Be of Good Cheer

The party has a shared resource called Spirit.  This is confidence or good cheer.  A party gains Spirit by (1) resting in safe places, (2) being entertained, (3) eating good food, (4) having NPC friends, (5) taking a bath.  A low-level party might have 5 Spirit when they go into a dungeon.

At any time, any party member can spend Spirit to reduce incoming damage by 1d4 for each Spirit spent this way.  If you get double 4s, you also get a +4 bonus on your first d20 roll next turn.  You can only spend Spirit if you are with the group.  You can spend Spirit to reduce incoming damage that would normally kill you (and in fact, this is probably the best way to spend Spirit).

So, spirit kind of functions like a second, shared HP pool for the whole group.  

As a corollary, clerics are no longer a base class.  (Yes, this is another anti-cleric push.  Sorry.)

Why Clerics Suck

1. It often feels obligatory.  Lots of groups think that they need a healer.
2. Groups often do need a healbot.  Sometimes an unlucky PC takes a big lump of damage and they need a heal.
3. It isn't very fun for most players to be the healbot.
4. Lots of adventures expect you to have a healer/cleric in order to remove curses, etc.

This blog post is mostly a fix for #1 and #2.  The goal is to make healing accessible to the party through a shared resource, not a single PC that someone feels obligated to play.  Clerics shouldn't be a core class like Fighter / Thief / Wizard.

As for #3 ("It isn't fun to be the healbot.") some of you are probably already saying "But I love playing healers" and "It's not boring to be the cleric--it's actually very interesting and fun to manage the party's HP".  I won't disagree with you.  (How can you disagree with an opinion?)  But I will say that I think that most groups don't always have someone like you in them.

I also think healers can be cool!  White mages are cool.  Flesh god healers are cool.  But I almost see those as optional classes.

With regards to #4 ("You need a cleric to remove curses, negative levels, possession, etc"), I disagree a lot.  I don't think it's good adventure design if your adventure needs a specific class feature to progress past an obstacle.

Other Design Goals

. . . besides removing the need for clerics.

#1 Make It Grittier

I almost hate to use the word "gritty" nowadays because it means too many different things to too many different people, but I do think that if you have a magical healer walking behind you who can heal you after you get stabbed in the chest, threats feel a little less threatening.

Because Spirit functions as a second HP pool, we can allow player HP pools to be a little smaller.  I think the game "feels" grittier if you have less HP (relative to monster damage).  It might be less lethal (depending on how much Spirit the party has) but it might "feel" more lethal.

#2 More Visibility of the Resource

Not everyone knows how many heals the cleric has left, so they don't have good knowledge of how much delving they can safely do.  

This is bad!  Dungeoncrawling is closely tied to resource management.  Resources like torches, spells, and HP.  The number of healing spells that your cleric has available is another resource like those--it's just confined to a single person's character sheet (even if the cleric's heals are effectively a resource shared by the whole party).

I recommend putting the party's Spirit up somewhere visible, like the Underclock.  Perhaps a small whiteboard?

#3 Diagetic Character Power Advancement

The party doesn't gain Spirit by leveling up.  They gain Spirit by building bases, making friends, finding a stream to take a bath in.  Engaging with the world.

And this is something that happens naturally, not mechanically.  (Relatively naturally, I mean.  "I take a bath and gain 1 Spirit" is more naturalistic than "I gain 350 XP and level up.")

#4 Encourage the Players to Make NPC Friends and Go to the Coliseum

Mechanical encouragement for roleplaying.  Some people hate it.  I think you just have to do it lightly.

#5 Encourage the Players to Build Bases Outside of Dungeons

Basically necessary, if they want more Spirit.  Note that they'll probably want to build some small fortification outside of every dungeon they intend to delve repeatedly.  It might take more than 1 trip, require some hirelings (guards, cooks).  This is probably worth a few rules of its own, actually.

#6 More Opportunities for Roleplaying

We don't normally have a good yardstick for "How happy is my character today?" but if a player wants to have an idea for how chipper they are feeling that day, they could use the current Spirit as a benchmark.

Also, all that diagetic stuff up above gives the DM more opportunities to world build.  If the party wants to go see a play (in order to be entertained)

The Specifics

The party can get different amounts of Spirit from different things.

Safety - Up to 3 Spirit.  0 for a tent.  1 for a tree-house.  3 in a castle that you own.

