Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="(un)reason" data-source="post: 9300931" data-attributes="member: 27780">Dungeon/Polyhedron Issue 96/155: Jan/Feb 2003part 2/10Critical Threats: The staff keep on trying to make this column happen despite the lack of external submissions, with this one just credited to them as a whole rather than any one person. This time it’s a single dungeon room that you could put anywhere in a larger complex. A magically chilled cavern which means you suddenly have to deal with the dangers of slippery footing on top of whatever monsters might be found there? Fairly basic idea, but you’d be surprised how many groups forget their crampons, particularly if they still have to worry about encumbrance. The ideas on who could be living there are quite advanced and varied though, with three different suggestions for different levels, all using nonstandard monsters with class levels or templates. Not one you can use without a little further work to come up with the full stats yourself then, but still both interesting and flexible, as well as actually managing to fit within a single page like they were supposed to in the first place.Side Treks - Hollow Threats: Sometimes a DM will put low level characters up against a challenge way above their pay grade as a lesson, this ain’t going to be a nice campaign and sometimes you’ll need to run away or hide if you want to survive long-term. Other times, it’ll be a fakeout, and the problem looks big, but is entirely within their power if they just show a little courage and use their brains. So it proves here, where 1st level characters hear rumours that there’s a dragon turtle raiding the local coasts. It’s actually just a gang of orcs who found the corpse of one and made it into a boat. Since they’d rather everyone just flee than have to fight, they use a halfling quisling to spread exaggerated rumours about the danger and then sound the alarm before they raid so hopefully the villages will be empty. Will the PC’s make themselves scarce along with the rest of the villagers or stay to be heroic? If they do it won’t be too hard an encounter. (although you can always add extra class levels if you want to scale the enemies up) Another decent but unexceptional bit of writing that has a decent amount of potential for follow-ups depending on how it goes, if any of the enemies survive and whether the PC’s realise the halfling they encountered earlier was actually an accomplice. Follow that formula and you’ll soon get to 2nd level and beyond.</blockquote>

Verification