Following a Star (Location)

 Wrote up a quick adventure location, an abandoned Victorian cottage built around an observatory. Good for placement in suburban hexes.

Click here.

Initially, I wanted to keep the area descriptions super-short, but I grew attached to too many little details to do that. Hopefully the site is better for them.

This Probably Shouldn't Be a Dungeon Checklist

 riffing (badly) from here.

8. a key and a lock

9. a skeleton!
(funny and/or sad)

10. a dungeon self-destruct trigger

11. a vat of goo

12. a potential cave-in prevent you from leaving and turning air into a precious resource

13. a new class you can level up in

14. a message in a carefully boutique conlang of the DM's devising

15. a tunnel to another dungeon

16. letters between the dungeon's master and other major NPCs

17. something like a spell scroll but in a strange medium

18. a statue with gem-like eyes

19. a lifelike statue, spooky coffin, gargoyle, sexy person or other entity that could foreshadow a particular kind of monster (medusa, dracula, gargoyle, etc.) but doesn't in this case

20. vape rig or other wizardly anachronism

21. ducts you can but probably shouldn't crawl through

22. fashionable clothes

23. orcs, done right this time

24. the Devil, looking to make a deal

25. a way to permanently change your primary attributes

26. someone ready to swear vengeance

27. someone who could plausibly be a PC's cousin

28. confidently incorrect plot hook from a map or book

29. one-way travel

30. dope vehicle or mount, and you're actually allowed to use it

31. a way to accidentally fuck it all up

32. mundane animals

33. thematically appropriate painting

34. big ol pile of trash

35. dead adventurers as environmental storytelling

36. obnoxiously trapped chests

37. passwords

38. national anthem for the bad guys

39. rival adventuring party, American

40. shop in the middle of nowhere

41. consumable, multi-dose magic item

42. magic item that has a cost of making you drunk when you use it

43. on a neutral reaction roll, the bad guys need to have a sport or card game they resort to

44. wheedling second-in-command

45. turn all the doors that could be secret doors into secret doors

46. a lever or button with no apparent function that has a radical effect on the dungeon

47. gross smells for all the monsters

48. elfs, done right this time

49. ridiculous over the top overkill trap (with sawblades?)

50. roll twice and combine

Homophrosyne: the Richest Man in the World (Location)

After years of siege and a night of slaughter, the richest man in the world finally has the most beautiful woman in the world back in his house. They drink, and they brood, stuck in this spartan coastal fort, and they worsen.

John. Armor as leather. +1 blueglass spear, +3 when thrown. Wears a key to the armory (10) around his neck. Carries an old blackfeather arrow smeared with a sovereign venom (save vs death). Wants: to avoid his wife, deal with the suitors, and unweave the marriage of his daughter to the son of his old war buddy Black Robert.

Richest Man in the World: Can always pay another team of bounty hunters and mercenaries to pursue those who wronged him. Always has a friend in port. Knows the methods of consulting sages and inventing strange devices just like a high-level PC would.

Irene. Unarmored (see below). Wants: to stick it to her husband, live in comfort, and die with dignity.

Most Beautiful Woman in the World: Not simply attractive, but beautiful in the way that a sunset or unconditional trust is beautiful, only more so. Casts light as a torch. Unless you're a witch or something, she counts as wearing plate mail and a shield. If you swear an oath that you must bring her away from this place and have her stay in your home, gain 500 XP or 1000 if you're a knight. Tell the players this when their characters see her, to tempt them.

d6 Encounters

1. Unscrupulous Suppliant (see Appendix A: d20 Unscrupulous Suppliants)

2. Two Tipsy Pirates. Veterans of hard fighting, used to getting their way. Always pass morale checks in sight of John.

3. 1d4 Unambitious Slaves

4. William of Nofry. A spy for the suitors. False beard, pretending to be a suppliant.

5. Leaman the Bard. Amused by the PCs, knowledgeable of most things.

6. Alan and Horace. Sons of two of John's oldest friends. Their fathers, the masters of two nearby dungeons, will ransom or avenge them as needed. Alan is a magician who knows Charm Person and Levitate. Horace is a swordsman in a chain hood with a whirlwind area-affect attack. 

House of John

First floor. Areas 5 and 9 have a second floor keyed to the same number.