Entertainment - Up to 2.  1 if you have your own bard, visit a brothel, go to Church, etc.  2 if the whole party does something new together for the first time (e.g. go see a play).

Food - Up to 2 Spirit.  Good meal -> Amazing meal.

Companionship - Up to 2 Spirit.  If you hang out with 1 or 2 friends*, you get 1 Spirit.  More: 2 Spirit.

Cleanliness - You get 1 Spirit if you've taken a bath since your last dungeoncrawl.

* Friends are NPCs that you hang out with because they're cool and you like them on a personal level, not because they pay you, give you quests, or cure your curses.  

You get Spirit after you eat a healthy dinner and get a good night's sleep.  If you are attacked at night and someone is hurt, you get no Spirit.

Gaining Spirit overlaps (does not stack) with previous Spirit.  If you gain 5 Spirit in town, spend 2 Spirit on the way to the dungeon, and then go to sleep outside the dungeon where you gain 4 Spirit, you will enter the dungeon with 4 Spirit.

Optional Rules

Ghosts and other undead shit can't hurt your HP, but they can lower your Spirit.  (Which is really just attacking a different HP pool.  Yes, this is analogous to ghosts removing healing surges.)

If a fighter gets double 3s on their Spirit roll, they heal for an additional +3.  This can't trigger more than once per turn.

You can probably do some fun interactions here with drugs, like giving everyone high Spirit but with huge downsides (e.g. everyone fails all Initiative checks).

Final Notes

1. It's easier to gain Spirit in town than it is in the wilderness.  Because of this, a party will usually be more chipper on the first day of dungeoncrawling than on subsequent days.  I like this.  It makes dungeoncrawling feel a bit more naturalistic, and gives parties a good reason to go back to town.

2. This caps out at 10 Spirit, for an average of 25 HP.  (Or 40 HP if it is only used by fighters, and only two Spirit at a time.)  This. . . is actually a lot of HP.

10 HP of healing is generally better than an additional 10 HP spread across the whole party's maximum HP, because targeted healing is more useful.  Like, if your 4-person party had to choose between everyone getting +1 HP, or being able to prevent 4 HP of incoming damage, the second choice tends to be much stronger since it can be applied exactly where it is needed.

If and when you implement Spirit in your own system, you should tweak it as needed.  Consider (1) if there are alternate sources of easy clerical healing, or if Spirit is a replacement, (2) how spikey the incoming damage is, or if it tends to be spread across everyone equally, (3) how the size of the spirit pool compares the base class HP.

You might also want to consider scaling the size of the Spirit die for high level characters.  I play GLOG, so all the characters cap out at level 4 with 10-20 HP, but it you are playing higher level games with higher character HP, your players might eventually need more healing than just a few dinky d4s.

Secret Santicorn 2025: Two Forges

 The Forge of Yakul

Yakul was obliterated, and his temples were sunk.  Memories of the dead god were struck from the souls of men.  A heavy punishment was levied on Yakul, for he strove mightily against the Authority in the early days of the First Temple.

Yakul is merely a curiosity nowadays, and a testament to the strength of the Authority.  Even today, the obliterations still hold their force.  Learn a prayer of Yakul and it will vanish from your mind by morning.  You can walk among the ruins, and learn the history of the place, but knowledge of Yakul is evanescent.  It flees before the dawn.  The only way to remember anything about Yakul is to write it down.

And so the ruins have become a shrine to memory, of sorts.  People now go there and pray to Yakul in order to remember.  Others make offerings to forget.  Some of those who are struck by diseases of memory go there to be healed, and others go there to study them.  The unspoken rule is that everything must be written down, because among the ruins of Yakul, new memories are forever vanishing, while written words persist.

The forge of Yakul was discovered intact, 180 years ago.  The Authority destroyed the temple and obliterated its priests, but the forges were hidden in a mountain, and so survived.  But the same compunctions of that obliteration weaken the mind but also reinforce the written language.  And so it is that the forge of Yakul can now forge weapons into books.

You'll need a weapon, a book, and a skilled blacksmith who does not possess perfect mental health.  Each blacksmith can only use the Forge of Yakul only once.

When you successfully forge the weapon into the book, roll a d4.  If it doesn't make sense, go up to the next number that does make sense.  If *that* makes no sense, pick.

