New flavour please....

[mostlyharmful]

Hi,

I'm out of creativity and I'm running a game this saturday... damn you frountal lobes.

Anywho, I've got a mid level party 3.5 in a swamp/jungle based campaign. So far we've had caves under temples in jungle with a heavy snakes/yuan-ti riff and they've done the usual and are now running from angry locals... into a pre-determined swamp.

Right, so.... when I was world building I pretty much left this bit out of my planning since I'm short of time at the mo (hence this posting for actual thinkers). It's suppossed to be themed around mazes and undead/frogs or undead frogs or lost froggy dead things but whatever.

Thing is I've used Slaad recently and I don't think Bulliwugs are really up to much although I suppose I could do a tucker-esque thing with them... meh.

My ideas are that probably this areas inhabitted by a magic focussed black dragon with a illusion/necromancy habit but that can change.

So, here's the beef. . I've got a session or two for them to struggle across uncharted marsh while being pursued by snakemen with a thematic set of challenges based on deception or undeath or frogs or some combination of that....

Anyone fancy sparking something new in my thinking? Most of this is negotiable since they don't know what's coming except some vague rumours about travellers getting lost/confused and eaten by rotting frogmen so where do I take it from there?

Team -

Necromancer (banned Conj and Enchant) 12
Swordsage (mostly shadowhand and setting sun) 11
Druid (shapechange varient) 12
Bard5/rogue6


Good strong builds (bard well played and well equiped) but they've got a real tendency to wander off and ignore each other in combat and generally get in each others way so don't throw too high a challenge or they'll fragment and that takes ages.

[Eldrys]

Lizardfolk? My DM housruled it that they have a swim speed of 20 feet and an ability to be hidden under water and then pop out from underwater, so that could be useful

[Pharaoh's Fist]

Kurast. You should definitely check out Kurast.

[hamishspence]

Sif, froggier than bullywugs, same book (Monsters of Faerun)

Planar Handbook- neraphim- a bit like slaadi, but lower powered- better for players or NPCs

Also, Dragon Magazine 324 has the grippli- 3.5 update of an old edition monster- tree frog-like.

[Asheram]

Kurast. You should definitely check out Kurast.

Son of a .... Argh! I hate that place! Loathe it!

Just make sure to have Loads and Loads, and even more kobolds to swarm the PC's.. or lizardfolk.. anything small is good.

[Pharaoh's Fist]

Son of a .... Argh! I hate that place! Loathe it!

The merc guild leader was pretty hot...

[TheThan]

Sounds like a good time to throw a black dragon at them.

The dragon could be sending agents (or going in himself) into town and creating these rumors to keep human types out of his territory. The frogmen could be aquatic Kobolds loyal to the dragon, either through loyalty to enslavement, your choice.
You can use a young adult dragon for this (CR 9) or a full adult (CR 11) depending on how well you think the party can handle a mid level dragon.

[mostlyharmful]

Kurast? what's the source?

ah, hadn't thought of the aquatic subtype, that opens a lot of doors.

Yes, bulliwugs and neraphim....hmm.... add aquatic to a few scalies like lizard folk and kobolds.... yeah, ok...

Dragon I was thinking of as a background menace that's way over their level, something high CR that's a source of pests rather than something they encounter although it's young/wymlings/grandkids would be cool...

nice grippli would be a cool touch, mangrove trees with neutral tree'frog people... excellent. that I can definately use.. good spin on deliverance.

Thanks people, just what I was looking for.

[Dhavaer]

Kurast? what's the source?

Diablo 2. It's a city overgrown by demonic swamps.

[mostlyharmful]

Diablo 2. It's a city overgrown by demonic swamps.

Ah, never played. but small city would be feasible... demonic sounds a bit fun... cant fit everything in but an outlying parimeter of gribblies and illusion with a chewey centre of decadent decayed whatever could be fun.

[shadzar]

Shambling mounds. Anyone ever ran into a grop of these things living near each other or fighting over territory?

The party runs across a shambling mound territory "dispute", and gets caught up in it.

There are also some upset treants in the area because of the ruckus being caused by the mounds.

How about that?

[Tsotha-lanti]

Plant monsters are a great idea. Tendriculous is another good one out of the MM.

