[The dungeon was run using the In the Heart of the Delve & Dangerous hexflowers. I used the Optional Chamber Dressing tables as is, and filled in the Encounter chart as I went, using the sample one as a relative indicator of power level and generating the monsters with a mixture of random pictures and oracle prompts. Stats were 3d6 unless I felt strongly about what they should be, HP were 1-3d6 depending on power level. Minor enemies have truncated stat blocks, where attributes not specifically noted are 10 (as in the rulebook). Powers were made up on the spot to make things interesting/fun/fatal.
Rather than trying to explain how the Hexflowers work, I'm just going to describe the rooms and note a few key results; there's a fully explained example of lay included with ItHotDnD rules (which are PWYW). It's also hard to keep track (sensibly) of the moves from hex to hex. I tried making lines to follow in paint, but doing it legibly would have slowed down gameplay too much. I switched to moving tokens (extra dice) on a printout, which is what I recommend doing if you can set it up somewhere your cats can't reach. Just sayin'. My only other observation is that it really needs some sort of treasure generator. There isn't one, and I mostly forgot to include any because of this.
[no encounter/hazard; smell - blooming orchard]
The first room to which they come has a low vaulted ceiling, and other than bits of detritus and shreds of ancient notices peeling off the brickwork, contains little of interest. The atmosphere in the chamber is wholly unexpected, however.
"I was afraid the air down here was going to be beyond disgusting," says Athalie, "but it smells like a blooming orchard in here."
"I never knew you to mince your words, my sweet," responds Isabeau.
"I wasn't, dear heart. Let me try again: it smells like a fucking orchard in bloom."
"It does at that!"
"I doubt this good fortune will last," says Bassianus. "Which way now?"
"The sewer taxi runs in roughly this direction," says Athalie, pointing, "so we should try that door."
Beyond the door is a damp passage, partly lit by storm drains high overhead, and with the fragrance as one expects of a sewer, sadly. It ends after a short way in another heavy door, the twin of the one they'd just taken.
[Room 2]
Behind it is a circular domed room of rough, cracking concrete, completely dry and arid. Rusting vents set into the walls draw in air, filling the room with slow cross-currents of air. As the explorers make their way across the rubbish-strewn floor, two childlike shadowy forms slip from between the corroded slats of a vent and rush at Isabeau. [encounter: d6=2 Invading Gloom]
STR 8, DEX 12, WIL 12, 2hp
Driven to extinguish light
Obscure Claws, no damage but extinguish light source if DEX save failed
Shadowy form: attacks by non-light bearers are Impaired
[DEX Saves to avoid surprise miraculously all succeed]
[Round 1]
The little fiends seem intent on dousing Isabeau's lantern, but she holds it high above her head, and though they leap at it with outstretched claws, they cannot touch it. Athalie swings her sword straight through one of the little fiends. It comes away with some small measure of shadow-stuff adhering to it, but the creature is mostly unharmed [d4=1 damage]. Isabeau's sword, bathed fully in the light of her lamp, does considerably better, and the creature dissolves in a fleeting puff of darkness as her blade bisects it vertically [5 damage, crit].
Bassianus' hatchet and Geta's talons tear wisps from the second creature, and though none of the cuts is telling, they still get the better of the little beast who dissolves back into nothingness [1+2=3 dmg to 0hp, 7 STR; 19=crit].
A door is set into a recess in the wall directly opposite the one they just entered. The explorers are through it in an instant, lest more of the shadow children arrive.
[Room 3]
A blast of chill and damp greets them as they step out onto a metal platform. A long steel bridge stretches out into the darkness before them, suspended precariously over a yawning black chasm. Bassianus looks for a pebble to toss in to sound its depth, but his companions restrain him. "Best not, my dear. You don't want to disturb anything that makes such a place its home."
"Indeed," he says, and abandons the search.
Athalie moves slowly to the edge of the bridge, tests the rusty iron railing and finds it sound, if disconcertingly low. She gingerly places one foot on the steel mesh bottom, and is relieved that it does not shift beneath her weight.
"I think it will hold. But I'm afraid you must go first with the light, my sweet."
"I do so wish we could see the far side," says Isabeau as she steps tentatively past her friend.