1. The book describes what the sword is best suited to doing outside of combat.

2. The book describes how the sword deals damage.

3. The book describes who would be best able to use this magic sword.

4. The book describes the conditions that empower the sword.

5. The book describes what the magic sword's goals are in the world.  Give it a random magic power.

How to Use This in Your Game

Your players have probably been finding libraries full of cool books since level 1.  This forge gives them a place that they can finally use those books.

If you want, you can limit this to spellbooks only.

Goblin Slop Forge

Why do you want a good thing?  Good things are hard to make!  It's much better to have a LOT of things QUICKLY!

Come to the goblin slop forge!  We've used our sniffentific methods to "ingest" lots of "data", so that we can quickly make whatever you want!  It's great!  We've completely replaced all blacksmiths everywhere!  (Sorry, blacksmiths!)

You no longer need to be good at making something to make it!  Which is great because we're all shitty blacksmiths and we can make swords ten times faster than regular blacksmiths!  That's because. . . 

. . .we know how the slop forge works!

The Slop Forge is super magical!  No one knows how it works!  We made the thing and not even we know how it works!  Sometimes we think that it's becoming self-aware, and might want to kill us, but that's okay!  We can make SO MANY MAGIC SWORDS SO QUICKLY!  We can make a sword FASTER THAN YOU CAN SHIT YOUR PANTS*!!!1!11

Here's how it works:

1. You give us a magic sword.  It doesn't have to be a sword.

2. The Goblin Slop Forge will "ingest" it.  I *know* what it looks like, but seriously don't judge us.

3. Using modern sniffientific techmogolies, the Slop Forge will "hallucinate" 1d4+1 copies of the magic sword you gave us through a process called "diffusion" because of how wet and loud it is. 

4. You give us the "tokens" (i.e. money) and we'll give you the magic swords!  Guaranteed* to be artifact-free!

If we smash more magic swords in there we can probably get more than the usual 1d4+1 that we normally get, but you'll need to sign a waiver**.

*A sword guaranteed**** faster than you can shit your pants, or the sword is free.

**Sometimes

***A waiver is kinda like a pig that only goblins can make.  Sometimes the forge blows up when we put a lot of swords in there, so we just kinda want to get your signature before you die.  I dunno, the boss is making a collection or something.

****Lol, no.

DISCLAIMER: MAGIC SWORDS GENERATED THROUGH "DIFFUSION" HAVE A 2-in-6 CHANCE OF BREAKING WHENEVER THEY ARE USED.  IF MORE THAN 1D4+1 MAGIC SWORDS ARE MADE AT A TIME, THE BREAKAGE CHANCE WILL BE HIGHER.  MAGIC SWORDS MADE THROUGH "DIFFUSION" ALSO PROBABLY CAUSE CANCER OR SOMETHING.  WE'RE NOT SURE AND WE'RE NOT KEEPING THE SWORDS HERE LONG ENOUGH TO FIND OUT.  

TAKE THE SWORDS WITH YOU WHEN YOU LEAVE.  DO NOT LEAVE THE NEW "DIFFUSION" SWORDS BEHIND.  THEY SCARE US.

Secret Santicorn 2025

This post is a gift for Ethaniel in a field of snow, who asked for a couple of special forges for creating thematic magic items.

GloGmas 2025: The Genius Legionis

Everything is alive.  Mountains, winds, the earth itself.  Even cities can dream.

But "city" is an arbitrary concept isn't it?  There is no clear boundary, nor any clear membership criteria.

This is irrelevant.  Everything is alive.  Everything strives.  Every collection of anything that has any sort of a shared identity.  Sentience comes from identity, not structure, and identity is not something that brute material can dictate.  We decide.

What is a human, except a collection of singular cells that dreamed themselves unified?

When the legion was founded, the genius legionis came into existence.  It is the metaphysical consequence of thousands of men uniting their wills under one banner--although it is equally true to say that the unitary will of the legion is the consequence of the genius legionis.

The genius legionis doesn't have an intellect the way that you and I do.  It is pure will.  It doesn't communicate with words, but with instinct and gut feelings.  It doesn't want anything except the shared goals of the group that it champions.  It is strengthened by recognition, honor, success, and sacrifices.

But the legion has passed from memory.  With their passing, the genius legionis has also dissipated.  But its home remains--a bronze eagle atop a tall standard.  The genius legionis wasn't made up of bronze, but it resided there.  And now that the standard has been picked up again by new hands, a new spirit stirs behind the bronze eyes.