1. Storage and Office. A storage magazine full of durable chests of outdoor gear, as well as a small office space. In addition to unimportant documents about the credits and expenses of running the house, John's seneschal has prepared a ledger of shipwrecks (see Appendix B: d20 Shipwrecks) for him to consider speculating on. The DM may wish to place these shipwrecks at an appreciable distance from the area where the house is established to be to ensure there is sufficient challenge in reaching them.

2. Starboard Overlook. Lightly furnished and well-worn, with a dart board and an artful carving of a sexy hydra. The door can be barred from the inside. 1-in-4 chance there are two pirates in the room at any given time, rising to 3-in-4 when the house is on high alert. Stairs lead down to area 14, where the pirate guards sometimes hear John speak to his long-dead comrades as though they were still alive. Very sad, that.

3. Stable. Six amazing horses, all worth 1000 gc but all with John’s brand. They have 9 morale, and if someone tries to steal them they will cause a ruckus that will attract attention unless they fail a morale save (and give circumstance modifiers for especially horse-wise PCs.) The horses are:

1. Canavaul, bay and nervous. Runs faster than the fastest running horse.

2. Menelaus, gray and bold. Stats as a troll, but pack horse speed.

3. Trotter, roan and friendly. Can leap 50 feet.

4. Diamond, pinto and haughty. Max HP. Goes rabidly hungry at the sight of moss.

5. Boatswain, dun and placid, Automatically passes all saves she is called upon to make.

6. Rowan, palomino and intelligent. Can cast Magic Missile 2/day and use spell scrolls, simple math, and doorknobs.

4. Port Overlook. Lightly furnished and well-worn, with a skittles set and copy of Murand's Great Highwaymen and Footpads of History. The door can be barred from the inside. 1-in-2 chance of 4 pirates present, rising to 2-in-2 when the house is on high alert.

5. Storage Magazine. Pallets and chests of thread, firewood, various tools, soaps, dry goods, ex chetera. Stairs lead up to a hall with several looms, couches, and pitchers of cool wine. Several doors split off to women's dormitories. The best furnished belongs to Irene, radiant and unhappy. In her room, she keeps the tinctures and potions of Toleme, a land renowned for its poisons and cures. Among mundane emetics, emollients, opiates, and the like, she keeps:

1. A cure for sorrow, odorless. Lasts 12 hours. Only 4 doses left in a massive bowl that must have once held over a hundred.

2. A deadly poison, berry-scented. Made to be painted onto fingernails or a carefully waxed lips. Perfectly harmless, when it's dry. 1 dose left. Kept in a small ruby tube.

3. A beauty draught. Vinegar scent, tasteless. Confers +1 permanent charisma and gives your next seduction attempt a charm effect. If you exceed 18 charisma with this potion, you've gilded the lily so much the bonuses are reversed for your freakish super-symmetrical face and uncanny affect. 3 doses. Kept in a labeled bottle with a wax seal.

4. Witch's Brew, a pumpkiny buggish mixture. Gives the random spells of an 8th-level magic-user for two hours, then causes a save vs death from utter neuroplastic exhaustion. Those slain by the potion have their brains leak out of their ears. 3 doses, separated into three simple vials displaying their rainbow-sheened liquid contents.

5. Potion of Impotence. Vanilla flavor. Lasts 6 weeks. 4 doses. Stored in a metal flask.

6. Sobering Fluid. Ironic scent. Dispels drunkenness and ongoing illusions. Deeply unpleasant. 1 dose. Left as dregs of a simple clay cup.

6. Courtyard. Creeper vines on the wall make it easy to climb on the roof of areas 7, 8, and 12. From there, you can look into the windows of random dorms of the hall.

7. Porch. John’s ancient dog, Gilmote, sleeps on top of a key to the armory here, pretty much constantly.

8. Altar of the Furies. Grotesque statues like five gargoyles piled up and melted. 245 gold coins and a ruby worth 1000 gc given in offering here. If PCs interact the altar, make a reaction roll, with modifiers if they've given an offering themselves or stolen from the altar. The altar responds with a blessing, blight, or sign by one of the following means (d6):

1. Birds

2. Shit

3. Oaths

4. Exposure

5. Rage

6. Rebels

9. Hall. Balcony with doors into men’s dorms, and the master’s room with balcony. A mural of a master smith forging a beautiful shield conceals a lock of a secret door that pushes open to reveal the armory. John's room is spartan (or, if the DM wishes, Argive), an ill-fated attempt at minimalism. The first gold piece he ever stole hangs on a red string on the wall and his boxy bed is decorated with geometric shapes.