[encounter: Spotless Victim
Q: Is it dangerous? 50/50 (4+): O4 C3 - yes, but... not intrinsically]
Spotless Victim
STR 6, DEX 8, WIL 4, 1hp
Driven to beg for scraps
When they've gone about two dozen metres -- each with one hand ever gripping the flimsy rail -- the lantern's light reveals a pure white lamb roped to the railing. It climbs to its feet as the explorers draw near, and looks up at them with sad, soulful eyes.
"I'm sorry, dear, but I've nothing to feed you," says Isabeau. The lamb bleats in reply. It nuzzles each of them hopefully as they pass it by, and bleats anew, with ever increasing insistence.
But the noise has disturbed the THING which dwells in the benighted abyss. Scores of oily, whip-like tentacles shoot up from below, grasping blindly at the source of the sound. The lamb is soon held fast, and before the explorers' horrified eyes is ripped down into the darkness with an awful snap as its leash breaks, sending shivers down the length of the railing.
Athalie ducks and weaves round the clutching tentacles, and bolts ahead into the blackness beyond the lantern's reach, running blindly along the narrow bridge before collapsing onto a platform at the other end. She looks back and sees Bassianus and Isabeau struggling against the tentacles binding them. A tremendous effort from each throws them off, and they scurry to join Athalie on the other side. As the bobbing lamplight reveals a door, Athalie throws it open and ducks inside, slamming it once her companions (and Bassianus' damned useless hawk) have crossed the threshold.
[The needed DEX saves to avoid being caught: only Athalie & Geta made theirs. Athalie needed a second DEX save to avoid a mishap as she ran through the dark; fortunately she succeeded in that as well.
Bassianus & Isabeau needed STR rolls to wrench free of the tentacles; the dice were very kind.]
[Room 4]
The room they find themselves in is another circular concrete dome. Dead and sodden leaves litter the ground, smelling not unpleasantly of a hothouse. Besides a toppled, now three-legged card table and a plethora of empty bottlesm there is nothing else here.
A passageway leads to...
[Room 5]
...a square chamber, swept entirely bare. The walls are completely smooth, and covered from floor to ceiling with sinister occult symbols. Athalie pauses to study them...
[Q: Any effect from looking at them? Unlikely (5+): O3 C2 - no, and... essentially indecipherable]
...but must soon admit she can't decipher a single one.
[Room 6]
As they take a short passage to the next chamber, the temperature drops sharply and the scent of cheap perfume wafts over them.
[chamber dressing: perfumey taste, flame spouting tar pits, very cold]
The passage opens into a vast space like the undercroft of a cathedral, with stout square columns curving out into squared vaults. A network of steel bridges and platforms criss-cross the room, whose iron railings glitter with frost. Below are pits of a bubbling, grey, tarry substance, at once the source of both the odour and the cold, despite occasionally bursting with gouts of crimson flame.
"Whatever it is," says Bassianus, "we'd ought not to touch it." His companions look on with splenetic consternation, as they wonder why he felt it necessary to pronounce so obvious an admonition.
The gratings clank with their footsteps as they traverse the chamber. But unbeknownst to them all, a star cultist has concealed [d6=] himself in a small recess, having been alerted to the explorers' arrival by the approaching lantern light.
star cultist (4hp, rusty knife d6)
[I gave the PCs WIL saves to avoid getting ambushed; only Athalie succeeded. But she needs a DEX save to act before cultist attacks (d2=)B: d20=19, failure]
Not trusting the flimsy gangways to support them all, the explorers each take a separate route across. Athalie sees movement in the corner of her eye, and hasn't even time to call out when she notices the hidden cultist step from the shadows and slash at Bassianus' back with his rusty knife. The blade lays open his shirt and traces a long read line upon his pasty skin. [the attack is Enhanced; d12=4 damage to 0hp, STR 15, but d20=2, B avoids critical damage]
Athalie is already running to his aid, and in mere moments has crossed the platform to answer the cultist's steel with her own. Her sword flashes once, and the cultist crumbles before her. [6 damage put him at 0hp, 8STR; d20=20, critical damage]
Isabeau tends to Bassianus' wound -- it's messy, but largely superficial -- whilst Athalie shoves the unconscious cultist off the edge of the platform into the grey tar. Bassianus begins to complain that the fumes are making him woozy, so Isabeau abandons her ministrations and the three press on. [due to the cloying odour, Short Rests are impossible in this room]
[Room 7]
[contents: mortal danger/hazard -- Pavilion of Darkness]
They find the first passage out and follow it into a vast empty chamber, so great the lantern's light does not reach any side walls, nor reveal the height of the ceiling. They creep forward over the uneven ground, and slowly a structure comes into view in the nothingness. It's the size of a modest lych gate, made of blocks of an unknown stone, and recalls an ancient shrine in shape. An opening or doorway beckons the explorers, but all is darkness within.
