Opinions on an adventure idea? (Chris S. keep out!) [Archive] - Wizards Community

Opinions on an adventure idea? (Chris S. keep out!) [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
Silopolis
08-25-05, 01:50 PM I'd like to get my ideas down "on paper" so to speak and see what you guys think of it. It's all mostly kinda vague (no locations, no NPC names, etc.), but I want to get the pieces in order before I paint them. ;) Apologies in advance for the length of this post. :)

The title of the adventure is "In the Grip of... Cyclotus!!" Imagine an old comic cover with one of the heroes caught in the grip of a giant construct, and you have the idea.

Basically, the players disrupt the escape of a wanted criminal in Sharn, and on the criminal they find a shard of mithril with some carvings on it. The bard PC (who will be from House Cannith) will recognize some of the carvings and a small Cannith brand on the shard. A Cannith contact will take the shard for analysis and return with a quest.

The quest is to seek out a Cannith artificer who lives near a small town in more rural Breland. The House hasn't heard from him in a long time, but the brand is his, and he would know more about the mysterious shard. Cannith sent a group of adventurers there a few weeks ago, but they never heard from them, either. Learning the artificer's fate and/or recovering information about his experiments (including whatever this shard is from) would be worth some real reward from the House.

When they reach the town, they find that it is under seige by wild animals in the nearby forest. They also learn that shipments of various materials used to come through the town and down a path into the forest, but the shipments have recently stopped. An interesting old man tells the party of a great white wolf that attacked him and how its eyes gleamed with intelligence. The town's hunters swear that the animals seem to work together, and that they seem to almost have a heirarchy that they follow. The hunters don't hunt that forest, for animal-attack reasons, but they will take the players to the path and into the forest to find the artificer's home.

In the forest, the players meet the animals. A pack of wolves harries the group, and a fight begins. With the hunters, the players should beat back the wolves easily. If they manage to kill any (the wolves will try to escape when they get low), they can examine the bodies and realize that the wolves are living constructs covered in fur. Odd!

Deeper into the forest, they get ambushed, and all but one of the hunters get sniped by arrows from the trees. Three green-clad characters drop from the trees and demand that the players stop where they are. The remaining hunter reveals herself as a changeling and draws steel on the party.

The emergent group explains that they came here, hired by Cannith to check up on a House artificer who dropped off the map and never returned their messages. When they got here, they learned of his experiments into construct building and realized that there was a whole new ecosystem here of living-construct animals. The adventurers had been hired by the town to hunt and kill the wild animals, but they (made mostly up of rangers and a druid) decided to study and protect them, instead. The players can deal with this group however they want, including noticing that there's no apparent druid with them at the moment. The NPCs explain that the druid went "missing" some time ago. They tell the players of a "source" somewhere in the forest that seems to control the animals. If the players decide to destroy the source, the NPCs will attack them. The NPCs can be convinced to accompany the players with some good RP.

The party continues down the path until they come to what looks like a mid-sized wood and metal shack. As they approach the shack, they sense an emanation in their minds. Those who fail a saving throw hear the word "Cyclotusssss..." in their minds and feel a desire to leave or to protect the territory around the shack. Investigating the shack finds a few artificer's tools and an open hatch in the floor that must have led to a basement or something before it was filled in with rock. Pages from a journal lie on a desk in the shack; the pages read, "What have I done, what have I done?" in repetition before becoming "CYCLOTUS IS THE SOURCE." There is no sign of the occupant. As they read the journal and/or search the place, the shack begins to burn, and a metallic voice from outside resounds, "CYCLOTUS IS THE SOURCE!"

Outside stands the missing druid, a mad warforged who has rained fire down upon the shack. If the NPC party is with the players, she will accuse them of betrayal and have her animals attack them along with the players. She is accompanied by a large pack of "warforged animals:" A massive bear, a pack of wolves, etc. When engaged in combat, she transforms into a huge white wolf and bounds into battle. The PCs must make saving throws to avoid the grip of the "Cyclotus effect," which is a Charm Person affect to convince the player to protect "the source." The fire quickly spreads to the dry tinder on the ground and sets the nearby trees ablaze. After the fight, the burning copse of trees reveals a cave in a hill face that had been concealed by the undergrowth.

The cave is hewn from the earth and leads under the shack. The mental buzzing from the Cyclotus effect can be sensed here, but no saving throw is needed until someone takes action against a minion of Cyclotus. Following the cave eventually leads to an underground chamber, the artificer's true lab. There are a number of failed constructs here, and notes and schematics by the missing artificer. A door opens up into a workshop.

