| Douglas Muir 406 |
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Consolidating some stuff from an old thread. This is a set of seeds for a short campaign set in an evil city that is dedicated to the sin of Gluttony. This post assumes that PCs are level 8-10, but it's easily tweaked for other levels. The BBEG is a Worm That Walks who lives beneath the city.
Welcome to Glutton Town
The Worm lives in a city whose culture is big on conspicuous consumption. The wealthy enjoy lives of ostentatious splendor, while the poor groan in misery. And the absolutely best way to show off wealth in this town is a fifteen-course, six hour long, absolute gut buster of a banquet. The Worm loves this, of course, and makes occasional quiet interventions to make sure that public gorging and mass gluttony continue to be central to the local culture.
The Worm's lair is, of course, beneath the great Banquet Hall in the center of town. This is the center of civic life, where the notables gather to eat the finest dishes and decide the town's affairs over replete stomachs and tight waistcoats. The Worm -- which in time will eat all, eat them all -- lurks directly below.
Glutton Town's alignment is firmly Neutral Evil If you want to keep things simple, you can have Urgathoa be the patron deity. However, if you want to change it up a bit, have the usual pantheon of your campaign, but with the local temples being evil. If they're good gods, the local priests may be perverted or heretical. If they're neutral, well, you get a Temple of Pharasma with NE priests who speak of the goddess as the Great Devourer. A temple of Calistria that's CE, with worshippers commingling gluttony and lust in some really creepy and disturbing ways. A temple of Abadar with plump LE priests who guard the city's bulging granaries, and who enforce the rule against charity with merciless severity. And so forth.
One peculiarity of Glutton Town: there are no magic items or scrolls for sale of greater than 500 gp value. This is because the Worm's ally the Leng Ghoul has grabbed them all for itself. Trying to sell more magical items, or simply brandishing them publicly, is likely to attract the Ghoul's attention.
Encounters in Glutton Town
As soon as the PCs arrive in Glutton Town, they should notice that it's not a very nice place. Most of the people are obviously poor, and many of the poor are visibly scrawny or even emaciated. A few wealthy people walk around, obviously dominant; they are richly dressed in fine fabrics and jewels and are usually quite plump. (And also generally well guarded, if the PCs start getting ideas.)
Fairly early on, the PCs should encounter some monks. There's an order of monks in the town that has two branches. One is a group of simple, humble men and women who meditate, pray, and try to help and protect the oppressed poor. The other consists of gluttons. How does a monk become a glutton? By absolute, fanatical focus on eating, of course... not quantity, but quality. "Exactly sixty-two grains of rice, four slices of sweet potato, and half a cup of water. So begins the path to perfection!" The humble monks are LG, the diet fanatic monks are LE. Later on, the PCs may encounter the evil monks as foes. As to the humble monks... have one of them help the PCs in some small way when they arrive in Glutton Town. Then let them see him being arrested (maybe for violating the law against, I don't know, giving food to the poor. Giving food to people who can't pay for it is against the law!) Later he can reappear down in the Worm's lair, with something awful about to happen to him...
There are bloatmages, of course. Can't have a City of Gluttony without bloatmages. They're grotesquely obese and usually carried in palanquins. Arcane PCs may recognize what they are; others will just wonder why the palanquins have magical symbols all over them. The wealthiest and most powerful bloatmages have palanquins that are actually magical, borne by matched sets of slaves of rare and unusual races.
There aren't a lot of guards or watchmen. This is because the authorities have other means of enforcing order. One is a meladaemon. It might seem strange to find a daemon of famine in a city devoted to conspicuous consumption, but the meladaemon views this city as a ripe, fat fruit just waiting to fall into the hungry jaws of the lower planes. It is there as part of a deal struck between the Worm and a powerful daemon lord. The city uses it as an enforcer: after all, what could be more terrifying to a city of gluttons than an incarnation of emaciation and hunger come ravening to their very door? Also, the daemon's Reduce Plants SLA is very handy for punishing peasants who don't pay their taxes. It makes their fields less productive, but only temporarily, thus ensuring that they can be sold into slavery to pay their tax debts and their lands given to people who will take the lesson and work harder to provide taxes and food for the masters. (This is "Management for Productivity", Neutral Evil style.)
A basic meladaemon is CR 11. If this isn't challenging enough, give him the Advanced template or a couple of fighter levels. He spends a lot of time polymorphed into human form, but he doesn't bother disguising his daemonic aura or the fact that he's not what he seems -- he wants people to be terrified of him, and so do the city fathers. PCs who make trouble in town can expect a visit from this creature pretty quickly.
