Squire James
First Post
Wow, so far it looks like the thread died before it got to the logical end! Given the subject matter, I shouldn't be surprised I guess!
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WIR S1 Tomb of Horrors [SPOILERS!! SPOILERS EVERYWHERE!!]
- Thread starter Stoat
- Start date
jonesy
A Wicked Kendragon
Nah. It's not dead. It's just taking a nap before entering the final sections. 
I can't think of anything apart from the pregens and the stricter time limit that would be different at a con game. I might have said that it would be harder to DM for, but that's not really the case if the DM prepares for it beforehand (like he should anyway). And, as has been noted multiple times, many of the rooms depend on DM interpretation and how he runs them, which would still be the same case.
I can't think of anything apart from the pregens and the stricter time limit that would be different at a con game. I might have said that it would be harder to DM for, but that's not really the case if the DM prepares for it beforehand (like he should anyway). And, as has been noted multiple times, many of the rooms depend on DM interpretation and how he runs them, which would still be the same case.
Bullgrit
Adventurer
It's not dead. It's just resting.
Remarkable thread, the Tomb of Horrors. Beautiful discussion, isn't it?
Stoat, (the OP), said he was really busy last week, and so couldn't continue then. Hopefully we'll get to the next section soon. If Stoat can't get back into this, and he doesn't mind, I can take up the pace for him.
Bullgrit
Remarkable thread, the Tomb of Horrors. Beautiful discussion, isn't it?
Stoat, (the OP), said he was really busy last week, and so couldn't continue then. Hopefully we'll get to the next section soon. If Stoat can't get back into this, and he doesn't mind, I can take up the pace for him.
Bullgrit
Last edited:
Orius
Legend
I think you make a good point about the Tomb's writing to be something like a DM's personal notes rather than being presented in a more standardized format. It was after all, one of the first published D&D modules, so naturally there's not going to be standardized stat blocks or the like here. Nor does it seem to have the more professional editing of later modules.
I'm not dead, yet! I've just been getting my ass kicked at work. Also, there's a lot going on in Area 25. I'll do 25A, 25B and 25C today, and pick up 25D later.
Area 25. The Pillared Throne Room
This is the largest room in the dungeon. It is 110 feet square with a ceiling 30 feet high. Scores of huge pillars, each about 3 feet across, fill the room. The pillars and floor are decorated in pastel colors.
http://www.wizards.com/dnd/images/ToH_Gallery/ToHGraphic25.jpg
Anybody who touches a pillar starts levitating uncontrollably. The floating PC bobs across the ceiling "just as a child's helium balloon." There's a light breeze up there, and it gradually pulls the PC to either the northeastern or the northwestern corner of the chamber. What's in those corners? A familiar face!
http://www.wizards.com/dnd/images/ToH_Gallery/ToHGraphic6.jpg
Yep. There are devil faces in each corner. The one to the west is green. Anybody that comes within 3 feet of it is automatically sucked in and teleported back to Area 3 in front of the original GDD. The PC will be naked, their stuff is with Acererak in Area 33.
The devil face to the east is "bluish." Anybody who comes within 3 feet of this face is teleported to Area 27A. They get to keep their clothes.
The southeast corner of the room contains a huge, glowing orange gem. Cinders, ashes, charred bones, burnt skulls and fire-damaged clothing, armor and gear surrounds the gem.
http://www.wizards.com/dnd/images/ToH_Gallery/ToHGraphic25c.jpg
The gem is evil and magic. Strongly so. Any character who uses "detecting" magic on the gem gets the sense that it is wish related.
The bad kind of wish related. Like a malevolent genie, the gem reverses and perverts the wishes of those who would use it. Wishing on the gem brings doom and evil to all. Worse, as soon as it "grants" a wish, the gem starts pulsing with hot, red light. The DM is instructed to count down from 10. When the countdown ends, the gem explodes, and anybody within 15 feet dies (no save). The gem reforms 1 week later.
There's a big black throne on a dias in the south part of the room. Let's talk about it later.
IMO: Here's what Acererak's riddle has to say about Area 25: "into the columned hall you'll come, and there the throne that's key and keyed." On the one hand, there's no mention of the other two traps here (the floaty pillars and the monkey paw gem). On the other hand, the riddle's silence is itself a clue. Leave that mess alone and proceed directly to the Throne that's Key and Keyed!