Combine with stirges, maybe - forget the mosquitoes. I think there's a stirge swarm somewhere on the forums, even (not that it'd be that hard to throw together).

Snakes, alligators, and other natural reptiles.

Swamp zombies.

[Hazkali]

How about one of:

Tribesmen tanked-up on psychoactive drugs (from roots, frogs or something) that they are almost zombies- but still human. Moral dilemma time!

Anaconda or Piranhas, especially if they're taking a boat.

[Pharaoh's Fist]

Swamp PCP?

[Grommen]

We just played though a really big swamp it was one of the Goodmen Games. It have Lizardmen (I'm old), and big ass crok-O-gaters in it. I remember every time we crossed a bridge we got ambushed, dumped over the side and nearly eaten by the gaters. It was ausome! I'll get you the name if you want.

The DM also asked me to make him a Druid Boss for the end of it and I did good. I can send you a copy of the character sheet if you like. It rocked.

Hyrm I think the name of the adventure was...DCC #17 (Dungeon Crawl Classics) "Legacy of the Savage Kings".

It's a hack and slasher adventure, but you can always tinker with it to suit your flavor. I had me a lot of fun romping though the adventure, as I'm usaly the DM getting to play an adventure was a lot of fun.

[Hat-Trick]

Kou-tao? Is that right? Frog-like people from MM.

[Kol Korran]

just some general ideas, not my best, but it's realy late where i'm at, so i'm a bit foggy:

1) stirge mobs, read through my link (just scroll down to the stirge). read the general purpose, bloodlust swarm, and how the stirge mobs generally act. they mostly add to the atmosphee, not to real danger. the locals (frog peopl or whatever) probably use repelent or something else the party can use. the stirges can make sleeping in the wild a very unpleasent experience... (just read)

2) Hydras and Nagas. fit quite nicely with the entire swamp/aquatic thing, as well with the snake themes (they might even be holy beasts for the Yuan- Ti. you could even make a special version of a Yuan Ti druid who can shapeshift into a hydra, some heads attacking, some casting spells... yes, whacky idea, and not entirely up to the rules. but still fun, no?
Nagas could be guardians of secrets, cosnpirers and decievers, and so on. who knows, they might have stirred up the rumors of the dragon in the first place?

3) some zone where everything around it is dead. reason? Catoblapes. perhaps even a pair or so. they could be accompanied by some blind creatures, (i think blind harpies that lure passers, for the catoblapes to kill), or perhaps some undead? (a vampire or lich or whatever would find them usefull guardians, who can't be affected by turn undead and such effects.
the frog people could treat the area as a sacred place, giving sacrifices, or a cursed place, avoiding it if they can/ the characters might have to travel through it in order to escape the tribes chasing them.

4) "march of shadow". i used this idea for some hills in a former campaign world of mine. bascially, the entire area was under some strange curse- no one could tell the exaact time of day (whenever you looked up the magic made the sun appear in a different place), shadows didn't make sense, and so on. the place had a sense of standing still. the place had a few shadow creatures (some simple shades, some normal creatures with concealment and so on). the party can get disoriented quickly in the place, as the place makes you more and more like a shaodw with each day that passes (-1 to some ability scores each day. both physical and mental). add some silent horror music, unexplained phenomena and sights, and you got a thriller. worked excellent with my party. (they just had to pass through, but later on came back to rid the place of it's curse, which is a story for another time)

5) sunken city: a whole area where a city sank once. it can still be looted for treasure, but there may be aquatic undead and so on (undead alligators? grabing you then sinking as deep as they can?) and so on. some high buildings may have portions above water, which are more easely explored.

6) hags! a trio of hags! with swamp giants! worship by the frog peopl or whatever, or perhasp feared by them? make them cunning, add class levels, and so on. it can be a realy memorable "boss squad" fight.

damn i'm tired. hope this helped. look through my link for more on hydras, nagas and gargoyles (for the sunken city) if interested...
Kol.

[mostlyharmful]

The DM also asked me to make him a Druid Boss for the end of it and I did good. I can send you a copy of the character sheet if you like. It rocked.

Hyrm I think the name of the adventure was...DCC #17 (Dungeon Crawl Classics) "Legacy of the Savage Kings".

That'd be grand, the less I have to write the better frankly as I've got a metric ton of marking to be doing.