They creep up to it, caution briefly overcome by curiosity. Isabeau hold her lantern high, and tries to illuminate the interior without crossing the threshold, but the light is swallowed up by the void. None are mad enough to step inside, so they give it a wide berth and look for a way out. Athalie hazards a glance back at it over her shoulder, and finds that the structure always appears to her head on, regardless of her position in the room.
They find the wall of the chamber and follow it round, finding it to be an odd shape. They abruptly come to another passage, long and narrow, which leads them to...
[Room 8]
[Sanctuary / area of relative safety]
...a circular sewer temple, dedicated to Venus Cloacina. There is no other exit from here than the one they came in, so the explorers choose to wait here a few minutes to rest before going back on their tracks to find another path. They don't go near the altar, lest the goddess curse them for some accidental blasphemy (which, they admit to themselves silently, they'd most likely commit).
[short rest, no encounter, Bassianus gets his HP back]
They go back to the dark chamber, hugging the wall so as not to reveal the mysterious stone pavilion with their light, though acutely aware of its pull. It's almost a relief when they reach the freezing tar pit chamber [room 6], from which they take the side exit, leading almost immediately to...
[Room 9]
[feature - pits (tar, normal) ; encounter - bloody Scourge]
...another chamber filled with tar pits, though of the more conventional sort. Several drudges are hard at work, shovelling tar into the iron receptacles of some mechanical conveyance system. They are fully absorbed in -- or rather, completely dulled by -- their task, and pay the explorers no mind. Not so the overseer, who flexes his muscles and snaps his scourge, barking at the new arrivals.
[Q: Is the overseer at all amenable to letting them past? unlikely (5+): O1 C4 - no, but... could be bribed]
"Get to work, you loafers, or you'll feel my sting!"
"We're not workers," says Athalie. "Why, one need only look at us. This is my best frock!"
"'tisn't really," mutters Isabeau.
"Quiet, dear, you're not helping."
"What these two charming ladies are trying to say," interjects Bassianus, "is that we are obviously the cream of society, and the only reason we must pass through this place is to get to the sewer taxi."
"The sewer taxi," muses the overseer. "Well, if yer to take the sewer taxi, that means you have money. Perhaps I'd be believing you, if I were to see some of it."
"Yes. Indeed, my good man. I, er... Geta, attack!"
Overseer
STR 14, 6hp, scourge d8
[The overseer needs a DEX save: d20=11, failure - can't attack in the surprise round.
Bassianus & Geta do 6 & 4 damage respectively, dropping him to 0hp, 10 STR; d20=14, critical]
The hawk flies right for the overseer's face, tearing at his eyes with beak and talon. Bassianus springs forward with his hatchet, and buries it between two of the man's ribs. His face assumes a (more) vacant expression, and he topples senseless and bleeding to the ground. The drudges take no notice of the event, and our heroes continue hastily on their way.
A short passage leads to the top of a spiral staircase, which leads the explorers down
down
down
down
down
down
next post: evil cults and misplaced literary references
[Round 1]
The little fiends seem intent on dousing Isabeau's lantern, but she holds it high above her head, and though they leap at it with outstretched claws, they cannot touch it. Athalie swings her sword straight through one of the little fiends. It comes away with some small measure of shadow-stuff adhering to it, but the creature is mostly unharmed [d4=1 damage]. Isabeau's sword, bathed fully in the light of her lamp, does considerably better, and the creature dissolves in a fleeting puff of darkness as her blade bisects it vertically [5 damage, crit].
