Origins: Grasslands of Merakai – Adventure Seeds II

Continuation of my Origins series, as detailed previously. -Mark

Dresan Encounters

Western Sector: Iron Arm’s

Ironarm’s is set in the Western Sector, in a very rough neighbourhood. Ironarm’s is a tavern/inn/arena. The place consists of two wooden buildings. The first is your standard tavern with rooms above it. The second appears to be a very large warehouse. The buildings are located across the street, opposite each other. The warehouse is only open for arena combats a few nights a week.

Tavern/Inn

This is the main place for partying action in the Western Sector. Everyone is invited to Ironarm’s as long as they are tough enough to survive. Ironarm himself is a full-blooded ogre, though he is a tid brighter than the average ogre. He also has three to ten other ogres in the bar with him at all times. The ogre band are heavy drinkers and their favourite drunk sport is halfling tossing (kind of like shot putting).

Ironarm runs the bar without many problems. Fights erupt frequently but he doesn’t care as long as you pay for what you break and take it outside. He also arranges arena duels for the other half of his business. He can usually set up any type of duel for PC’s within 3-5 days. Ironarm also runs the betting end of the deal but he extracts a health 15% commission off of any winnings over 100
GP.

The bar will hold up to 75 people fully packed and there is sleeping room for 25 in the common room and for 24 in 12 private rooms with two beds a piece. There are also four elite suites which are rarely occupied.

The Warehouse

The warehouse looks like an indoor stadium. It is three stories high with seating and bars on all three levels. The bottom level is composed of tiers of bleachers around the “cage”. The “cage” is 150′ long, 65′ wide, and 30′ tall. It is made of solid iron bars, one inch in diameter, with bars every seven inches and cross bars every foot. It has a huge door with a big lock and several bars to fasten it shut. The second story is where most of the bets are handled. Six clerk-type windows adorn the back wall where the bets are taken. The third floor is where friends of Ironarm sit to watch the duels. It is lushly furnished with a fully stocked bar.

Other Information

In order to get on good terms with Ironarm, PC’s must first prove their abilities in an arena combat. If PC’s make Ironarm an enemy, their first combat will be their last. Combats at the warehouse are relatively infrequent with only one per week.

Ironarm is called so because he wears two iron forearm protectors with spikes on them. He specialises in brawling and boxing. He generally does not wear any armour but has been seen in it once or twice.

Mid-City: The Lost Book

A mage from Mid-City has lost a book in the Thornbrush river and would like to recover it. A reward of 500 GP is offered for the books return. He knows the basic location where the text is from a few scrying spells. He also offers free potions of water breathing to those adventurers looking for the book. The book is wrapped in seal skin (waterproof) which is dyed black. It is lying in the cabin of a riverboat which sank several years ago. The text is actually a 4th level spell book. I used this scenario to introduce a few fresh water monsters. The fresh water scrag (listed under troll in Monster Compendium) is an excellent choice for a set encounter. Other than that, a few wandering monsters from the fresh-water encounter table will easily provide a good session. Do not forget that metal armour does not function underwater too well and of course all attacks are made at half speed as is normal movement. Duration times for the potions is also critical (you can’t drink a potion while your submerged). Before using this scenario re-read the DMG section on underwater spell use and underwater combat.

Eastern Sector: Heldo Braggart

The last scenario involves a merchant. Heldo Braggart is an “alchemist” who specialises in magical oils. He readily tells customers that he can make any type of magical oil. Heldo actually believes that he can but in actuality, Heldo has only discovered a segment of the refining process which divides crude oil into several different layers of fine/good quality oil. They are not magical and do not confer any bonuses but stop all rusting of weapons or armour. One of the oils is actually greek fire but Heldo does not know this and happens to sell that one as oil of fiery burning. Make up types of oils from anything. Even give a few “bonuses” here and there but most of all, charge exorbitant prices and unload the treasure from those gullible PC’s.

Origins: Grasslands of Merakai – Adventure Seeds

Continuation of my Origins series, as detailed previously. -Mark

Adventure Seeds

The Adventure Seeds sequence are snippets of encounter ideas I posted in tandem with the original background material. The majority of the ideas are tied to a location within the Grasslands but could easily be plopped down elsewhere. Reading through some of these, I am amazed at how brutal I was to the players at the time. However, the precept of the campaign was focused on surviving a brutal era and area.

