Skysaber
2013-12-07, 12:55 AM
One of our current campaigns started here:
Sunnycrypt
Originally a fortified dwarven city overrun by goblins that an archmage who liked to be called The Mortician raised up into the sky as an enclave - mostly because it was already honeycombed with chambers and corridors and came filled with bodies, the raw material for his ongoing work in necromancy.
Very shortly after raising his enclave, however, The Mortician killed himself and all of his assistants and senior apprentices in an experiment conducted in an attempt to create the very first intelligent undead. It worked. Unfortunately, due to the interference of a demon prince it worked far too well. Vapors billowed out killing everyone they could touch, leaving almost no survivors.
The vapors were heavier than air, so sank at every opportunity, thus they filled the test chamber and lower warrens of the enclave very quickly. Since these lowest levels carried the highest status, they were filled with those who carried the most power in the enclave, leaving only the miserable, lowest level apprentice mages forced to live in the upper reaches of the enclave as survivors.
The most senior surviving apprentice, at barely 5th level, tried to assume the role of archmage and titled himself The Second Mortician - only every one of his fellow students now calls him Morty the Mayor. He is not truly suited to necromany, but The Mortician never asked if someone wanted to be his apprentice, it was study that or die, so he'd studied.
Morty is a generalist mage left holding the bag for a powerful necromancer, and most of his time is spent trying to fix the messes The Mortician left behind. He renamed the enclave to Sunnycrypt trying to improve its image without denying its origins, and practices decorating trying to improve the gothic horror/dwarven tomb look by adding accents like brightly colored bows to gargoyles and cheerful houseplants or flowers in odd corners.
The enclave is laughably underdefended, and could be taken with ease by any other archmage. The thing is, no one of any respectable talent wants it. Construction halted shortly after it had barely begun, so the architecture is upside down from the current perspective, with ceilings and roofs of dwarven construction forming the floor, doors being mounted upside down from the current plane of gravity, and so on.
Transportation to and from the city is also difficult to arrange, as The Mortician never got around to any permanent spells or trade arrangements. Likewise, food and water are hard to arrange, and the population limited. So the city kind of limps along as sort of the poor, inbred cousin of the completed enclaves.
One secret poor Morty has been reluctantly trying to keep quiet is that The Mortician and his assistants are all still around, after a fashion. Revived as ghouls by the very spell that slew them, they retain none of the vast and powerful magical abilities they had in life, only possessing a terrible jealousy of living wizards.
Of far more immediate concern to Morty than a bunch of ghouls now locked in the basement was the fact that The Mortician's last spell had a radius measured in miles and slew just about every living thing it touched, turning all humanoids into ghouls. So the farmlands and valleys that was under the city when that spell was cast are now laid waste, and he desperately needs adventurers to take care of the problem of a massive ghoul invasion.
Bonus Spells for Studying in Sunnycrypt: Animate Animal (lvl 0), Animate Skeleton (lvl 1), Animate Zombie (lvl 2), Invigoration of Undeath (lvl 3), and Identify Undead (lvl 0). Source is Encyclopedia Arcane: Necromancy.
Locked deep in the ghoul-filled labs where the former archmage lurks are The Mortician's notes on his final spell:
The Mortician's Ghoulish Cloud
Necromancy
Level: 10
Components: V
Casting Time: 1 Standard Action
Range: Close
Area: 1 mile radius per caster level
Duration: Instant
Saving Throw: Fort negates
Spell Resistance: No
Designed to kill large numbers of creatures, it worked too well. When cast, billowing vapors moved away from the caster at an incredible rate of speed, overtaking anything within the area of effect, including the caster, unless magical means were used to escape. Creatures caught within the cloud who fail the save were killed instantly, to rise as though slain by ghoul fever.
The vapors are heavier than air, so sink as per Cloudkill.
Anyone have any suggestions for this as a Touchstone Site/Magical Location/Cerebrotic Blot equivalent?
Sunnycrypt
Originally a fortified dwarven city overrun by goblins that an archmage who liked to be called The Mortician raised up into the sky as an enclave - mostly because it was already honeycombed with chambers and corridors and came filled with bodies, the raw material for his ongoing work in necromancy.
Very shortly after raising his enclave, however, The Mortician killed himself and all of his assistants and senior apprentices in an experiment conducted in an attempt to create the very first intelligent undead. It worked. Unfortunately, due to the interference of a demon prince it worked far too well. Vapors billowed out killing everyone they could touch, leaving almost no survivors.
The vapors were heavier than air, so sank at every opportunity, thus they filled the test chamber and lower warrens of the enclave very quickly. Since these lowest levels carried the highest status, they were filled with those who carried the most power in the enclave, leaving only the miserable, lowest level apprentice mages forced to live in the upper reaches of the enclave as survivors.
The most senior surviving apprentice, at barely 5th level, tried to assume the role of archmage and titled himself The Second Mortician - only every one of his fellow students now calls him Morty the Mayor. He is not truly suited to necromany, but The Mortician never asked if someone wanted to be his apprentice, it was study that or die, so he'd studied.
Morty is a generalist mage left holding the bag for a powerful necromancer, and most of his time is spent trying to fix the messes The Mortician left behind. He renamed the enclave to Sunnycrypt trying to improve its image without denying its origins, and practices decorating trying to improve the gothic horror/dwarven tomb look by adding accents like brightly colored bows to gargoyles and cheerful houseplants or flowers in odd corners.
The enclave is laughably underdefended, and could be taken with ease by any other archmage. The thing is, no one of any respectable talent wants it. Construction halted shortly after it had barely begun, so the architecture is upside down from the current perspective, with ceilings and roofs of dwarven construction forming the floor, doors being mounted upside down from the current plane of gravity, and so on.
Transportation to and from the city is also difficult to arrange, as The Mortician never got around to any permanent spells or trade arrangements. Likewise, food and water are hard to arrange, and the population limited. So the city kind of limps along as sort of the poor, inbred cousin of the completed enclaves.
One secret poor Morty has been reluctantly trying to keep quiet is that The Mortician and his assistants are all still around, after a fashion. Revived as ghouls by the very spell that slew them, they retain none of the vast and powerful magical abilities they had in life, only possessing a terrible jealousy of living wizards.
Of far more immediate concern to Morty than a bunch of ghouls now locked in the basement was the fact that The Mortician's last spell had a radius measured in miles and slew just about every living thing it touched, turning all humanoids into ghouls. So the farmlands and valleys that was under the city when that spell was cast are now laid waste, and he desperately needs adventurers to take care of the problem of a massive ghoul invasion.
Bonus Spells for Studying in Sunnycrypt: Animate Animal (lvl 0), Animate Skeleton (lvl 1), Animate Zombie (lvl 2), Invigoration of Undeath (lvl 3), and Identify Undead (lvl 0). Source is Encyclopedia Arcane: Necromancy.
Locked deep in the ghoul-filled labs where the former archmage lurks are The Mortician's notes on his final spell:
The Mortician's Ghoulish Cloud
Necromancy
Level: 10
Components: V
Casting Time: 1 Standard Action
Range: Close
Area: 1 mile radius per caster level
Duration: Instant
Saving Throw: Fort negates
Spell Resistance: No
Designed to kill large numbers of creatures, it worked too well. When cast, billowing vapors moved away from the caster at an incredible rate of speed, overtaking anything within the area of effect, including the caster, unless magical means were used to escape. Creatures caught within the cloud who fail the save were killed instantly, to rise as though slain by ghoul fever.
The vapors are heavier than air, so sink as per Cloudkill.
Anyone have any suggestions for this as a Touchstone Site/Magical Location/Cerebrotic Blot equivalent?