Entering the dungeon
There are several options for this. The simplest is that the PCs are contacted by the Resistance. (Because of course there's a Resistance.) These plucky rebels don't know about the Worm, exactly, but they've come to realize that the real source of the evil in their town is not the fat Council (selfish and venal though they are), but something deeper and much, much worse. They know there's a complex under the Banquet Hall, and they know there's something bad down there, and they can direct the PCs to the entrance. Use this hook if you want something fairly heroic and straightforward. If the PCs get really interested, you can have them join the Resistance for a while (using the rules from Book One of the Hells Rebels AP). But eventually, someone has to go down that hole...
Second possibility: once the PCs have done something noteworthy in town, have them be recruited by a powerful local nobleman. Lord Jowly sits on the Council, but he's come to realize that the Council is being manipulated by some deeper power... and also that members who pry too closely tend to disappear. He knows of the Worm's existence, but thinks it is just a powerful evil spellcaster. Use this hook if the PCs aren't particularly heroic, or you want to turn up the moral ambiguity a bit. After all, if the Worm is eliminated, Lord Jowly isn't going to embark on a program of radical reform. He thinks Glutton Town is fine the way it is. He just wants to be in charge.
More in a moment...
Doug M.
| Douglas Muir 406 |
Glutton Town, part 2: the dungeon.
What's down in that dungeon?
The BBEG is the Worm That Walks, and the PCs may encounter him more than once. That's because his lair has a lot of little holes in the floor everywhere, leading into a drainage system. Let the PCs spot this and wonder about it. Clever players may conclude they're up against a vampire or someone with Gaseous Form, which is close. (Too-clever players may try gaseous form or shrinking. They'll meet various glyphs and magical traps, and also Squeaky and his friends.) If the Worm is every seriously threatened or badly injured, he discorporates and crawls away under the floor. Remember, his fast healing means that he'll recover any hp damage in less than a turn.
If they meet him outside his lair, he should be surrounded by some low or medium level undead, with the Worm bolstering them with desecrate and buffs. So the PCs carve their way through, attack the mysterious robed figure... and the Worm collapses at the first touch, leaving nothing but a black robe and a nasty smell. Lather, rinse, repeat. Eventually, the PCs corner the Worm... but this time, it's wearing all its gear, and has its most powerful servants at hand. So there's a proper boss fight.
Now, say you start with a bunch of lower level undead... bleeding skeletons, zombies, ghouls and wights, CRs 1-3 (though, lots of them). The PCs should wade right through these guys without too much trouble, and it should get them thinking "okay undead, that's what this is about".
Then you can bring in the worm's allies. There are several. First, he's keeping company with a nabasu demon with 10 growth points. I statted this bad boy out a while ago, and he looks like this:
CE Medium outsider (chaotic, demon, evil, native)
Init +7; Senses darkvision 60 ft.; Perception +23
DEFENSE
AC 27, touch 14, flat-footed 23 (+3 Dex, +1 dodge, +13 natural)
hp 203 (9d10+54+100 from growth points)
Fort +19, Ref +19, Will +19
DR 10/cold iron or good; Immune death effects, electricity, paralysis, poison; Resist acid 10, cold 10, fire 10; SR 24
OFFENSE
Speed 30 ft., fly 60 ft. (average)
Melee 2 claws +25 (1d6+6), bite +25 (1d8+6)
Special Attacks consume life, death-stealing gaze, sneak attack +2d6
Spell-Like Abilities (CL 18th)
At will—deeper darkness, greater teleport (self plus 50 lbs. of objects only), telekinesis (DC 19)
3/day—enervation, silence (DC 16), vampiric touch
1/day—mass hold person (DC 21), regenerate, summon (level 4, 1 nabasu 30% or 1d4 babaus 30%)
STATISTICS
Str 22, Dex 17, Con 22, Int 15, Wis 16, Cha 19
Base Atk +9; CMB +25; CMD 29
Feats Cleave, Combat Expertise, Dodge, Improved Initiative, Power Attack
Skills Acrobatics +25, Fly +25, Knowledge (arcana) +24, Knowledge (planes) +24, Perception +33, Sense Motive +25, Stealth +25 (+33 in shadowy areas), Survival +25; Racial Modifiers +8 Perception, +8 Stealth in shadowy areas; growth point modifier +10 on all skill checks
Languages Abyssal, Celestial, Draconic; telepathy 100 ft.
