One Troll Test - please click through to the blog if you'd prefer a 'with images'.
The trolls live inside a mountain, where they make a profitable living through quarrying, and by operating a tannery. Their leather products, (including harnesses, armour, scabbards, boots and sandals), are of excellent quality and in high demand throughout the region.
The entrances to the trolls’ stronghold are encircled by a corral formed of massive slabs of solid rock, which form a ragged fortified wall. From a distance it looks as though clouds of smoke rise from the enclosure. These are actually flocks of crows hanging over the corral, before falling on freshly staked out carcasses at every opportunity. Anyone approaching the corral cannot easily escape the appalling stench that hangs in the air. The wretched smell rises from animal skins staked out to dry outdoors, mixed with the odours from the combination of urine and dung used to soften and bate the skins.
Traders and craftsmen enter the corral to sell, craft and purchase items; and there’s a regular procession of carts and wagons carrying goods in and out. Fresh animal carcasses, tree bark, bird dung and vats of urine are brought into the compound, while slabs of cut rock and finished leather are shipped out.
Despite their savage nature the trolls are dour and business-like, providing nothing disrupts trading. They tolerate sunlight by wearing wafer-thin sheets of obsidian as helmet visors. Most of the actual trading is carried on in ramshackle cabins or at outdoor stalls where players can purchase a wide variety of goods: waxy nose plugs, flesh-stripping maggots, sun-blocking natural glass and a nutritious meat broth are all in plentiful supply.
There are two entrances to the trolls’ caverns. The first of these is for deliveries. Those entering are expected to extinguish all flames. Bioluminescent fungi and lichens offer a very faint light throughout the stronghold. Wagons are driven into the caves and parked over holes in the floor. The contents of most wagons are then dropped straight into the level below. Adventurers have the option of delivering themselves direct to the second level or seeking out the steps at the back of the first level.
Beyond the delivery points the top level contains a large hall, kitchens, living quarters and a snail farm. The occupants are mainly female and young trolls engaged in preparing large meals served in the hall. The female and young trolls are not troubled by visitors unless exposed to a bright light source, which will make them call for guards. Large groups of trolls gather in the food hall every six hours. PCs can quietly join such a meal if they wish to and the trolls will barely notice. The trolls consume a meal of rough bread and meat broth, washed down with tankards of lukewarm snail slime.
Any PC ‘consuming’ organic troll products, i.e. nose plugs, any foodstuffs or slime notices the following cumulative effects: larger ears, longer hair, swollen nose, weight gain, thickened fingers, improved night vision and more.
The external entrance to the second level down is more heavily guarded and adventurers need to use an effective disguise or distraction to get in without a fight. A massive cavern serves as a warehouse for countless slabs of cut rock, which are brought in along a wide tunnel that leads further into the mountain. The stench intensifies as PCs proceed on into the area of the tannery. A series of interconnected galleries are used to store and prepare raw materials dropped from overhead.
In one chamber maggots strip the last flesh from stretched skins, in another a large pool of urine loosens hairs from the skins readying them for scudding, and in a third weaker trolls knead the skins with dung to make the leather supple. These chambers lead to further galleries where, for example, scraps of flesh are turned into glue, skins are stretched and soaked in tannin-rich bark residue, and some skins are bated in a jelly of brain offal. Finishing workshops follow, with chambers set aside for dyeing, basic metalwork and specialist ‘tanning’, (using chromium sulphate or by tawing). Working trolls will not set out to question players, but occasional guards may try to insist that PCs leave.
A dull, persistent hammering can be heard on the steps to the third level. Security is much tighter with guards at the entrance to a massive quarry worked by male trolls. Hauling equipment is used to raise further slabs through a hole in the floor of the quarry. PCs can try to go down the hole or quietly enter a series of catacombs occupied by various lizards. Most are on long chains and the centre of the labyrinth contains an arena where trolls and lizards compete in pit fights. Beyond the labyrinth, steps lead down to the quarters of the male trolls. There are few trolls here except outside a remarkably clean chamber, freshened with herbal infusions. It also contains a soft bed, a woman’s clothing and a large stone bath.
Steps leading down to a second huge quarry reveal a curious scene. There are dozens of trolls all working on scaffolding surrounding a 40′ tall statue in the centre of the quarry. At the base of the statue the trolls’ chieftain and a shaman call instructions up to the masons. The statue takes the form of a tall, willowy woman wearing a long dress and a golden crown. The same young woman stands beyond the shaman, who uses a measuring stick to check the woman’s proportions before barking further instructions to the trolls on the scaffolding. The chiselling should be louder, but the trolls have padded their hammers to reduce the noise.
The trolls will engage in hand-to-hand combat with intruders but the use of any ‘powerful magical effect’ causes a few cracks to appear in the statue. The trolls are terrified at the prospect of damage to the statue and will barter to avoid more damage. If asked, the young woman will invite the party to leave without her. She’d like to let the trolls finish first.
