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For those of you with the Pathfinder Campaign Setting Guide: Sandpoint, Light of the Lost Coast, I think this title will be pretty self-explanatory, but for those who don't, I'll give a brief background for context.
Now, I'd very much like to use this location, firstly because it's neat, and secondly because my party is already suspicious that there may be more un-collapsed portions of the Catacombs of Wrath. They've also been hesitant to head to Jorgenfist, so I've been whipping up an alternate Book 4 - the first half of which I've already designed, taking them into the Pit to discover the temple of Kabriri and the ancient cult of Urgathoa, as well as uncovering a pre-Runeforge fleshcrafting facility where Chellan was made.
My issue is two-fold:
1) There isn't a lot of narrative value as-is in the Hellfire Catacombs, as it mostly introduces parties to Alaznist and Bakrakhan, things my party is already familiar with. I mostly want to show off the control room, and I want to add an actual catacombs where Alaznist's agents harvested materials from soldiers slain by the Flume, but if anyone has any ideas for narrative devices to put in here to tie things together, that would be awesome.
2) As-designed, the Hellfire Catacombs appear to be CR 5. Obviously that won't do for my level 11 party, but I'm not that experienced at higher-level play. What are some thematic monsters - sticking primarily to demons, undead, and creatures with the fire subtype. Constructs also work, but I'm not familiar with any particularly appropriate ones.
If anyone's got any suggestions that would speed-up my own researching, that would be mighty helpful.
(I then aim to connect the Hellfire Catacombs to the Underflume, which the party has already seen a fraction of in a previous one-off. And from there, a teleportation ring to a laboratory that lies under what is now Grubber's Hermitage, a prison for the legendary beast known only as the Black Maga... the patron of a hag's coven the party is vaguely aware of. I swapped ol' Maga for a Daughter of Oblivion in Book 3. This lab's archive will act similarly to the Therassic Library, and Maga will be able to tell the party just who Xaliasa was.)
Getting to the control room would let them (or maybe Master Quink) activate the Old Light to defend Sandpoint from the giants? That seems a nice hook for your party.
11th level foes - mobs of vrocks (very apropos for the Runelord of Wrath), enhance some efreetis a bit, maybe some fire elemental guards.
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I did spend a good chunk of a day to try and mock up some monsters for Book 4 before I built the dungeons (so I'd have an idea what I was working with, and here's what I've got:
Hellfire Catacombs
- "The Charred" (Young Cinder Ghouls), filling the catacombs. They were never put to rest properly before the Cataclysm came, but the other inhabitants of the catacombs have simply sealed them off. Block access to to the extraction site, containing valuables.
- A Glabzeru (in the control room). Disguises herself as a female tiefling in classic Bakrakhanian garb (warm colors, loose, flowy dress), bound to the control room. Crafty as she is, isolation has warped her and damaged her social skills.
- Advanced Caryatid Columns and a Caryatid Golem, lining the paths between sections (between the Catacombs, the Underflume, and the Control Center). All resemble Alaznist and wield ranseurs. Can be deactivated by a password that only the Glabzeru remembers at this point.
- I like and agree with your Vrocks. I'm not quite sure where to put them yet, but I think I'll definitely include Vrocks somewhere within the Catacombs or the Underflume. Probably connected to Anizorah somehow, as she was the main Sloth caster we know of employed by Alaznist.
And I like your point re: activating the Old Light. It's explicitly too destroyed to possibly operate anymore, but if the party is able to find 1) The control center, 2) The power core in the Underflume, and 3) The Hellfire Lens (intact at perhaps a collapsed Hellfire Flume), they could conceivably put together a makeshift Hellfire Flume. That would sure be something...
a makeshift Hellfire Flume. That would sure be something...
Definitely enough to stop one giant attack, even if it melts down in the process.
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@Andrew
... oh. Damn. I had no idea.
As you might find in my campaign journal thread, I just worked together material from the Sandpoint Campaign Setting Guide, third-party material, and homebrew to make the map, then filled it out with the recommendations here and in the Sandpoint guide.
Monsters I ended up using:
- Demon, Vrocks
- Qlippoth, Gongornians
- Chimera, Legendary
- Runescarred Wrathspawn Barbarians
- Demilich
- Skeletal Champion Magi
- Geist
- Worm that Walks Human Cleric
- Shining Child of Thassilon
- Kuchrima, Lamia-kin
- Combusted (beefed up and granted some of the abilities of a Cinder Ghoul).
Just to show what I followed up from above, here were some major elements the party found:
- A lot of haunts connected to the Demilich Anizorah as well as people who worked closely with her, such as Verzazmian (cleric of Yamasoth) and Xaliasa (cleric of Lamashtu).
- Fleshwarping equipment and scrolls, sufficient to take and use the Fleshwarper feat. The party has shown no interest in selling this stuff, and is keeping it where they found it, but Cordelia is considering establishing a fleshwarping facility in the old fleshcrafting chamber of Thistletop.
- Evidence that Alaznist concocted a way to survive the Cataclysm, but it seems to have failed (unclear what the method was).
- A power crystal, only recently functional again thanks to the re-awakening of the minor runewell of wrath.
- The prison of the Black Magga, who, in my campaign, is stuck underneath Grubber's Hermitage - and the reason Alaznist recruited wizards from Haruka and placed them at this particular Hellfire Flume. She informed them a bit about Xaliasa and Runeforge.