SPECIAL ABILITIES
Consume Life (Su)
When a nabasu creates a ghoul with its gaze attack, it gains a growth point. It gains a bonus equal to its growth point total on attack rolls, CMB rolls, saving throws, caster level checks, and skill checks. Its maximum hit points increase by 10 for each growth point, and its caster level for spell-like abilities increases by 1. For every 2 growth points, its natural armor bonus, SR, and CR increase by 1. Every time it gains a growth point it makes a DC 30 caster level check—success indicates it matures (gaining both the advanced and the giant simple templates) and plane shifts to the Abyss in a burst of smoke. A nabasu can have a maximum of 20 growth points—it automatically matures if it has not done so already when it reaches 20 growth points.
Death-Stealing Gaze (Su)
As a free action once per day per growth point (minimum of 1/day), a nabasu can activate its death-stealing gaze for a full round. All living creatures within 30 feet must succeed on a DC 18 Fortitude save or gain a negative level. A humanoid slain in this manner immediately transforms into a ghoul under the nabasu's control. A nabasu's gaze can only create one ghoul per round—if multiple humans perish from the gaze in a round, the nabasu picks which human becomes a ghoul. The save DC is Charisma-based.
Demons Revisited gives this interesting feat option for nabasus:
Benefit: When you would normally create a ghoul with your death-stealing gaze, you instead create a ghast. As a free action, you may also spend a number of growth points in order to even further augment your new undead minion as it is created. If you spend 1 growth point, you create a wight instead of a ghast. If you spend 3 growth points, you create a wraith instead of a ghast. And if you spend 5 growth points, you transform the target into a juju zombie instead of a ghast. Note that spending growth in this manner reduces your statistics as appropriate.
-- Note that since growth points don't give the demon more feats, you'd have to swap out two of its feats to get this. Personally, I'd consider house-ruling that it gets a feat for every 5 growth points, but if you want to play strictly by the RAW I'd throw out Dodge (AC is not its strength anyway) and Combat Expertise (ibid).
This particular nabasu has a bad case of arrested development. It likes the Prime Material Plane and doesn't really *want* to become a vrolikai. So, it takes the above feat -- and whenever it creates an undead, it burns the growth point to create a wight. That way, it never has to make the level check. (And after a while, there may be quite a few wights around.) Other demons might view this creature askance -- it's like the kid who never wants to go through puberty, but would rather be an eternal 10 year old, playing with Pokemons and Legos. But what does it care what other demons think? The Worm called up the nabasu a while ago as a hedge against the Leng Ghoul, who it (correctly) suspects of becoming unreliable as an ally. Now the demon has a very cosy relationship with the Worm -- they're both gluttons, and they're both all about undead.
Another ally for the Worm is, of course, a worm. A purple worm, to be precise. Normal purple worms are CR 12; sticking the advanced template on it makes it CR 13. Again, having an enormous eating machine that's threatening the PCs with being swallowed whole seems a nice thematic fit for Gluttony. If you're feeling cruel, you can have it join the Worm That Walks in the final boss fight.
There are some humans in the Worm's lair. Some of these are pathetic helpless slaves, drawn from the poor above. Their lives are horrible and short, and they will end up food for the Worm's undead minions. (The Worm always keeps one close at hand to charge up his Death Knell spell.) Some, OTOH, are nobles or priests from the town above who are in on the secret and working with the Worm. There should be a few low-level priests around, to cast Darkness for the worm if nothing else.
There are at least a couple of monks. The leader of the evil monks knows of the Worm, and he's fine with it -- by its mere existence, this creature generates an environment conducive to correct thought and focused study. He's assigned some midlevel monks as liasons. Say, a couple of 9th level monks... hungry ghost monks, of course. If you're ready for undead, monks can be a very interesting surprise.
The Worm has a couple of friends and allies down in his lair. One is an Arcane Trickster. It's a ratling witch/rogue with a quasit as its improved familiar. (If you missed it, ratlings are the horrible little ratlike dudes with half-human faces, little handlike paws, and evil intelligence. They're Lovecraftian too, so that fits.) I'd make the ratling something like a Rog 3/Witch 3/Arcane Trickster 5. That only makes it CR 10 or so... but it runs around under the floor, constantly going invisible, throwing spells and launching sneak attacks and summoning rat swarms and stealing small useful items from the PCs and giggling horribly (witch's cackle). Trust me, it won't take long before the PCs utterly hate this guy.