10. Armory. Locked— John has the key. On racks and in stands: 25 cutlasses, 5 bows, and 50 arrows. In a locked cabinet can be found:

1. A battered brass helmet (once belonged to John's warlord brother)

2. A bloodstained +1 net (instrumental in killing John's brother, later acquired by John)

3. Two petards

4. A very poisonous arrow, kin to the one John carries.

11. Dung Heap. A good place to hide, if you're not proud.

12. Pool. A magical illusion— seems to resemble a Scrooge McDuck-style pool full of gold and jewels. Actually an open hole into a basement-level pool full of water, home to the mermaid Rachael, a war-captive and the favorite candidate for an underwater revanchist political movement that seeks to overthrow the Merfolk Congress. Passionate and friendly, with a simplistic worldview. A mural of a woman wrapping her arms around a pained lizardman conceals a secret door that opens to a simple push.

Basement

13. Treasury. Secret doors to 12 and 14 are obvious from this side, with seams and handles. Golden tripods and fine cauldrons piled around worth 5000 gc, weighing as much as 8000 coins. In the pile is the key to a vault in a nearby large city, the largest single cache of John's wealth in any one place. Along one wall is a mummified centaur wizard with an empty quiver hanging from his flank, slain by his own very poisonous arrow. If unwrapped, the skins tears open to release deadly poison gas. 

14. Work Room. Here, John has clumsily created a magic circle and a ritual to resurrect his old war buddy, the unstoppable Black Robert. The risen Robert lingers in the circle as a half-seen shade, bulky but insubstantial, raspily whispering for blood. If allowed to drink at least a pint of fresh blood, he will become capable of speech. Dour, relentless, and desperate to undo his own death, he will try to charm the party with facts about the land of the dead before demanding more blood. If they can get him a total of eight pints, he will return to the world as a powerful wight, but only sustain himself as long as he can keep his throat wet with blood (stats as vampire). He has no loyalty to John or the PCs, but will only attack them if he feels he has a special reason to. In the corner, a mural of a harper standing at the mouth of a cave conceals a secret door that opens to a simple push. Door opens to a staircase up to area 2.

Wooded Camp

While John was away, leading all the men of his home to war, a whole generation grew up without fathers, and with mothers who were prevented from making the right interventions. They became mean and braggadocious. Many have risen up in disobedience and rebellion, more out of aimlessness and frustration than genuine disdain. Called the suitors because they nominally desire to slay John and marry Irene, their goals are ever-more mercurial.

1. Watchtower. Lookouts will alert the camp if the party approaches openly.

2. Gate. Guarded by two very mossy mossmen (See area 6).

3. Pool. The center of camp life, as it's here that a dirty old pool spirit tells the suitors sex stories in exchange for wine. Inveterate shit-stirrer, he is likely to provoke, challenge, or exalt the PCs upon meeting them.

4. Tents. 20 suitors roughing it with spears, axes, and the odd helmet or bit of old linothorax. Between them they've got 800 gold coins constantly getting circulated through dicing, as well as a prism-cut peridot worth 300 gc hidden under the head suitor's pillow. The odd clump of harvested moss from area 6 is seen.

5. Estovers. Several trees cleared, with axes, stacks of firewood, and tracks leading further out from the camp towards area 6.

6. Mossy Rocks. Covered in a magic moss that staunches wounds for 1d6 healing, but it infests the area permanently and you get that many Moss Points (MP). On future moss-based healing attempts, there’s a MP-in-Max HP chance that the injury is to an enmossed area and more moss won’t be effective. If your MP ever equals your HP, you become a Moss person (-1d6 to all mental attributes, become 3 HD, move 90’, slam attack for 1d6, 1-3 surprise in wooded or mossable places, distrust fire)