Playing as the Genius Legionis

This is a character class.  One of the players at the table can play as the genius legionis.  As a PC, the genius legionis is a little unusual.  They don't have a body, except the bodies of the rest of the party.  They don't have a voice, except the voice of the party.  They cannot die, unless the party dies.

Around the table, this might be a little bit awkward, but I think it might suite some players who like a more background role.

I would also recommend that the player who plays the genius legionis be given a hireling that they can roleplay as.  A standard bearer--who can also be a porter, torchbearer, etc.

The Genius Legionis Class

The genius legionis can help solve puzzles by putting ideas in the heads of party characters.  They can't speak directly, but other characters can speak for them.  And like anyone else, they get one action every round in combat.  (This action is usually performed via the body of a willing player character, although some of them are performed "through" the body of their opponents.)

Starting at level 2, a genius legionis gets access to Stunts.  Most stunts are useful in combat and can only be used when certain conditions are met.  Each Stunt can only be used once per combat.

Template Bonus: Everyone in the party gets +1 Initiative for every Genius Legionis template you have.

A Inspire, Killing Instinct

B Shrine, 2 Random Stunts

C Trophies, 2 Random Stunts

D Battle Flow, 2 Stunts of Your Choice

Inspire

You can't speak, but you can deliver ideas into the brains of anyone else in the party, at any time.

Killing Instinct

As a standard action, pick a party member who hasn't dealt any damage to anyone this turn.  They get a free melee attack.  You roll it.

Shrine

The party can set up the battle standard and make an offering to it (which can be literally anything, as long as it is delivered reverentially).  The site becomes a shrine.  Within the shrine, party members are automatically alerted (via spidey sense) if any enemy enters.  The "site" can be a campsite in a wilderness or a small fort, as long as it is fully owned by the party.

Trophies

In an hour-long ceremony that requires a bard and a lot of mead, the party retells the story of how they killed a powerful enemy.  (You gotta roleplay this at least *a little*).  Then a trophy of that enemy is affixed to the battle standard.  Against a similar foe, once per combat, as a free action, you can grant an automatic success after someone fails their save, or turn a critical miss into a critical hit.

You can affix a maximum of 3 trophies to yourself

Battle Flow

As a standard action, pick an enemy or a group of similar enemies.  Then pick a party member.  The enemies will all attack the chosen party member.  They get an Int save if this would expose them to immediate, obvious hazards.  They get another Int save if they are human-intelligence or smarter.

Alternatively, you can use this ability to make enemies *avoid* attacking a specific party member.

Stunts (d10)

1. Don't You Die on Me

Useable only when a party member is Dying.  For the rest of the turn, all attempts to stabilize the Dying party member get +2.  All attacks against the enemy that last dealt damage to the Dying party member get +4 to hit.

2. Special Delivery

One party member can cast a spell into a melee weapon held by another character.  The weapon glows, gets +4 to damage and to hit, and delivers the spell on the next hit.  If the weapon isn't discharged in one round, the spell dissipates.  If the weapon misses, you can use your standard action to give them an extra roll, as per the Killing Instinct ability.

3. Overconfidence

This ability is only useable after at least 3 attacks have missed this turn.  As a standard action, an enemy becomes overconfident and missteps.  They get -4 Defense for the next round.  Useable 1/combat.  

4. The Cavalry is Here

If one party member is separated from the party, and they are about to die (i.e. in combat and within 1 hit of death, drowning in a pool, etc), you can roll a d6.  On a 4 or higher, the party can arrive on the scene as long as it is feasible within the fiction.

5. Gank

An enemy takes 2d6 damage.  Useable only when three different party members have dealt melee damage to them in a single turn.

6. Suddenly, a Rat

At the end of a turn where an enemy moves somewhere new, a random rat appears and attacks the enemy.  The enemy steps on a rat nest or something similar.  If rats don't exist in this location, a creature of similar menace appears instead. 

7. Irresistible Monologue

A villain capable of monologuing spends a round monologuing, giving the party extra time to move, prep, or heal.  You can use this ability at the start of combat before any hostilities have broken out, or when the enemy seems certain to win.  The monologue ends as soon as anyone takes an action that is overtly hostile.  (E.g. the enemy has a readied action to cast power word kill as soon as you raise your bow--they're not monologuing with their eyes closed.)  Only works on enemies that can talk.  