Plant monsters are something I hadn't even considered, definately included... and since they're so high level I can throw an all but limitless swarm of pirahanas and gators at them... he he he....

And I like the moral dilemma idea but my group at the moment... well.... it might be a little lost on them since they hack first, slice second, stab third and think things through morally, contextually or rationally a distant fourth if that.

I think I'll pass on the Kao-tua, they never really rang it for me and the stirges are good for characterfull descriptions. ok, swarms of mozzies and stirges, gators and snakes... then trippy locals of some flavour or other, some deliverance/swamp dewellers leading into inner swamp with lots of little black dragons with foreshadowing of huge menace... struggle through aquatic kobolds and then onto old, over grown road way towards a dragonlance-esque sunken city that they'd do well to run away from and rest up beyond the marsh.. good hook for the next few weeks... ok, I can run that.

[JonestheSpy]

Hey, don't forget the Frogemoth!



Stats here:
http://www.enworld.org/cc/converted/...froghemoth.htm

[Quietus]

Kou-tao? Is that right? Frog-like people from MM.

Kuo-toa. Those might work.

Alternatively, you've mentioned illusion/necromancy black dragon. Illusion can produce frog-looking people. Necromancy can raise disgusting, bloated bodies from the muck - just describe their long, drawn out moans as ending with a popping sound. Bonus points if you can even roughly imitate it - it actually does sound sorta toadish if you do it right. Make'em Juju zombies; Best as I can figure, that's just zombies that don't have the slowness quality. I'm sure it'd be easy enough to homebrew up something really quick and easy.

Plant monsters are good, though, as are monstrous vermin/snakes. Far lower CR than you need with the vermin/snakes, so they'll probably be capable of swatting them out of the air without thought, but they're there for the feel. It's a freakin' swamp, after all.

[mostlyharmful]

Hey, don't forget the Frogemoth!

uh... no.. thanks but no. no chance, I take that out in frount of the guys and I'd get laughed at all night. I'm a member of the school of thought that just because it's DnD doesn't mean we have to put up with weirdass monsters who's designers sanity or sobriety is more than a bit suspect.

[shadzar]

Have the swamp critters like rats, gators, etc living IN the plant critters!

Fighter: Whew that plant creature is finally dea.... OH GOD THE RATS!



The plants become encounter pinatas. Bust open the outer shell for all that monstery goodness inside.

:rofl:

[Harperfan7]

Black Dragon Necromancer with bullywug zombies? They ramble out of the mist and water from all sides in a big horde.

[RTGoodman]

Not to toot the forum homebrewers' collective horn, but have you taken a look at Project Swampgas? It's almost an entire supplement on the level of Frostburn or Stormwrack, but all swamp stuff.

It's, sadly, never been finished, but I think there's actually some really good stuff in there.

[gibbo88]

Something you might find fun for a chance to annoy the players - Assassin Vines. My PC's learnt the hard way that climbing the tree that looks safe isn't always the best idea.

[mostlyharmful]

Not to toot the forum homebrewers' collective horn, but have you taken a look at Project Swampgas? It's almost an entire supplement on the level of Frostburn or Stormwrack, but all swamp stuff.

It's, sadly, never been finished, but I think there's actually some really good stuff in there.

I may need to rebuild my campaign... they're never getting out...

Swamp campaign . woot.

[Ganurath]

Cruel Twist on Tucker's Kobolds: If there's a temple sort of building, having the vines overgrowing the wall be Assassin Vines. All of them. They'd need to go flamethrower mode to get through unmolested, which would easily draw the attention of their draconian host.

[Josh the Aspie]

Yaknow, this would actually make a perfect place to introduce the Frog God's Thane from Complete Scoundrel. Fits your theme, pre-made for you and everything. And you can just make some simple alterations to keep the PCs that read that part of the book from knowing everything about the place.

[Keld Denar]

What about Tren? Sec, looking up the link now.

http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x...040613a&page=4

There they are.

[Frog Dragon]

Zombie trolls might be fun. Or maybe even zombie Scrags (Aquatic Trolls). Yay for zombies with swim speed!
Skum might be worth a shot. Sorta frog like. You could advance them like giving them a few extra HD or even class levels. Then if you wan't to go by the undead theme, skeleton or zombify them.
And you could try Fiendish toads. As a swarm.