In the lab are more bits from the artificer's journal. It turns out he was seeking a way for warforged to reproduce themselves using raw materials. In his searching he encountered a "life force," as he called it, that would empower this sort of construction. He called it the "source" and set it into a vault in his workshop, sealed with a mithril seal. He set the seal and completed the ritual needed to "jumpstart" the source. At that point his careful handwriting changes, and his notes babble a bit about setting the source free and constructing Cyclotus to house and protect the source. There's talk of breaking the seal and entrusting a shard to Kundarak for safekeeping. There's talk of leaving the lab and sealing it for good, and of fearing for his own mind.

If an NPC remains, he will succumb to the Cyclotus urging and attack the PCs for the mithril shard, seeking to place it in the seal. Otherwise, the players may realize that they must open the vault to retrieve the source, and that requires the seal to be complete.

Entering the workshop reveals a massive room with a massive metal-and-wood statue seated on the far end. The statue has, within what looks like a furnace on its chest, a huge, glowing red gemstone. The "furnace" is closed, and a broken mithril seal keeps it closed. The shard matches the gap in the seal.

Upon placing the seal, the furnace begins to open, but the statue comes to life, rumbling, "I AM THE SOURCE." The statue's rising shakes the old workshop and causes it to crumble. Players who wish to retrieve the source must climb the golem and get the stone while the golem attacks and the underground chamber crumbles. Players who attack the golem find that it is nigh invulnerable (DR 10/adamantine or so), and those who escape find that the escape route is blocked by warforged animals. Removing the source causes the statue to fall immediately and the animals to die within two or three rounds.

From there they can return to the village (where they are heroes for stopping the wild animals) and then to Cannith, where their reward depends on what they actually recovered. If they got the source, their Cannith contact rewards them healthily and demands that they keep this all secret, even from the rest of the House. This is an important finding, and she wants to research this before she submits anything to the House about this.

Any thoughts? This is meant to be an intro adventure for lvl 3 or so characters, thus the "not tied into anyone's background in particular" thing. I am likely to have a Cannith human bard and a warforged mage, so I am keeping in mind things that would make this interesting for them.

Thanks!
Silopolis
08-26-05, 07:04 PM Sorry for bumping. Is there no feedback whatsoever?
Tek
08-26-05, 08:51 PM I just got a chance to read this today and I must say it sounds like quite the fun adventure. Lots of intrigue and finding out the animals are actually warforged will be quite a thriller. Good luck running it!