Bassianus' hatchet and Geta's talons tear wisps from the second creature, and though none of the cuts is telling, they still get the better of the little beast who dissolves back into nothingness [1+2=3 dmg to 0hp, 7 STR; 19=crit].
A door is set into a recess in the wall directly opposite the one they just entered. The explorers are through it in an instant, lest more of the shadow children arrive.
[Room 3]
A blast of chill and damp greets them as they step out onto a metal platform. A long steel bridge stretches out into the darkness before them, suspended precariously over a yawning black chasm. Bassianus looks for a pebble to toss in to sound its depth, but his companions restrain him. "Best not, my dear. You don't want to disturb anything that makes such a place its home."
"Indeed," he says, and abandons the search.
Athalie moves slowly to the edge of the bridge, tests the rusty iron railing and finds it sound, if disconcertingly low. She gingerly places one foot on the steel mesh bottom, and is relieved that it does not shift beneath her weight.
"I think it will hold. But I'm afraid you must go first with the light, my sweet."
"I do so wish we could see the far side," says Isabeau as she steps tentatively past her friend.
[encounter: Spotless Victim
Q: Is it dangerous? 50/50 (4+): O4 C3 - yes, but... not intrinsically]
Spotless Victim
STR 6, DEX 8, WIL 4, 1hp
Driven to beg for scraps
When they've gone about two dozen metres -- each with one hand ever gripping the flimsy rail -- the lantern's light reveals a pure white lamb roped to the railing. It climbs to its feet as the explorers draw near, and looks up at them with sad, soulful eyes.
"I'm sorry, dear, but I've nothing to feed you," says Isabeau. The lamb bleats in reply. It nuzzles each of them hopefully as they pass it by, and bleats anew, with ever increasing insistence.
But the noise has disturbed the THING which dwells in the benighted abyss. Scores of oily, whip-like tentacles shoot up from below, grasping blindly at the source of the sound. The lamb is soon held fast, and before the explorers' horrified eyes is ripped down into the darkness with an awful snap as its leash breaks, sending shivers down the length of the railing.
[The needed DEX saves to avoid being caught: only Athalie & Geta made theirs. Athalie needed a second DEX save to avoid a mishap as she ran through the dark; fortunately she succeeded in that as well.
Bassianus & Isabeau needed STR rolls to wrench free of the tentacles; the dice were very kind.]
[Room 4]
The room they find themselves in is another circular concrete dome. Dead and sodden leaves litter the ground, smelling not unpleasantly of a hothouse. Besides a toppled, now three-legged card table and a plethora of empty bottlesm there is nothing else here.
A passageway leads to...
[Room 5]
...a square chamber, swept entirely bare. The walls are completely smooth, and covered from floor to ceiling with sinister occult symbols. Athalie pauses to study them...
[Q: Any effect from looking at them? Unlikely (5+): O3 C2 - no, and... essentially indecipherable]
...but must soon admit she can't decipher a single one.
As they take a short passage to the next chamber, the temperature drops sharply and the scent of cheap perfume wafts over them.
[chamber dressing: perfumey taste, flame spouting tar pits, very cold]
The passage opens into a vast space like the undercroft of a cathedral, with stout square columns curving out into squared vaults. A network of steel bridges and platforms criss-cross the room, whose iron railings glitter with frost. Below are pits of a bubbling, grey, tarry substance, at once the source of both the odour and the cold, despite occasionally bursting with gouts of crimson flame.
"Whatever it is," says Bassianus, "we'd ought not to touch it." His companions look on with splenetic consternation, as they wonder why he felt it necessary to pronounce so obvious an admonition.
The gratings clank with their footsteps as they traverse the chamber. But unbeknownst to them all, a star cultist has concealed [d6=] himself in a small recess, having been alerted to the explorers' arrival by the approaching lantern light.