Appendix A: d20  unscrupulous suppliants

• 1. Malthuzlathrax the Confuser, a wizard in red robes. Talks in the third person and desires to trade magic in exchange for missions to obtain a specific trinket, “of no real value to your quest.”
• 2. James Redhand, a thief who wears a ratty old tigerskin toga. Begging sanctuary until the heat dies down from his latest heist, an unsuccessful carriage robbery of a comptroller's husband.
• 3. Captain Catherine the Grey, a successor-alderwoman to a piratical port that John technically ruled for a short time. Overly chummy with him, would like to set up some onerous recurring donation, seeing as it is his alma mater.
• 4. King Troggue, a warmongering troglodyte who needs shipments and shipments of weapons. Haughty.
• 5. Edith, a waifish duelist who hopes her blood- and tear-soaked history will convince John to lend vast resources to tracking down the list of men she wishes to exact vengeance upon.
• 6. Buellerian, the prodigal son of a foreign general who gets by on his wits. Inoffensive but very impressed with himself.
• 7. Abbot George, a venal priest who seeks to reform his ways and earn a good mid-level sainthood by recovering the sword and armor of a dragon-killing martyr, and needs financing.
• 8. Mary the Green, a veteran ranger seeking a good ship and crew to sail over the horizon, seeking new places and new people.
• 9. Lady Florence, a noblewoman of a respectable family who needs vast sums if she's to clinch the right candidates into the right bishoprics to ensure her family's holdings remain secure.
• 10. Jape Drangul, an officious robin's egg blue diplomat from another world. Has an all-business personality, desperate to purchase human heads, but keeps getting derailed by our world's quaint customs.
• 11. Gabriela Fairhair, a middling tomb robber who seeks to ply information from John about where good scores from his wars would be.
• 12. Charles the Jay, a rambler and man of many facets. Actually a disguised warlord trying to make up his mind about John.
• 13. Dame Ruth-Glad, a knight seeking to obsequiously beg for the forgiveness of certain unwisely spent loans. Wears a helmet that resembles a birdcage.
• 14. Viscountess Nell, who is losing a war badly and seeks to commission a privateer fleet on credit.
• 15. Bess, a fur-clad fighter from a land where everyone is thick-thewed and pantherlike. Spending some time drinking with kings before she's back to strangling anacondas and smashing eunuchs for pay. The one suppliant John enjoys so far.
• 16. Master Lawrence, esquire, a barrister undertaking a performative suit against John in order to show off his bone fides and eventually get hired.
• 17. Rudolph, a banker/crusader with a chip on his shoulder. Needs vast sums to seed a new bank.
• 18. Macey McDonald, an egotistical wandering shieldmaiden who tries to turn people against each other with slander and gossip for her own amusement.
• 19. Long Raymond, a fishmonger. Hoping to get as many glimpses of Irene as he can.
• 20. Kasimir DuVre, a baron and a mystic. Slowly bleeding John in exchange for drabbles of secrets and mystical references. Doesn't know why John seeks after necromantic arts, but is starting to connect some dots.

