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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Libertad" data-source="post: 9458951" data-attributes="member: 6750502"><img src="https://i.imgur.com/RHKPP7o.png" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " data-size="" style="" /> BecqueshireMisty hills surrounding a lake home to ruins from the times of Once. Quiet villages home to subtle magics woven into the land, and living embodiments of spell-warped weather a frequent danger. Several interesting locations include Beasty Hill, where talking animals gather during half and full moons to feast and party; Salmuri Chapel, a Conclave temple where the magically talented (and afflicted) feel an odd desire to gather, and whose head priest can remotely find hidden things in the valley via his third eye; and Saint Mairwenna’s Harp, a two-story magical instrument that plays in the winds and causes random magical effects, and due to this mages and alchemists of all sorts make their homes nearby. Some interesting NPCs include the gnome Skoldap Gnur, the greatest alchemist in Wildendrem whose services attract the attention of powerful people and thus side quests; the old and vengeful Silvered Noble Meldrim, who fell from power and his greatest Want is to see his old rivals destroyed; and the witch Evredeni Rasp, a collector of songs she stores in glass bottles that once obtained cannot be sung by anyone else.The Hungry Amphitheater is a seemingly abandoned place with ten props scattered over an empty stage. Nearby is a belltower, and it’s common knowledge in the region that a show will be put on tonight when it’s rung. The props are inhabited by the ghosts of actors and actresses with their own personality traits, and will be able to temporarily bond with and silently speak to whoever touches their linked prop. The performances are improv, but the spirits will attempt to steer PCs into suggested titles and concepts for plays, which can be randomly generated with provided tables in the book. The PCs must then perform their own ad libbed play, and the spirits can use magical illusions to add a feeling of realism. PCs who perform well (this can be determined by relevant ability checks and good role-playing) will earn applause from the audience, rewarding the party with money. The unlucky PC who is determined to be the best actor will have the spirits offer a “reward” to them, to die immediately and join them forevermore as a spirit of the amphitheater. Should the PC refuse, they must swear an Oath of Spectacle or save vs death. The Oath revolves around encouraging the performing arts even when offstage, and quests involve activities such as doing such great acting that you can fool others into believing you’re someone else entirely, changing people’s minds on a subject via music or storytelling, and the like. PCs who leave the amphitheater before or during a show, or steal a prop, will have the spirit continually harass them into returning.Nevruné Hall is the decaying estate of a noble family of two surviving sisters, Lady Gemna and Lady Scarlova. They despise each other, having been this way for so long that the original reason’s forgotten and they continually find and make up new excuses to continue their vendettas. The flower knights are humanoid plants who serve the Nevrunés, and being honorbound to both of them has caused conflicts in their duties. For you see, Lady Gemna and Lady Scarlova have the knights engage in endless contests of one upmanship, but when the PCs arrive the noblewomen will attempt to convince the party to covertly assassinate the other. The flower knights do not want this, not necessarily to prevent harm to the Nevruné line, but the fact that serving the Ladies is the only thing that gives their lives meaning, and will do what they can to covertly sabotage any assassination attempt.Reporting one sister’s offer to the other will cause that one to offer successively greater rewards. But revenge won’t make the survivor happy, and should the PCs kill one of them she will grow to resent them and send flower knights and hired help to hunt the party down. The two sisters can be convinced to set aside their differences on a temporary basis, but the only one who can make them see the light for good is the ghost of their father who is interred in a family crypt in a nearby mountain. Said mountain and crypt isn’t mentioned anywhere else in the book, so I presume it’s either missing content or traveling there is uneventful.