Lierchmon: The Cook

Lierchmon is a pretty small village with quite a few problems. To begin with, there have been several murders right in the village. No one knows what has happened but several citizens have disappeared and several areas showed signs of a struggle. This stems from the group of Troglodytes living in the basement of an abandoned inn called the Foaming Mug. They wander late at night ambushing unwary citizens.

Secondly, several visiting clerics have been poisoned. Many clerics have fallen ill after about 2 days in Lierchmon. They all have the same symptoms but nothing ties them together. Actually, the cook at the Golden Grain Inn has been slipping poison into their food which takes 1-2 days for the affect to occur. The poison can kill but it usually just incapacitates the cleric for 1-8 days. The cook, Snivel Graltar, is a 3rd level assassin who despises clerics. He will attempt to poison any cleric who travels through Lierchmon and stays at the Golden Grain. Also, once he has poisoned the cleric, he will sneak into the cleric’s room and rob him blind while the cleric is still delirious from the poison.

Fedell: Ants

One of the few poor farmers in the area has had a terrible misfortune. His wheat field has been invaded by a hill of giant ants. These ants wander about the area eating all the vegetation which is beginning to cause a food shortage in the town. The council of merchants has offered a reward to any group of adventurers who will destroy the ant-hill. The reward is about 500 GP for the body of the queen ant. Follow the guidelines for the ant population printed in the Monstrous Compendium. Run several encounters of worker ants in the field and then a few warrior ant encounters as the PC’s make their way toward the hill. Eventually, the PC’s will need to fight their way inside the ant-hill and kill the queen. This ends the scenario–except for getting the large queen’s body back to the city. Remember if the PC’s destroy the body of the queen (i.e. by fire) no reward will be given.

Fedell: The Raid

The PC’s are hanging out in one of the several inns/taverns in Fedell when a group of wandering bandits hit the town. A portion of the bandit group will bust into the tavern with swords drawn. They intend to rob the bar and make off with the expensive alcohol not to mention any women who may be in there (PC women can be subject to this). If the PC’s destroy the first group of bandits another set will show up to find out where the first is. Or the PC’s may enter into the street where the bandits will attempt to run them down. Throw a few NPC’s into the bandit group and have them escape–this gives the PC’s someone to chase down.

Arfeld: The Wayward Inn

The foremost rumour within the town are of the towns Dadta and Marku to the west (into the scrub area). The rumours say that anyone who travels to these areas never returns. There is a small trail leading west out of Arfeld which is very overgrown due to lack of use. It leads to the Wayward Inn. The inn is the last stand of the humans who used to dwell in the area. Very recently, a large force of hobgoblins descended from the mountains and swept over Dadta and Marku. They have taken over both towns and are living off the stores of food and other supplies the fleeing humans left. Many of the settlers who remained in the towns are now dead or have been enslaved. Let rumours slowly trickle into the PC’s. Enough rumours will make them journey into the area.

All told, there are about 500 hobgoblins divided between the two towns and wandering about the surrounding areas. Killing hobgoblins should keep the PC’s busy for a couple of weeks. Eventually, after enough hobgoblins are slain, they will retreat to the mountains. Of course, other NPC’s will be in the area competing for the treasure (and gratitude of the old settlers). I used this situation to expose my players to several NPC enemies (a few of whom have been harassing them through several levels of experience).

Arfeld: The Great Cliff

The second scenario which I have prepared to spawn from Arfeld is the introduction of the Great Cliff. Many years ago, an earthquake caused a section of the scrub area to sink about 350′. This caused a great cliff of limestone to be exposed. Weathering has since opened a variety of caves up and carved ledges from the soft stone. Utilising these caves for lairs, many different encounters can be set up. The cliff varies from 200-500′ tall and averages 350′. It runs almost 40 miles and is potted by numerous caves.

One idea for the Great Cliff is to have the PC’s climbing along trying to reach a large cave opening about 50′ above them. The cave is actually the lair for a wyvern who just happens to come home while the PC’s are on a very thin ledge, say 1.5′. This will make the player’s scream as the wyvern repeatedly dives, knocking PC’s off the ledge and letting them plummet a couple hundred feet.

To make the climbing even more difficult, a had a nice spring thunderstorm roll into the area. It rained quite a while, dropping 1″ of precipitation. Try adding a little hail with the rain!

At ground level of the Great Cliff, a nice tribe of minotaurs make their home. This is a great encounter since the minotaurs love to appear at various levels from cave openings and drop rocks & debris on the players.