the territory of Angwarngaxx, a typically unpleasant member of his race who lives in a giant mushroom with his pet giant spiders. He has a number of traps set in the vicinity, and careless PC's could be caught without even seeing who's responsible. If he catches the PC's, he'll sprinkle dust of diminution on them to make them easy to imprison and only let them go if they have some useful information to offer him. (and even then he won't give their stuff back or restore them to their regular size, requiring a whole other quest while still quarter-sized to fix yourselves.) If you beat him but hang around the area too long afterwards, a group of Drow he trades with will come along to further complicate your lives. So this is the kind of short encounter that's easily expanded into a much longer story, depending on how it goes, allowing you to lose but not die and have more interesting adventures as a result of it. It's sufficiently inventive and sadistic with it's various magical tricks to amuse me and make players develop a real grudge against this guy if he beats them, while not being so laden down with contingencies as to be impossible for smart players of the intended level. I think this is worthy of a good high-pitched nyahahahaha!!!!</blockquote>

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