The setting a Necromancers lair. This short scenario works best if the Necromancer has appeared before and this is the final battle between the two. It should appear early on in the Adventurers questing history, and they should think this is the hardest thing they will face.

Room 1:Entrance

There is an obvious entrance to the cave, with Satanic markings and all. However, if the adventurers search, they will find an alternate entrance. It is hard to find and behind Shrubbery. It is a small wooden door that the Necromancy uses. If you try to go though this, a magic forcefield will keep you out. It can be dispelled, but it should be hard to do.

The main entrance has a bunch of Zombies, led by the Necromancer’s assistant. You could make him as strong as you like, whatever race you like, but he should be a recurring villain, like the Necromancer.

The Main entrance itself is locked by a arcane lock that you cannot unlock unless you have the key that the assistant holds.

Room Two: Brain Dead

As you walk in, a rather large inscription should tell adventurers a riddle:

We cannot think, yet we know what you do not
We don’t have brains, yet in our heads we form words
These words we have can help you out
To bad our Tongues were the first to rot!

After a few minutes pass to allow the adventurers to ponder this, Skeletons will drop from the ceiling, each wielding weapons. These should not be made to tough, but serve as a tiny challenge. If the players smash their heads, they should find a tiny scroll in side each one. The scroll should have one letter on it, really big.

All the letters combined should make the word:

'Death'

This is the password. The letters should be scrambled in not come in the order of the appearance of the Skeletons. If you are to say the password to the door, they will hear a loud click. The door will now swing open easily if pushed,, but swing back once let go.

Room Three: Turn Around

There should be a short narrow hall way to another door. Above it should be another inscription:

Sorry but to the password there is more
Return from where you came to open this door.

The Travelers than have to go back to the room they just left and kill(?) more skeletons and take the letters out. However, the Skeletons fall at greater rates, with three skeletons to a party and only one having a letter. The letters should read

'Is Only The Beggining'

So the complete password is 'Death is only the Beggining'

Again, scramble the letter. The password has to be said to the door at the end of the hall again, with the same results.

Room Four: The Necromancer

The Necromancer sits upon his thrown of bones, applauding the Travelers for getting that far. But as always, he has to try and kill them anyways.

Five or so big bulky men wielding Battle Axes should come out somehow and attack the Adventurers. Should you kill one of them, The Necromancer will resurrect them. One will always stay in front of the Necromancer and take all the hits for him, getting healed instantly by the Necromancer. The only way to finally kill these guys is to separate either their hearts or head from their body, or wait until the Necromancer runs out of Magic. After that, you can kill the Necromancer. The last room is behind his thrown, which his concubine, who hid behind it after the fight broke out, will tell you.

Room Five: This is going to be be a long day…

As you enter the final room, you will here bells ringing everywhere. Torches immediately light themselves to reveal the Necromancers spellbook and other personal things on a large round table. After about ten seconds, Men will begin to appear in puffs of smoke. Each of them is wearing the same clothes as the necromancer. As they appear, they will say things such as:

'You called a meeti-, GASP, your not ~~~~!'

And such. Also, make it evident that they are Necromancers, for they are. You have a loooong way ahead of you…

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? Responses (12)

Sweet idea! I like the skeletons with clues in their head, I like the boss fight with the complication of resurrection, and I must say *with a big evil GM's grin on my face* that I like the twist at the end.

My favourite bit is the riddles. I have a soft spot for riddles. The name is ace too.

Oh, and by the way, welcome to the citadel! Hope that you have a pleasant journey!

Hah! What a silly, and entertaining adventure, I like it, if for nothing else, then for the image of merry dungeoneering through holes of any shape or weirdness.

Nice entry, mrcelophane.

While I would have presented the same scenario very differently, a lot of the differences revolve around my personal prefernces as opposed to yours. I prefer to provide a lot of specific details (assuming that a GM can cut out the ones that don't fit), while your preference seemed to be to keep things generic, allowing the GM to fill in areas for their own world.

I would have like to see more specific information about why the necromancer has set himself up this way. He has set up secure doors which require passwords to enter, but no information is given about why he placed riddles to allow entrance. Is he just absentminded, and expects that he can command his own undead to give him the reminders as needed?

The necromancer called a meeting with a bunch of powerful associates. Why? Is he their minion, master, or associate? If this is an adventure for inexperienced characters, a room full of powerful mages could be an ugly encounter: Hopefully, they're not hostile ("You guys killed off Bob? OK! Bill, you owe me 20 gold pieces, you bet he wouldn't get himself killed until October.").

Thanks for the comment

Yes, I do sort of like to keep a lot of ideas up to the GM, but the main reason I didn't put them was because I myself didn't have them. IT was something I came up with on the spur of the moment when I realized I had time in between my homework to write it.

And as for setting up riddles, those are just to stop other people. The riddle does not change, so he would be able just to breeze through.

AS for calling a meeting, it was really a defense mechanism set up that the others mistook for him calling a meeting. I guess I should have explained that a little more.

And the Necromancers probabally could take on the adventurers, but they are pretty weak (in my opinion) without there undead minions

thanks again

the name of the sub of course is divine. I am also one for maximum detail and specificity, but its clever in its own way. I also like the clues inside the skeleton's skulls :)

I would use this, but maybe first put a macabre spin on it.

Hmm, fully fleshed and brained zombies that you had to hack apart while they still convulsed to get the slips of paper? (How DID they get these in here. Hold still, damn you...)

Wow, everybody likes the name. I came up with it on the spot.

Yeah, the zombie thing would be cool. Theyed have to be kept in waterproof compartments to keep them safe. But other than that, it is a cool idea.

I too like the name and the idea of clues on the skeletals heads. However, my players are too smart for a scenario like this and would go through it very quickly. Also, they would need some serious motivation to even continue once they were told to go back to the original room. They would probably just leave.

If the only way out was the room behind the throne, that would be different.

I only see two difficulties in this. First, to my knowledge, the only way to decapitate some one in D&D is with a vorpal blade and some luck, but a vorpal weapon is a seriously powerful item, and a group of PCs in possession of it find no threat in skeletons and zombies. In Runequest the only way to decapitate some one is to do a lot of damage to their head (hard to hit). Secondly, for the first password the PCs need to kill five skeletons, but for the second password they need to kill fifty for skeletons unless I read it wrong. The difference in the size of the passwords is enough for them to be challenging.

However, all in all, it is an very great idea that I plan to use in an upcoming dungeon.

Out of curiosity, if you are still around, I was wondering if you did in fact use this and how it went.

Great twist. The writing was a big shaky and the second skeletons from ceiling puzzle does require you to bust a very large amount of skulls. I get a very video game vibe from this. It doesn't feel like your typical fantasy adventure, it's more like something you would find with a certain mask on. Not bad at all. I might have to use it in some form or another.