Squeaky is old friends with the Worm. They get along great, actually.
Finally, there are three powerful creatures who might interact with the PCs in more complex ways. First, there's a bloatmage. He's not As noted above, the city is full of them, but this one is particularly powerful and a close ally of the Worm. He's a truly vile character who delights in every form of gluttony. I'd say he's 12th or 13th level, and based on a sorceror build -- though he didn't dump Int, and is nobody's fool. Rakshasa bloodline comes to mind, though daemon could work too. He uses a simple Extended Disguise Self to appear as an older man with a cane and dark glasses, tapping his way along a bit uncertainly. The cane is to explain his low movement, and the dark glasses are a bit of misdirection -- the PCs will encounter him in the Worm's lair, where everything is always dark anyway. (In fact, he has perfectly good darkvision.) He'll explain that he's a humble worshipper of some NG deity, who some years ago was afflicted simultaneously with clouded vision and strange powers granted from the god. (This should have canny PCs immediately thinking "oracle", which is exactly what he intends.) The cruel masters of this wicked city have kept him imprisoned down here in these catacombs, hoping that he'll use his strange mystical visions in their service... are you bold adventurers here to stop them? (This is where the Rakshasa bloodline's +5 to bluff really shines, along with the SR against divination spells.) If the PCs trust him, they're setting themselves up for a world of hurt.
He specializes in illusions and transmutation spells, which might prove troublesome if the PCs have come specialized for undead. Like most high level bloatmages, he starts every day with Overland Flight so that he can bob along like Baron Harkonnen. He has various magic items, one of which will surely be a jar of fortifying leeches, just because they're great.
Second, there's a vampire. A /captive/ vampire, surrounded by holy symbols and a Magic Circle. The creature saw this city full of well-fed people, their blood so thick with rich sauces and high living, and foolishly thought it had found an ideal hunting ground. But the Worm brooks no rivals, and it quickly sniffed out the vampire and captured her. The vampire is a 12th level Dirge Bard, which would normally make it CR 13 or so, but the effects of hunger have greatly weakened it. (The rules for that can be found on the vampire page, right here -- scroll down a couple of screens.) Depending on how weak from hunger it is, its CR may be down by as much as 3.
The vampire begs the PCs to free it, offering to tell all it knows and help them against the Worm. Will it really? You tell me. A Dirge Bard could be pretty useful as an ally. On the other hand, possibly the vampire will fly off at once. Or maybe it will ally with the PCs until the end, then turn on them, hoping to replace the Worm. Season to taste! Regardless, it'll be desperate for a blood meal before anything else.
Oh, and: in a cell down the hall from the vampire? Is a flumph. A party of several flumphs arrived in Glutton Town a while ago, after their divinations detected the presence of an otherworldly abomination. They tried to warn the townsfolk... and quickly ended up here, in the Worm's jail and larder. The rest of the flumph's party has been converted to stir-fried flumph, flumph nuggets, and flumph-on-a-stick. This one is only alive because the Worm is saving him for a special occasion. He's a third level cleric, which means he'll be of some small use to the party but will also have to be protected. Like most flumphs, he's Lawful Good, kind-hearted, and painfully earnest. If released, he'll help the PCs in any way he can, but will object to allying with the vampire, and will very loudly object to any dealings with Leng Ghoul.
Finally, there's the Leng Ghoul. Urbane, erudite, green and hooved, this strange creature has been an ally of the Worm for years. The Worm called him from Leng to help with constructing the dungeon and establishing his rule over the city. In return, he offered the Ghoul any magic items, books, scrolls or occult lore to be found. That worked for years, but now the alliance is fraying: the Ghoul has found all the interesting stuff that this single mortal city contains, and it's ready to move on. (It's chaotic neutral rather than chaotic evil, so simply tormenting a city of mortals isn't a major motivator.) However, the Ghoul would really like to acquire some of the Worm's loot before it goes. The creature will be encountered in its study, a room full of books and scrolls. If the PCs stop to talk, the Ghoul will offer to ally with them in return for the Worm's stuff. Its opening bid will be the Worm's staff and its spellbook; the staff is negotiable, the spellbook is not. Failing that, it may also offer to trade information for items in the PCs' possession. A sufficiently high Knowledge check can also allow a PC to entertain the Ghoul for an hour of conversation, after which it will answer a single question. The Ghoul helped build the dungeon and it has worked with the Worm for years, so it's very well informed.