8. Last Stand

A character at 1 HP takes a full turn of actions, chosen by you (and with the consent of the character's player).  They get +4 attack and damage on their first attack roll. 

9. Swift Punch in the Throat

An ally punches an enemy spellcaster in the throat, dealing 1 damage and giving them a 50% chance of fumbling their spell.  Only useable when an enemy is casting a spell adjacent to an ally.

10. Glorious Charge

When the entire party charges enemies simultaneously, all enemies take 1d10 fear damage.  When most of the party charges enemies simultaneously, all enemies take 1d6 fear damage.  Useless against enemies that are immune to fear or enemies that have no reason to fear you (e.g. ghosts,  elder dragons, werewolves).

Describe how the glorious charge appears in the eyes of the enemies.  For example, you might appear as a flaming hawk above the party.

Merry GLoGmas!

This is a GLoGmas gift for antitime at Temporal Negativity  

I'm sort of riffing of their Five Fighters class.  They also have a functional little dungeon here.

Merry Christmas, everyone.

Eyes of Idola, Part 2

This is Part 2.  Here is Part 1.

Concept 1: Entering the Dungeon

Descending the stairs into B1, the party reach rooms that are dark, crowded, flooded, and don't have any apparent ways out.  Then after solving some simple training puzzle (for more complicated puzzles later), they open a door and enter B1.

It's a crumbling stone bridge across a huge gap.  The real floor is 20' below you.  No visible walls, the sound of water lapping below, stale seaweed stink.

Approaching the bridge and the undead archer across the bridge will audibly (and slowly) draw his bowstring, giving the party time to react.

Charging across the crumbling bridge will break it and send the whole crumbling thing into the dark water below.

There's also a safe way down like stairs, but players will probably look at the bridge before they take the stairs down a second time.

If they want to kill the skeleton archer on the far side, they'll have to find to approach from the other side, or do some tricky climbing.

Sketch 1

Sketch 2

I'm not sure what shape the big room takes, but it can be a hub room for the Area 1.  (I've decided that this is the public-facing side of the temple grounds.

Area 1 Hub Room

Other ways to enter the dungeon are the elevator and the sealed door, back in the Mouth of Mormo dungeon.  The elevator goes to the crypts.  The sealed door goes to the cloister/monastery portion on the far side of the juggernaut.

Concept 2: The Juggernaut

Crushed bones on the floor, scrape marks on the wall, and ceilings higher than your torchlight illuminates.  The wall is covered with a repetitive motif: warped men and women, all uniquely deformed, carry offerings towards Area 6 (Inner Sanctum).

Of in the darkness, a pair of eyes flares to life 12' above the ground.  Something huge begins grinding its way towards you.  Slow and first, but rapidly gaining speed.  Sparks flash where metal wheels scrape against the walls, illuminating a huge, rigid shape.

Up close, the thing is a stone-and-iron juggernaut, topped with an elephant skull, bound to the machine by silver wires.  A pair of red flames dance in its skull, focused on you with homicidal intensity.

Originally, the area 2 hub was going to be a flooded crossroads that the players would cross on a rowboat or something, and the monster (that is trapped in this zone) was going to be a blob or water weird, but after mulling it over, the juggernaut sounds more fun, and more accessible.

I know that this was supposed to be a water dungeon, but I'm rethinking the flooded rooms bit.  It's something new (yay) and it offers a new challenge (yay) but flooded rooms actually seem to reduce player options (boo) compared to dry rooms.  (This dungeon was also supposed to have the gimmick of water levels that changed with the tide, but I might take that out, too.)

Mechanically, the juggernaut behaves kinda like those big crushy-stabby spike chariots in Elden Ring dungeons.  Although the juggernaut is rudely sentient, not mindless.  (My toxic trait is that I don't think that anything in a dungeon should be truly mindless.)

Cross-shaped areas won't work anymore, we need a new shape for Area 2.  I have a few ideas but I'm thinking about making it triangular, with an opening on each corner and in the middle of each side, for a total of 6.

W goes to Area 6 (Inner Sanctum).

E goes to Area 4 (Crypts)

The two N exits go to the remainder of Area 2 (Cloister/Monastery)

The two S exits go to Area 1 (flooded statue hub)

The reason that some of them are doubled up is because the juggernaut likes to park itself in corners, so it can watch two directions at once.