I don't think there's any clue to warn the PC's that the pillars have a levitation effect. They'll have to find out the hard way. The module does not say how fast a floating PC moves toward the devil faces or which devil face the PC moves toward. Presumably, a floating PC drifts toward the nearest face, but the speed that PC moves is pretty important. The longer it takes to drift to a face, the longer the PC's buddies have to try and save him.
The devil faces (Areas 25A and 25B) are not technically deathtraps. Although as somebody noted above, donating all your gear to Acererak is almost a fate worse than death. Also, note that the face in Area 25A deposits the naked PC right in front of the original GGD back in Area 6. A player might think that the GDD serves to teleport lost PC's back to Area 25. It does not. Play one of the henchmen for now and roll up a new character for next week.
All in all, the business with the pillars is probably not too much to worry about. I expect that many PC's will never touch a pillar. Nobody will touch one after the first PC starts floating. Assuming the floating PC is moving at a slow pace, there should be time for the party to tether him before he winds up getting sucked into one of the devil faces.
As for the gem. I haven't been too impressed with the illustrations in the module, but the picture for Area 25C is great. That gem is clearly bad news, and anybody who touches it deserves what's coming. I guess some players would be tempted to try wishing on the gem. After all, there have been other helpful items scattered around the Tomb. The module leaves the consequences of such a wish entirely up to the DM.
At this point, I expect the whole party to start running every time the DM starts counting down from 10. I doubt many folks get blasted to ash when the gem explodes.
Area 25. The Pillared Throne Room
This is the largest room in the dungeon. It is 110 feet square with a ceiling 30 feet high. Scores of huge pillars, each about 3 feet across, fill the room. The pillars and floor are decorated in pastel colors.
http://www.wizards.com/dnd/images/ToH_Gallery/ToHGraphic25.jpg
Anybody who touches a pillar starts levitating uncontrollably. The floating PC bobs across the ceiling "just as a child's helium balloon." There's a light breeze up there, and it gradually pulls the PC to either the northeastern or the northwestern corner of the chamber. What's in those corners? A familiar face!
http://www.wizards.com/dnd/images/ToH_Gallery/ToHGraphic6.jpg
Yep. There are devil faces in each corner. The one to the west is green. Anybody that comes within 3 feet of it is automatically sucked in and teleported back to Area 3 in front of the original GDD. The PC will be naked, their stuff is with Acererak in Area 33.
The devil face to the east is "bluish." Anybody who comes within 3 feet of this face is teleported to Area 27A. They get to keep their clothes.
The southeast corner of the room contains a huge, glowing orange gem. Cinders, ashes, charred bones, burnt skulls and fire-damaged clothing, armor and gear surrounds the gem.
http://www.wizards.com/dnd/images/ToH_Gallery/ToHGraphic25c.jpg
The gem is evil and magic. Strongly so. Any character who uses "detecting" magic on the gem gets the sense that it is wish related.
The bad kind of wish related. Like a malevolent genie, the gem reverses and perverts the wishes of those who would use it. Wishing on the gem brings doom and evil to all. Worse, as soon as it "grants" a wish, the gem starts pulsing with hot, red light. The DM is instructed to count down from 10. When the countdown ends, the gem explodes, and anybody within 15 feet dies (no save). The gem reforms 1 week later.
There's a big black throne on a dias in the south part of the room. Let's talk about it later.
IMO: Here's what Acererak's riddle has to say about Area 25: "into the columned hall you'll come, and there the throne that's key and keyed." On the one hand, there's no mention of the other two traps here (the floaty pillars and the monkey paw gem). On the other hand, the riddle's silence is itself a clue. Leave that mess alone and proceed directly to the Throne that's Key and Keyed!
I don't think there's any clue to warn the PC's that the pillars have a levitation effect. They'll have to find out the hard way. The module does not say how fast a floating PC moves toward the devil faces or which devil face the PC moves toward. Presumably, a floating PC drifts toward the nearest face, but the speed that PC moves is pretty important. The longer it takes to drift to a face, the longer the PC's buddies have to try and save him.