<img src="https://i.imgur.com/ozDgBDl.png" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " data-size="" style="" />The Perfumed Tomb of the Necropoet is Becqueshire’s dungeon, located in the village of Little Motte. The town was home to Lyra, a bard of great skill who was gifted supernatural powers by a spirit known as Moirlaga (book doesn’t mention gender or pronouns for the latter). Unfortunately one of the shade’s “gifts” made Lyra’s songs so powerful that it instilled in others the Swooning Sickness, a disease that causes one to lose the desire to do anything other than sing and engage in merriment. They will eventually die and rise as zombie-like singing undead known as Perfumed Dead, attracted to scenes of beauty.Moirlaga had a crisis of conscience, but the spirit’s solution was horrible: to murder Lyra and force the townsfolk to inter the body in a tomb. Moirlaga then killed the people who worked on the tomb in the belief that this would contain the sickness, and then returned to the world of the dead. While the disease was contained for centuries, it slowly made its way past the magical protections and into Little Motte. Over the past few weeks up to 20% of townsfolk became infected, which has caused societal collapse and word to spread that something very wrong is happening in town.While the saga of Lyra has since passed into myth and legend and few remember the true facts, the entrance to the concealed tomb can be found via inspecting the statue in the middle of town. It is surrounded by a group of Perfumed Dead (think zombie that can transfer the Swooning Sickness) who will become hostile at anyone who attempts to unlock the hatch at the statue’s base. The book mentions that Thornton Sprightly has the key, but the only NPC with this surname is Pinton Sprightly, the town mayor, so I presume it’s either a misprint or a spouse/family member.The Tomb is a 10 room, 3 level dungeon, heavy on undead in the form of more Perfumed Dead and visitor shades that impose penalty on rolls on a failed save as they whisper hurtful things from the characters’ pasts. Non-undead include mournful hedges which are humanoid masses of animated brambles whose thorns bear poison that deal additional damage, and poetry golems which are carved animated statues with record players built into their chests that can play sheet music. Interesting rooms and treasure include a garden of poisonous flowers and mournful hedges, one of which plays a magical vielle by the name of Melody that causes listeners to weep and take a penalty on rolls while the song plays; an archive room full of Lyra’s songs and other writings of music and folklore, with a poetry golem that is hostile due to jammed sheet music in its chest playing discordant noise; a hidden room accessible by bringing two figurines of Lyra and a shrouded shade together, which contains a book containing six words that can be used to command a dead or undead creature to obey in exchange for the utterer, and living beings that hear it taking 1 damage. For this last treasure, the book causes the holder to suffer -2 AC as they neglect their self-preservation instinct, and risks cursing a wielder to become addicted to it, eventually losing the desire to eat and drink in a week’s time.Lyra’s Crypt holds the bard’s corpse as well as flower blossoms that can be brewed into love potions, but release poisonous spores if improperly handled. Lyra will wake from the dead if her tomb is opened, and will be angry and confused, likely playing her magical vielle Cacophany* that will enrage all undead within earshot. However, she can be reasoned with in several ways, such as showing her the instrument Melody or reminding her of who she is via obtaining clues elsewhere in the dungeon. A hidden staircase below the sarcophagus leads to a cavern with a bridge to the afterlife, stretching into a black void. Those who walk on the bridge risk being tempted to cross over on a failed save vs death, effectively dying. Lyra, if present, will give Cacophan* to someone who was helpful to her before walking across the bridge to join her beloved Moirlaga. If Lyra is killed the old-fashioned way, she will reform in 2d12 days, making this a temporary solution to the sickness.*Using it to enrage undead is possible for wielders besides Lyra, so it can be a fine contextual reward.Thoughts So Far: While one can say that the supernatural is omnipresent in the Valley of Flowers, Becqueshire’s theme strongly plays to the idea of magic being suffused in the land itself. The other major theme is on spirits of the past, such as the ghostly playwrights or the late Nevruné patriarch being necessary for the happy ending to the feuding sisters. Lyra’s Tomb is a novel spin on undeath; while most dungeons with this theme emphasize darkness and decay, the Perfumed Tomb is a bright, sweet-smelling place, and whose monstrous inhabitants may not be overtly hostile but whose moods are highly subjective to the presence and absence of aesthetically pleasing sights and sounds.I’m not as fond of the idea of Lyra reuniting with Moirlaga as the one true way to stop the curse, as well as the book’s use of “beloved” as an adjective in the text. While I’m aware that the Arthurian myth that the Valley of Flowers draws on has some rather outdated and toxic views on relationships, given that Moirlaga basically killed Lyra as the first course of action and then killed more people from a problem of their own doing, such a figure would (hopefully!) be viewed as a villain by most gaming groups and not someone Lyra should be with in the afterlife as a happy ending.Join us next time as we venture into the foreboding Gnarl, filled with rotting undead, the sole priestess of a growing godling, and the haunted prison of one of King Aerthur’s fallen knights!</blockquote>

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