star cultist (4hp, rusty knife d6)
[I gave the PCs WIL saves to avoid getting ambushed; only Athalie succeeded. But she needs a DEX save to act before cultist attacks (d2=)B: d20=19, failure]
Not trusting the flimsy gangways to support them all, the explorers each take a separate route across. Athalie sees movement in the corner of her eye, and hasn't even time to call out when she notices the hidden cultist step from the shadows and slash at Bassianus' back with his rusty knife. The blade lays open his shirt and traces a long read line upon his pasty skin. [the attack is Enhanced; d12=4 damage to 0hp, STR 15, but d20=2, B avoids critical damage]
Athalie is already running to his aid, and in mere moments has crossed the platform to answer the cultist's steel with her own. Her sword flashes once, and the cultist crumbles before her. [6 damage put him at 0hp, 8STR; d20=20, critical damage]
Isabeau tends to Bassianus' wound -- it's messy, but largely superficial -- whilst Athalie shoves the unconscious cultist off the edge of the platform into the grey tar. Bassianus begins to complain that the fumes are making him woozy, so Isabeau abandons her ministrations and the three press on. [due to the cloying odour, Short Rests are impossible in this room]
[contents: mortal danger/hazard -- Pavilion of Darkness]
They find the first passage out and follow it into a vast empty chamber, so great the lantern's light does not reach any side walls, nor reveal the height of the ceiling. They creep forward over the uneven ground, and slowly a structure comes into view in the nothingness. It's the size of a modest lych gate, made of blocks of an unknown stone, and recalls an ancient shrine in shape. An opening or doorway beckons the explorers, but all is darkness within.
They creep up to it, caution briefly overcome by curiosity. Isabeau hold her lantern high, and tries to illuminate the interior without crossing the threshold, but the light is swallowed up by the void. None are mad enough to step inside, so they give it a wide berth and look for a way out. Athalie hazards a glance back at it over her shoulder, and finds that the structure always appears to her head on, regardless of her position in the room.
They find the wall of the chamber and follow it round, finding it to be an odd shape. They abruptly come to another passage, long and narrow, which leads them to...
[Room 8]
[Sanctuary / area of relative safety]
...a circular sewer temple, dedicated to Venus Cloacina. There is no other exit from here than the one they came in, so the explorers choose to wait here a few minutes to rest before going back on their tracks to find another path. They don't go near the altar, lest the goddess curse them for some accidental blasphemy (which, they admit to themselves silently, they'd most likely commit).
[short rest, no encounter, Bassianus gets his HP back]
They go back to the dark chamber, hugging the wall so as not to reveal the mysterious stone pavilion with their light, though acutely aware of its pull. It's almost a relief when they reach the freezing tar pit chamber [room 6], from which they take the side exit, leading almost immediately to...
[Room 9]
[feature - pits (tar, normal) ; encounter - bloody Scourge]
...another chamber filled with tar pits, though of the more conventional sort. Several drudges are hard at work, shovelling tar into the iron receptacles of some mechanical conveyance system. They are fully absorbed in -- or rather, completely dulled by -- their task, and pay the explorers no mind. Not so the overseer, who flexes his muscles and snaps his scourge, barking at the new arrivals.
[Q: Is the overseer at all amenable to letting them past? unlikely (5+): O1 C4 - no, but... could be bribed]
"Get to work, you loafers, or you'll feel my sting!"
"We're not workers," says Athalie. "Why, one need only look at us. This is my best frock!"
"'tisn't really," mutters Isabeau.
"Quiet, dear, you're not helping."
"What these two charming ladies are trying to say," interjects Bassianus, "is that we are obviously the cream of society, and the only reason we must pass through this place is to get to the sewer taxi."
"The sewer taxi," muses the overseer. "Well, if yer to take the sewer taxi, that means you have money. Perhaps I'd be believing you, if I were to see some of it."
"Yes. Indeed, my good man. I, er... Geta, attack!"
STR 14, 6hp, scourge d8
[The overseer needs a DEX save: d20=11, failure - can't attack in the surprise round.
Bassianus & Geta do 6 & 4 damage respectively, dropping him to 0hp, 10 STR; d20=14, critical]
The hawk flies right for the overseer's face, tearing at his eyes with beak and talon. Bassianus springs forward with his hatchet, and buries it between two of the man's ribs. His face assumes a (more) vacant expression, and he topples senseless and bleeding to the ground. The drudges take no notice of the event, and our heroes continue hastily on their way.
A short passage leads to the top of a spiral staircase, which leads the explorers down
down
down
down
down
next post: evil cults and misplaced literary references
Well I guess that explains why people choose to pay for the taxi. The pedestrian route seems a pain.
ReplyDeleteAnd since there's no XP for encounters....
Delete