Appendix B: d20 shipwrecks

• 1. The Orphan. Entered a cursed cove in a storm, where it fell victim to 20 undead pirates (stats as skeleton, captain has a +1 flaming hook [must fit into handless wrist] and demon parrot (stats as vampire bat). The cargo, bolts of fine cloth and enameled bottles of choice wine, is intact. Worth 2,000 gc. The ship itself is mostly functional.
• 2. The Unsinkable. Lost in a storm off the coast of a remote island while transporting the renowned oracle Dara Dolema. Before drowning, she wrote a final message and sealed it in a bottle, which now floats along the ceiling of her quarters. When a PC opens it, tell the player they get one question. The message is an answer to that question.
• 3. Lady Amalthea. A spice vessel, lost while attempting a less-charted route between ports. The ship has run aground on a small island, covered in sun-polished bones and a trio of sirens. Some of the spice has been fouled by storm, but there is still properly-sealed pepper, cinnamon, and saffron worth a total of 2,500 gc.
• 4. The Answer. Intended to carry a valuable sarcophagus over the sea, but never arrived in port despite good weather and seeming in fine order at its last point of call. Found in a placid sea, utterly abandoned and undamaged, except for the captain, dead, lashed to the helm. The sarcophagus is missing.
• 5. Squalproof. Sent to melt down statues and furnishings from the cursed palace of the doomed King Lessos, who was cursed so that all he touched turned into silver. Lost too much of its crew after repelling raiders, and sank off the coast of a desert island. Contains 20,000 coins' worth of cursed silver bullion. Double encounter chances as long as you carry any of this, and every day there’s a 1-in-6 chance of a rival adventuring party showing up seeking the silver.
• 6. Damien's Pride. Confirmed to have returned from a successful diplomatic meeting with the Merfolk Congress, but ambushed and sunk by hateful sea elves due to waterlogged political rivalry. The hold contains four well-labeled water-breathing potions with three doses each, lasting 2 hours and imparting a vague nausea in the last 20 minutes as an alchemically-infused warning that time is running out. A set of five golden tridents worth a total of 1000 gc can also be found, alongside well-wishes, a couple clamshell bras, and a scrimshawed tusk depicting well-to-do merfolk having a feast.
• 7. Linebreaker. Was in the middle of a tricky operation transporting an ancient symbol-covered pillar to the home of a wealthy prince when a relatively minor storm sunk it due to lack of compensation for the extreme weight of the cargo. The pillar is pretty much impossible to lift from its watery grave but if you speak dwarven, you can read the inscription that shows a hidden compartment containing special amber lenses worth 2000 gc that give +2 to secret door rolls.
• 8. The Shadow. A swift vessel lost while transporting rare cargo, a kraken's tentacle severed by a magician's cutting spell. Mid-transit, the tendril suddenly animated and tore the ship apart. It now lies resting in its jetsam tomb, but if a PC gets too close to it they must save or be grabbed, taking 3d6 damage ever turn unless freed.
• 9. Bastion of Saint Roland. Was carrying fine weapons to a warzone when it was unintentionally beached on a sandbar and set upon by a trio of weresharks. Now half-sunk, the cargo is largely intact, save for the pieces the therianthropes have raided for themselves. 1,500 gc in fine swords, stiff spears, helmets, and chain shirts.
• 10. Secret-Fire. Lost after "liberating" several magic scrolls and rare books from an occulted library. The entire haul was ruined as the ship fell beneath the waves.
• 11. Shield-Basher. Sent to purchase a particular artifact, its features circumscribed in all notes, with a hold full of treasure. On the way back from the Wintermoot, struck an iceberg and stubbornly sailed on, refusing the approach of all ships offering help. This single object is a gas-lamp that contains a potent fire spirit (stats as efreet). Will serve the holder of the lamp, but after completing three tasks the spirit and the holder switch fates. This traps the user as a spirit until they can complete three tasks and releases Mary Blackthorn, a master thief afflicted with mummy rot.
• 12. The Gunga Din. Set out on speculative expedition, seeking new ports of call. Came upon the remote island of the Lotans, who possess a superlative narcotic flower. Sampling it in the midst of their voyage, the crew grew so slack they starved, eventually tossed aside by a great wave. Within their hold remain five buds of the drug— when eaten, save or enter a deep somnambulant addiction, itself like death.
• 13. The Parakeet. Returning from a trade mission that utterly ruined their finances. Their fortune continued to dive as poor weather stranded them in a still sea, where, starving and sunmad, they resorted to cannibalism. Seven and a half lacedons remain on the vessel.
• 14. Relentless. A former naval vessel converted into a prison vessel, dispatched to retrieve the renegade wizard Tenchan Three-Hand. Sunken due to faulty equipment and loss of stability. The crew had to abandon ship, but the brig, which takes up half the hold, still contains several prisoners' floating remains, for they were deemed too dangerous to keep alive. Abandoned in haste in a chest in the captain's quarters is a waterproof case containing Three-Hand's spellbook, which has the following spells inscribed: Detect Magic, Read Languages, Youthful Image, Knock, Tenchan's Barred Entry, Turn Shadows, Conjure Glock Gnomes, and Disguise Self. Those who carefully study the book will notice that the writer was tridextrous. And yet, all the prisoners they saw in the brig had two hands…
• 15. The Freeport. Recovering belongings and trappings of a Wintermoot raider, now settled in what is more commonly considered civilized lands. Unfortunately, most of what remains after a sudden sinking is Klolse, a regional delicacy that involves shitting into a squash and letting it ferment for a few months.
• 16. Chadia. Was embarked on a journey to recover strange creatures for a king's menagerie. Now a watery cage for drowned gorillas. 😭
• 17. King Brand. Sent to take letters from a beleaguered port. Crashed midway, and is now the home of a giant octopus, which practices its camouflage against the lower deck and sings strange songs.
• 18. The Antipode. Sent on a rescue mission to recover the crew of Secret-Fire, presumed shipwrecked. Shipwrecked itself, then gradually digested and replaced with one giant mimic (12 HD).
• 19. The Line. Taking bullion to buoy colonial authorities, then return with indigo and rum. On the return journey, it was raided by privateers of a rival power, then scuttled. Nothing valuable remains.
• 20. The Red Pike. Attempted to find an oceanic passage around a large landmass. Got caught in a horrific whirlpool. Those who search it out risk entering into that whirlpool themselves. 1-in-3 chance of surprise if not forewarned, leads almost inevitably to a save vs waterlogged death situation.