Area 2 - Built around a square cloister.  Rotating statue puzzle is in the center (rotate the statue to unlock whatever blue door it is currently pointing at).  Scriptoriums, weird cultic induction rooms, and evidence that the abbot was up to some weird shit.

Area 6 - Inner Cloister.  Put all the high weirdness stuff here.  This is the conceptual climax.  Contains Eolalia the Forgotten (the lady of sand).

Area 3 - The Reef Beneath.  I'm moving away from cursed reef and more towards weird goddess of prophecy and mutation.  This area is going to be changed to a little town in the sea cave.  A few buildings on a rocky shore, with a bridge to area 5.

The Sea Cave contains a family of dolphins--some of the most evil creatures known to man.  (Sharks are beloved because they are simple beasts, but dolphins are all allied to the merfolk, and they delight in the murder of men.  They are intelligent enough to know their own magic.  They taught themselves to laugh like humans do in order to taunt us.  The only thing they prefer above murder is rape.)

The dolphins will family tackle people off the bridge, knock them in the water, and then a pair of dolphins will grab your arms and drag you down to the bottom of the save.  They can also squirt water to put out your torch.  (They can echolocate just fine in the dark.)

Area 5 - Ralupon the Red is here.  He believes that you are here because he summoned you.

Factions and NPCs

Ralupon the Red (Manamanian enchanter).  

Metal rings sewn into his hair.  A thin black veil covers his eyes while a huge pair of eyes looks out from a painted wooden “hat” that stands tall upon his forehead.  He is either a wizard, or very superstitious.  He carries a staff.  A small eyebat hangs upside down from one of his ears.  (Eyebats intercept the first spell cast at their wizard.  If they are lucky, they can reflect it.)

Currently a nest of giant starfish + an evil wizard.  They are human hypnotists, enchanters, and illusionists.  They are closely aligned with the Empire of Dathroya, the largest nation of the merfolk.  Most claim that they are their secret vassals.  (This is true.)

He believes that he summoned the party here by burning weird stuff in a fire for a couple of days, at the advice of his master.  (“That curiosity in your heart?  The greed in your belly?  I put that there.”)

If befriended, he can pay you, or teach you enchantment.  You’ll need to travel to Manamar to study under a master and get your spellbook, though.  (Seek out Shaymish.)  Shaymish isn’t a person, it’s a river.  The spirit of that river can teach you enchanting.

He is the son of Razubek the Bey, the guy who originally assaulted this place and killed the cult.  

Ralupon is back to finish what his father started.  He wants to claim the Chalice of Immortality from the Inner Cloister.  He will tell you that strong enchantments prevent him from entering the dungeon.  (False, but contains elements of truth.)  Offers to geas you to help with your resolve.  Will attempt a suggestion if he thinks he can get away with it.  (This isn't evil.  It's not even rude.  It's practical.  Still intends to pay you when you're done.)

When the party meets him, he'll be sitting on a crown of thorns (Giant starfish, stats as ogre) but there is no puppeteer tentacle up his butt.  The giant starfish actually serves him.  If combat breaks out, two more giant starfish burst from where they were burrowed, nearby.  The stars serve him--or maybe he serves the mind stars.

Friendly guy, but the enchanters of Manamar grow up in an environment where love potions are considered completely normal facts of life.  Everyone enchants everyone all the time, for all sorts of reasons.  Because of this, most of his normal behavior (enchanting people) would be considered evil by most civilized people.

He smiles and wishes you well, and he genuinely means it, but he'll never shake your hand.  (Too risky.)  Nor will he ever let you within 10' of him.

Makes a good stew though.

Eolalia the Forgotten

Lives in the Inner Sanctum, wants you to kill Ralupon, destroy the merfolk ghouls that still linger her, and restore the wards.  Will reward you with the chalice of immortality (very reluctantly) and teach you how to be a cleric of Idola.  Long term, she also wants you to find the surviving members of the Idolan cult and convince them to make her human again.

Lives in the inner sanctum, which is completely covered with words.  Eolalia is immortal but her mind is not, and she forgets things constantly.  Because of this, she needs to write her entire history--literally everything she knows--along the walls and floors of the inner sanctum.

At first she wrote on the walls with blood (back when she still had blood) and then scratches.  But now her body is too crumbly to scratch the walls any more, and so she now writes on the floor with sand.  Every square inch of the floor in here is covered in minute sand writing.  A stray footstep would erase parts of her childhood that she would never recover.

