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View Full Version : DM Help Need ideas for The Palace Under the Hill



Jay R
2014-12-01, 07:53 PM
I'm about to introduce The Palace Under the Hill, as a famous legend. I want them to have mixed, mutually incompatible views about it. So my plan is when they get where they can recognize it, I tell then that they all know about The Palace Under the Hill, and give them each the legend on a sheet of paper.

The kicker is that the papers don't agree. They all agree that the Palace was owned by a great noble wizard, the greatest wizard of his age, who used epic magic arranged for a hill to appear over his palace and hide it when he died. He planned for it to re-appear when it was needed. But they all have a difference story for when it would reappear, and they all have a different name for the wizard, from many different legends - Archimago, Baba Yagi, Circe, Dallben, Grindelwald, Gwydion, Jadis, Medea, Merlin, Mordekainen, Olorin, Pallando, Prospero, Shazam, Sheelba, Stephen Strange, Thoth-Amon, ...

When they start going down the main hallway, they will see friezes extolling very clear and obvious moments of great heroes from many conflicting legends. About halfway down will be a frieze showing their own last adventure.

In fact, it's an accident that the palace is now uncovered, and it did not belong to any of the wizards mentioned above. In fact, if they reach the tomb at the center, it contains a body missing one eye and one hand.

So, I have two questions:
1. Will the multiple conflicting stories work to both provide cool flavor and confuse them early on (whether they compare notes or not), and
2. What kind of magic should be in Vecna's palace?

The game is 2E, so I don't have to worry about any WBL nonsense. The party is fourth level, and doesn't have much magic. This is intended to give them some really cool options, but neither overpowering power nor invulnerability.

Gnoman
2014-12-01, 10:09 PM
If you go this route, make the differences pretty major. In my previous D&D campaign, the party found multiple accounts of the Godwar and First Titan War (extremely important events in the backstory that provided the background for the Second Titan war (which was essentially Ragnarok, Armageddon, etc.) that was breaking out at the time. The accounts were supposed to vary enough that the PCs couldn't really trust any of them, but the differences went over the party's head, and I wound up having to have a god exposit to them instead.

Jay R
2014-12-03, 09:19 PM
I think I've covered having the differences be major. The Palace will reapppear:
When the world's greatest heroes appear
When the world is most at risk
When the world is about to be destroyed
At the birth of the most powerful god.
Once every thousand years.

Any other good ideas? With six players, I need six stories.

Also, what kind of magic should be found in Vecna's palace? [Both treasure and traps.]

Gnoman
2014-12-03, 09:26 PM
The sixth story should probably be an astrological alignment of some sort. Something along the lines of "When the moon sits in the belly of the Dragon (a constellation), and the Warrior wears a crown of stars (a meteor shower above a different constellation), the path of rebirth shall open."