I didn't really like the raven challenges at the beginning of Maiden, Mother, Crone; so I decided to rework them a little bit. My players just finished it tonight (and got as far as meeting the Rashalka), so I figured I'd share the changes I made.
The basic premise, for those who don't want to read the whole thing, is this:
The Details (really, you can safely assume it's spoilers from here on out)
New map for Dancing Hut, Iobaria Configuration
A1. The Cauldron Room. This area is exactly the same as in the book.
A2. The Corridor of Counted Sorrows. Instead of a never-ending knot, the corridor is a large ring. The door from A1 is on the inner side of the ring, and the secret door to A9 is on the outer wall of the ring. On the far side, also on the inner wall, is the door to Moc's chamber.
The description of the corridor is largely the same, except that the carvings in the walls begin to subtly shift as the party gets closer to Moc's door. Instead of pleasant pastoral scenes, they begin to take on a more sinister caste, depicting people in torment and agony. By the time they reach the door, faces seem to be screaming silently at them from the carvings.
A3. The Iron Forest of Moc, the Twilight Raven. Pretty much the same description as in the book, except it's a large ring instead of a rectangle. Moc's nest is on the far side of the ring from the entrance, as is the door to the next innermost ring (where the party will fight the Beast of Gelghlast).
Moc is surprised at first when the party enters, but quickly recovers. Once he determines that they're working for Baba Yaga, he hatches his plan. He informs them that they must complete three trials in order to proceed on their quest. The first is the Trial of Strength: they must proceed into the next ring, defeat the beast within, and bring him its tusks. They can then proceed to the next trial.
In reality, the Beast is immune to Moc's mind-effecting abilities, which makes it unlikely that he can defeat it. He can't get past it to Rozum: it's been affected by Yelizaveta's magical madness and will attack him on sight. He wants the PCs to bring him the tusks so he can confirm it's dead before venturing into the room with it.
Once the PCs have defeated the beast and returned with its tusks, Moc will give them his amulet and escort them to Rozum's chamber.
A4. The Beast of Gelghlast. The same as per the book, except that the room is a ring and the beast has an additional ability: immune to mind-effecting spells and abilities. If this will be a significant detriment to the party, other abilities can be removed or weaknesses added to compensate.
A5. The Moonflower Bower of Rozum, the Raven of Midnight. The description of the room is the same, except that it's a ring and Rozum's nest is on the far side of the ring. Moc accompanies the party into the room and is able to silently communicate his plan to Rozum. Rozum then informs the party that their second trial is upon them: the Trial of Cunning.
In the next room, he tells them, is a projection of a memory. It is, however, jumbled up. In order to proceed, the PCs must set the memory back in its proper order. They will be granted a boon once this is complete, and they must return with it to Rozum.
In reality, Rozum is unable to pass through the room because of its blinding brightness and his pigmentless eyes. It literally hurts him to even enter it. He hopes that once the PCs complete the memory, it will fade and allow him through.
A6. A Memory of Porcelain Street. (Note: My goal here was to create a puzzle that's more thematically tied to the story. I'm not sure I really succeeded. The puzzle I used is presented here, but I encourage you to swap it out with better ideas. It's a long one, so I'll include the details in the first comment.)
This long, circular corridor is decorated into a twisted rendition of Porcelain Street on a bright winter day, very much like a madwoman's attempt to feign sanity. Bright, cheery building are painted along the walls with ghostly faces screaming from upper windows. Facades jut out into the street at strange angles, nailed crudely to the walls with iron spikes that sometimes also holds small birds or even human appendages. Figures made of porcelain lean out from some of the shops and perform simple, repetitive motions: like animatronics at an amusement park. Some speak in tinny voices, repeating broken phrases over and over.
Five porcelain figures are different: they stand unmoving and whole in the middle of the street, evenly spaced around the ring. The figures are: a Peddler, a Dollmaker, a Child (actually a representation of Yelizaveta), a Guard, and a Jadwiga (Yelizaveta’s mother, who is searching for her). There are numerous garments of different colors strewn throughout the scene.
The door where the PCs enter represents the north end of the street. Moving clockwise is equivalent to moving south.
The scene represents the only happy memory that Yelizaveta's fragmented soul can recall: a time as a child when her mother took her to Porcelain Street to buy a new doll, they got separated, and the young princess strolled the street taking in all of the exciting sights and sounds. Once the memory is completed, the doll appears in the Child's hands and she offers it to the PCs. The memory begins to fade as soon as they take the doll from the child's hands. Once they bring it to Rozum, he will lead them through the now dim room to the "south" end, where a new door has appeared (leading to Tryva's chamber).
A7. The Reflecting Pool of Tryva, the Raven of Dawn. Same as described in the book, with the standard ring exception. Rozum and Moc can silently pass the plan on to Tryva when they enter.
Tryva then informs the PCs that they have one trial left: the Trial of Resilience. She informs the PCs that they must enter the next and final chamber. There they will encounter an entity; from that entity they must learn the location of "the shard." She will not tell the PCs anything about the shard, informing them that they need only know its location, not anything else. Once the PCs return to her with the location of the shard--in truth, the information they've been trying to coax out of Yelizaveta the whole time--she'll grant them her amulet and inform them of the secret door to area A9.
A8. The Interrogation Room. Description initially as in the book, except it's a circle. However, once the PCs have all entered the candlelight begins to turn reddish and pulsing. The figure of Yelizaveta rises up from the stain on the bed, and then fragments. The room suddenly becomes a swirling chaos of tortured faces, reaching arms, twisting hair. Yelizaveta is everywhere within the room at once, screaming and shrieking. Allow each PC an immediate reaction, and then have them all roll a Will save (DC 10); each failing PC takes a point of wisdom damage. Note that Yelizaveta's fragmented ghost is too diffuse to be effectively targeted by attacks or spells.
Each round thereafter Yelizaveta will shriek again: the DC increases by 1 each time. Meanwhile, the PCs must attempt to coax information about the shard out of her. This is accomplished by making diplomacy checks against a DC 18 (showing her the doll can decrease this DC to 15). The PCs must succeed at three consecutive diplomacy checks before she'll reveal the shard's location: it inhabited a doll in the hut, which later helped a young girl named Vasilisa escape from Baba Yaga.
Once the PCs have learned Yelizaveta's secret, they can exit the chamber and take the information to Tryva, who will give them her amulet and tell them the way out.
(Note: The PCs will meet Vasilisa's doll later in the adventure path, confined and tortured within the hut. The shard in the doll knows nothing of Yelizaveta's fate since it was separated from her.)
A9. Ratibor's room. As in the book.