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Silopolis 08-25-05, 01:50 PM	I'd like to get my ideas down "on paper" so to speak and see what you guys think of it. It's all mostly kinda vague (no locations, no NPC names, etc.), but I want to get the pieces in order before I paint them. ;) Apologies in advance for the length of this post. :) The title of the adventure is "In the Grip of... Cyclotus!!" Imagine an old comic cover with one of the heroes caught in the grip of a giant construct, and you have the idea. Basically, the players disrupt the escape of a wanted criminal in Sharn, and on the criminal they find a shard of mithril with some carvings on it. The bard PC (who will be from House Cannith) will recognize some of the carvings and a small Cannith brand on the shard. A Cannith contact will take the shard for analysis and return with a quest. The quest is to seek out a Cannith artificer who lives near a small town in more rural Breland. The House hasn't heard from him in a long time, but the brand is his, and he would know more about the mysterious shard. Cannith sent a group of adventurers there a few weeks ago, but they never heard from them, either. Learning the artificer's fate and/or recovering information about his experiments (including whatever this shard is from) would be worth some real reward from the House. When they reach the town, they find that it is under seige by wild animals in the nearby forest. They also learn that shipments of various materials used to come through the town and down a path into the forest, but the shipments have recently stopped. An interesting old man tells the party of a great white wolf that attacked him and how its eyes gleamed with intelligence. The town's hunters swear that the animals seem to work together, and that they seem to almost have a heirarchy that they follow. The hunters don't hunt that forest, for animal-attack reasons, but they will take the players to the path and into the forest to find the artificer's home. In the forest, the players meet the animals. A pack of wolves harries the group, and a fight begins. With the hunters, the players should beat back the wolves easily. If they manage to kill any (the wolves will try to escape when they get low), they can examine the bodies and realize that the wolves are living constructs covered in fur. Odd! Deeper into the forest, they get ambushed, and all but one of the hunters get sniped by arrows from the trees. Three green-clad characters drop from the trees and demand that the players stop where they are. The remaining hunter reveals herself as a changeling and draws steel on the party. The emergent group explains that they came here, hired by Cannith to check up on a House artificer who dropped off the map and never returned their messages. When they got here, they learned of his experiments into construct building and realized that there was a whole new ecosystem here of living-construct animals. The adventurers had been hired by the town to hunt and kill the wild animals, but they (made mostly up of rangers and a druid) decided to study and protect them, instead. The players can deal with this group however they want, including noticing that there's no apparent druid with them at the moment. The NPCs explain that the druid went "missing" some time ago. They tell the players of a "source" somewhere in the forest that seems to control the animals. If the players decide to destroy the source, the NPCs will attack them. The NPCs can be convinced to accompany the players with some good RP. The party continues down the path until they come to what looks like a mid-sized wood and metal shack. As they approach the shack, they sense an emanation in their minds. Those who fail a saving throw hear the word "Cyclotusssss..." in their minds and feel a desire to leave or to protect the territory around the shack. Investigating the shack finds a few artificer's tools and an open hatch in the floor that must have led to a basement or something before it was filled in with rock. Pages from a journal lie on a desk in the shack; the pages read, "What have I done, what have I done?" in repetition before becoming "CYCLOTUS IS THE SOURCE." There is no sign of the occupant. As they read the journal and/or search the place, the shack begins to burn, and a metallic voice from outside resounds, "CYCLOTUS IS THE SOURCE!" Outside stands the missing druid, a mad warforged who has rained fire down upon the shack. If the NPC party is with the players, she will accuse them of betrayal and have her animals attack them along with the players. She is accompanied by a large pack of "warforged animals:" A massive bear, a pack of wolves, etc. When engaged in combat, she transforms into a huge white wolf and bounds into battle. The PCs must make saving throws to avoid the grip of the "Cyclotus effect," which is a Charm Person affect to convince the player to protect "the source." The fire quickly spreads to the dry tinder on the ground and sets the nearby trees ablaze. After the fight, the burning copse of trees reveals a cave in a hill face that had been concealed by the undergrowth. The cave is hewn from the earth and leads under the shack. The mental buzzing from the Cyclotus effect can be sensed here, but no saving throw is needed until someone takes action against a minion of Cyclotus. Following the cave eventually leads to an underground chamber, the artificer's true lab. There are a number of failed constructs here, and notes and schematics by the missing artificer. A door opens up into a workshop. In the lab are more bits from the artificer's journal. It turns out he was seeking a way for warforged to reproduce themselves using raw materials. In his searching he encountered a "life force," as he called it, that would empower this sort of construction. He called it the "source" and set it into a vault in his workshop, sealed with a mithril seal. He set the seal and completed the ritual needed to "jumpstart" the source. At that point his careful handwriting changes, and his notes babble a bit about setting the source free and constructing Cyclotus to house and protect the source. There's talk of breaking the seal and entrusting a shard to Kundarak for safekeeping. There's talk of leaving the lab and sealing it for good, and of fearing for his own mind. If an NPC remains, he will succumb to the Cyclotus urging and attack the PCs for the mithril shard, seeking to place it in the seal. Otherwise, the players may realize that they must open the vault to retrieve the source, and that requires the seal to be complete. Entering the workshop reveals a massive room with a massive metal-and-wood statue seated on the far end. The statue has, within what looks like a furnace on its chest, a huge, glowing red gemstone. The "furnace" is closed, and a broken mithril seal keeps it closed. The shard matches the gap in the seal. Upon placing the seal, the furnace begins to open, but the statue comes to life, rumbling, "I AM THE SOURCE." The statue's rising shakes the old workshop and causes it to crumble. Players who wish to retrieve the source must climb the golem and get the stone while the golem attacks and the underground chamber crumbles. Players who attack the golem find that it is nigh invulnerable (DR 10/adamantine or so), and those who escape find that the escape route is blocked by warforged animals. Removing the source causes the statue to fall immediately and the animals to die within two or three rounds. From there they can return to the village (where they are heroes for stopping the wild animals) and then to Cannith, where their reward depends on what they actually recovered. If they got the source, their Cannith contact rewards them healthily and demands that they keep this all secret, even from the rest of the House. This is an important finding, and she wants to research this before she submits anything to the House about this. Any thoughts? This is meant to be an intro adventure for lvl 3 or so characters, thus the "not tied into anyone's background in particular" thing. I am likely to have a Cannith human bard and a warforged mage, so I am keeping in mind things that would make this interesting for them. Thanks!
Silopolis 08-26-05, 07:04 PM	Sorry for bumping. Is there no feedback whatsoever?
Tek 08-26-05, 08:51 PM	I just got a chance to read this today and I must say it sounds like quite the fun adventure. Lots of intrigue and finding out the animals are actually warforged will be quite a thriller. Good luck running it!