Wall of Glyphs

[Rogozhin]

My five level 3 adventurers have found the local headquarters of a devil summoning cult. The cult are working for the world's biggest villain, but the adventurers don'thave any idea of that, and won't discover it for a while. The only clues so far are a pair of journals written in Infernal. (one of the party speaks Infernal.) The headquarters are in the sewers under a somewhat abandoned city (Think medieval Detroit)... but the altar room is a surprisingly spacious affair. Part way through the fight with the cultists, if they are losing, their leader (a tiefling cult fanatic) will read a glyph off the wall that animates two suits of armor.

I was thinking it could be cool if the back wall of the altar room was covered in glyphs... some could be benign, but I figured most of them would be Glyphs of Warding, but having one of them, when read, opening up a secret door that leads to some badass treasure.

So... are there any cool suggestions for other interesting things the glyphs could do? Any thoughts on clues I could give the adventurers as to which glyphs to read and which to avoid?

I'd love to hear some thoughts!

Thanks!

[EvilAnagram]

One Glyph could be a Tidal Wave. It wouldn't kill anyone, but it would be funny if one of them randomly got slammed across the room by a fountain of water.

[Rogozhin]

One Glyph could be a Tidal Wave. It wouldn't kill anyone, but it would be funny if one of them randomly got slammed across the room by a fountain of water.

Yah, very cool. I like the idea of including some non-lethal, but still discouraging effects caused by the glyphs.

[nickl_2000]

Wind wall, wall of ice. If you want to really mess with them, reverse gravity.

Actually the more I think about it the more reverse gravity would be fun. Make it a ten foot ceiling so they don't take much damage. However, they are stuck on the ceiling and sitting there going "huh, what do I did now"

[sir_argo]

When you said a glyph opening a secret door, it sounds like these are not the same as the 3rd level spell, Glyph of Warding. Basically, you want designs on the back wall that act similar to a Glyph of Warding, but can do oddball stuff.

I'd go with something that duplicates a spell effect, but visually includes the glyph itself. Here's a couple options:

Grasping Vine: A glyph peels off the walll and lashes out at the characters.

Faerie Fire: A glyph begins glowing and leaps off the wall and onto the characters.

Arms of Hadar: A number of glyphs turn black and and begin flailing at anything near the wall.

Conjure <something>: The lines of a glyph rearrange themselves into a drawing of a <something>, that then steps off the wall and begins attacking the characters.



You get the idea. There's so much you can do here.

[JackPhoenix]

When you said a glyph opening a secret door, it sounds like these are not the same as the 3rd level spell, Glyph of Warding. Basically, you want designs on the back wall that act similar to a Glyph of Warding, but can do oddball stuff.

Technically, that would work, spell glyph variant Glyph of Warding loaded with Thaumathurgy if the doors are unlocked, or Knock if they are not. Although single-use, 200 gp doorknob usable anyone who can read isn't the best solution.

[Ninja_Prawn]

It might be funny to load one with Darkness and one with Blindness... to the players triggering them they'd appear to be the same, but to everyone else the difference is obvious.

If you wanted to up the difficulty of the fight, you could have a whole set of buffs - Haste, Enlarge, Cure Wounds III, Magic Weapon, Mirror Image, etc. that the cult leader could activate if the fight's going badly for them. That might give your players some problematic ideas for the future, though. :smalleek:

[BiPolar]

Technically, that would work, spell glyph variant Glyph of Warding loaded with Thaumathurgy if the doors are unlocked, or Knock if they are not. Although single-use, 200 gp doorknob usable anyone who can read isn't the best solution.

Although, a glyph hidden amongst other glyphs still may work. Kind of the "hidden in plain sight" thing - but the trick is you need to know which glyph to select.


It might be funny to load one with Darkness and one with Blindness... to the players triggering them they'd appear to be the same, but to everyone else the difference is obvious.

If you wanted to up the difficulty of the fight, you could have a whole set of buffs - Haste, Enlarge, Cure Wounds III, Magic Weapon, Mirror Image, etc. that the cult leader could activate if the fight's going badly for them. That might give your players some problematic ideas for the future, though. :smalleek:

Love this idea (and OPs idea in general.) Especially if you've set up hints/clues along the way as to what the target glyph is. If you didn't...then it's just kind of a weird trial and error thing, which could get unfun pretty quickly.

If you really wanted to make things fun...banishment!

[Zanthy1]

I always love the idea of traps that give conditions instead of damage. Someone above mentioned reverse gravity, which is awesome. A stinking cloud is fun, maybe something to conjure some minor, level appropriate, devils. I also saw someone mention the idea of some glyphs having abilities that the cult leader could use during the combat, and I am in full support of this. Spells that help his side (not necessarily by hurting the players), but ones that he may not normally be able to cast due to class restraint or level.