The devil faces (Areas 25A and 25B) are not technically deathtraps. Although as somebody noted above, donating all your gear to Acererak is almost a fate worse than death. Also, note that the face in Area 25A deposits the naked PC right in front of the original GGD back in Area 6. A player might think that the GDD serves to teleport lost PC's back to Area 25. It does not. Play one of the henchmen for now and roll up a new character for next week.
All in all, the business with the pillars is probably not too much to worry about. I expect that many PC's will never touch a pillar. Nobody will touch one after the first PC starts floating. Assuming the floating PC is moving at a slow pace, there should be time for the party to tether him before he winds up getting sucked into one of the devil faces.
As for the gem. I haven't been too impressed with the illustrations in the module, but the picture for Area 25C is great. That gem is clearly bad news, and anybody who touches it deserves what's coming. I guess some players would be tempted to try wishing on the gem. After all, there have been other helpful items scattered around the Tomb. The module leaves the consequences of such a wish entirely up to the DM.
At this point, I expect the whole party to start running every time the DM starts counting down from 10. I doubt many folks get blasted to ash when the gem explodes.
jonesy
A Wicked Kendragon
And here at last we get to the moment of shame. And thanks by the way for rubbing it in like that.
The second party I played the Tomb in entered area 25 with five PC's (a ranger, a druid, a thief, a mage, and me with a fighter). We'd already lost a donkey, three NPC hirelings, a PC cleric, and the other PC fighter.
What happened next went something like this:
1. The ranger, being the party leader and the most experienced player, decides that we head to A (the green devil teleporter) and get prepared to enter the 26 room next to it (since there are two rooms designated 26).
2. The ranger says: "We start tying ropes across the pillars in front of the door " (the door to 26).
3. The DM says: "All of you help him?"
4. Everyone looks at the player of the ranger and then nods. The first dumb thing has just occurred.
5. The DM says: "As you touch the pillars.."
6. A simultaneous groan escapes from every player.
7. The DM continues describing what happens as we all float right into A, and get sucked in. As we were all already right next to it there was no time really do anything. The DM decreed that we hadn't even managed to get a single rope set up, since we'd had to touch the pillars to do that.
8. We plop out in front of area 6.
9. The most amazingly stupid thing occurs. We decide, as one, to jump right 'back' in, with the idea that it would take us back to the room and our equipment. It seemed perfectly logical at the time.
10. 5 dead PC's.
11. Stunned silence. Then someone, I can't remember who, makes the comment: "And I used to think that the Head of Vecna story was stupid".
Squire James
First Post
Ah, I see. It was asleep, but it was lucky enough that the juggernaut didn't run over it...
jmucchiello
Hero
I haven't read the module in decades but I could swear those 10 counts are supposed to be done silently.
Rogue Agent
First Post
Page 6: "NOW BEGIN COUNTING SLOWLY TO 10, and the odds on that there will be a stampede up the stairs to get away."
It seems to be fairly explicit that these counts are supposed to be out loud.
And they do work very well when used as such.
Bullgrit
Adventurer
Questions:
Are the PCs still floating after they teleport out of the pillared throne room? The text doesn’t say one way or another.Stoat said:
Do they get to keep their clothes/equipment?Stoat said:
Tomb of Horrors said:
Nice to see a trap is actually labeled as a trap. Compare this death trap to the sleep gas hall/juggernaut and the green slime tapestry. Those gave no warning at all that there was anything dangerous, and yet they killed with no save. But here we have a no-save-kill trap that not only advertises its presence, but it gives a countdown warning.Stoat said:
Also note:
Green slime tapestry: “Covered characters are turned to green slime and gone, with no recourse possible due to the amount of slime.”
Juggernaut: “Everything it rolls over is squashed to a pulp. There is no appeal.”
Gem: “The stone then explodes, absolutely killing any character within 15’ radius with a wave of searing radiations and flames.”
Does this mean that those killed by the gem have a recourse and/or can appeal the death?
I’m kidding around here, of course, but the omission of such a “you’re dead and that’s that” phrase here is interesting. But then, maybe "absolutely" serves that purpose in the gem text.Bullgrit
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