Picking a fight with the Ghoul is not a great idea; it's as powerful as the Worm, its best treasures have already been shipped to Leng, and if severely pressed it will simply pull out a scroll and Plane Shift away. I see it as a CR 13 creature, either a Wizard 1 / Cyphermage 5, or a sixth level Mesmerist.
Boss: The Worm That Walks
The Worm's lair was once a richly appointed room with carpets, silk hangings, lovely furniture. Now the furniture is decaying and collapsing, the carpets are a mass of mold, and everything is lightly coated with slime.
The Worm himself? Start with a daemonspawn tiefling (+2 Int and Dex, -2 Wis, gets Death Knell instead of Darkness as a SLA). Assuming APL 8-10 or so, make him a necromancer 11/gravemaster 3. The gravemaster PrC is kinda so-so -- you give up a level of casting, so he'll only have spells like a 13th level necromancer. But it does give him the Undead Manipulator and Negative Energy Conduit powers, both of which are nice if you want him to be standing in the middle of a horde of attacking undead.
In terms of stats, a 20 point build with racial adjustments and level bumps gives Str 9 Con 16 Dex 18 Int 22 Wis 10 Cha 12. (He doesn't dump Cha because he needs it for Command Undead.) 14d8+42 gives 105 hp, which isn't a lot for a CR 15 creature but keep in mind that he has DR 15/- and fast healing 15. If you want to bump him up a little but don't want to add more caster levels, consider a couple of levels of rogue -- that gives Evasion, a few more hp, and the 15 rank Bluff skill unlock (blocks alignment detection and mindreading).
Any encounter should take place in deep darkness -- ideally, with a minor caster somewhere throwing Darkness to attack PC light sources. The worm has both darkvision and blindsight, so he doesn't care. For those PCs with darkvision, you want this guy in heavy, shrouding robes so that the PCs can't see what they're actually facing. Depending on APL, they may face him alone, or with a bunch of low to medium level mooks and undead surrounding him... you decide.
What does his gear include? That's up to you, but I'd consider giving him a Staff of Hungry Shadows -- nicely thematic -- and having him open negotiations by using it to summon a devourer. (He's no dummy, so if the PCs are carving a swath through his servants, he'll summon it in advance -- it works like Planar Binding, so it lasts up to 13 days.)
Actually killing the Worm will require delivering a lot of damage very fast, since he'll just discorporate and slither away if seriously threatened. However, if he has to leave his stuff behind, he'll be weakened. He won't want to leave town, though; this is his food source. So if the PCs don't kill him straight off, he'll gather allies and come back for a rematch.
Phew. Thoughts?
Doug M.
| The Skeptical Gnome |
This sounds quite intriguing. Would make either a good one off or an interesting side quest in a larger overarching campaign. And a good chance for the PCs to get some excellent loot, should they decide to exterminate the leng ghoul and take his and The Worms stuff.
| Douglas Muir 406 |
Since the Worm is the BBEG and the Ghoul is a potential ally -- okay, a very self-interested, not terribly trustworthy potential ally -- I'd give more treasure to the Worm. Also, note that the Worm is (1) leaving soon anyway, and (2) not actually evil (Leng Ghouls are allowed to vary their alignment, so he's CN). Good-aligned PCs who pause to talk before hacking should realize that even if they don't want to ally, there's no compelling reason to fight this creature. But all that is entirely up to the DM.
If you like, you could leave some papers in the Ghoul's study indicating that the REALLY good stuff -- a big shipment of spell books and magic items -- got shipped off to "Sesquiritia", a tomb-palace-library on the borders of Leng. I'm imagining this as a complex where several Leng Ghouls have cooperated to build a joint collection with lending rights, under the care of some monstrously evil and powerful Librarian. Finding Sesquiritia, getting there, and then dealing with the various terrifying guardians of the Ghouls' horde... yah, that could keep the PCs busy for a while.
Doug M.
| Douglas Muir 406 |
-- So I like Glutton Town well enough as a Gluttony-themed adventure park. However, I was pretty much flattened by the Kill Six Billion Demons version of it. If you're not a K6BD fan: it's a webcomic, and the multiverse is ruled by six evil demiurges, each one *loosely* associated with one of the seven deadly sins. The Chosen One is supposed to arise, overthrow these seven bosses, and establish a glorious new rule. However, the Power Of The Chosen One was given to his girlfriend instead: Alison, a 23 year old barista.
The Gluttony Boss is the first one Alison meets, and that sequence starts right around here, more or less. Don't worry about feeling thrown into the middle; it's always like that.
Doug M.