Keeper of the Chalice of Immortality.  She is made of sand and can have a very normal conversation with you if you allow her enough time to read things off the walls and floor.

She is made of sand.  As long as she is touching sand, she will instantly regenerate.  (All of the rooms in the inner sanctum are covered in sand.)

The Mannikin

A paperclip maximizer demon thing.

Completely and utterly evil, but also completely focused on maximizing the number of clean and beautiful sets of clothing available for the Abbot to wear.  Cannot leave the a certain area (the cloister?)

Mother Narshay

One of the fully sentient undead, and one of the two leaders of the crypt.  

Wants you to kill all of the remaining merfolk ghouls (she'll know when you're done) and leave the crypts the fuck alone.  

Seriously, why do people keep coming into the crypts?  Its for the dead, not the living.

Salakhan Latsu

Huge, mad, evil ghast.  Distended, elongated, and twisted into a new shape that is better for grasping and swallowing than his living body ever was.  

Leader of the mer-ghouls.  Currently trapped between two portcullises in the BAD HALLWAY.  (This will be the first- or second-most difficult combat in the dungeon.  It'll be telegraphed well--the players can open this useful shortcut at their own discretion.)

(Digression: why the fuck are lacedons just regular dudes?  They should be undead merfolk ffs.)

Cloakers

I forgot they were here.  Led by Mwoheth.

Goblin Merchants

Hatchi Matchi and his "sons".  The goblin king commanded them to open up shop here for 7 years.  He had a good business tip.  (False.  Hatchi Matchi was sent here because he's annoying as fuck and everyone hated him.)

Grandmaster Grunky

Living frog statue that sells maps.

Some Secret Doors

Obvious Door, Hidden Switch

1. 

A round stone in the wall with a pair of holes in it, about 8 inches deep.  About the right size and height for two dudes to stick their peepees in.

One room over is a metal thing shaped like TT.  

This is a handle meant to be inserted into the two holes and rotated.  (You can achieve the same thing with three spears, if needed.)

2. 

Evolved version of the previous switch.  Now the pair of holes is in the bottom of a pool of water.  You'll have to try a little harder to get leverage.

3. 

Next to the sealed door is a doorknob inside a blood-soaked hand mutilation machine.  Reach inside, turn the blood-slick knob, and your hand is painfully removed.

Door is opened by pulling the chandelier.

4.

All of the bricks on the wall are covered with random words.  Print this out and give it to your players.

Except some of them aren’t nonsense words, and can be pressed to spell out “PRAISE IDOLA MOTHER OF WISDOM”, a phrase that is seen elsewhere in the dungeon.  Wrong piles = poison gas or something.

All of the correct tiles are directly above one another.  Once all of them are depressed, you hear a mechanism click inside the wall, something shifts at the top of the wall.  Not clearly visible, but the depressed tiles form a perfect ladder up to the trap door in the ceiling.

5. 

An inscription reads “The key to this door cannot be seen, though all can feel it.  It cannot be held, although all have it except for the dead. From your mouth produce the answer.”

The answer is “breath” or “wind”.  Blow into the hole (a little narrower than your finger) to open the door.

(Eh, this is a fiddly puzzle–put something non-essential behind it.)

6.

This is one of the rooms hidden behind the rotating statue puzzle.  To open the secret door, you need to actually close the entrance door to this room by splitting the party, having half of the party rotate the statue out of alignment.  This reveals the switch on the backside of the door that you opened to enter this room.

Once the secret door is opened, it stays opened, and the party can rejoin and go through the secret passage.

The secret passage holds some monsters to fight, of course.

7.

Maybe combine this with #2?  

Flooded room with switch underwater.  When flipped, all of the water flushes everyone into the next room and into a pit trap.

8.

A bunch of tiles covered with random objects.

A door has a symbol of an egg.  Press all symbols that hatch from an egg.  (Rooster, Snake, Fish, Frog).  

Another door depicts a knight.  Press all the symbols that are weapons (Shield, sword, bow).  The incorrect answers: Crown, Whale, Shepherd’s Crook, Jug of Water, Cottage.

(Rating 2/5 stars.  Kinda fiddly.  Too escape roomy, not OSR puzzly enough.)

Secret Door, Secret Switch

Secret/secret doors should only be used in non-essential cases.  They make good shortcuts to areas that can be reached in other ways.  This lets skilled players access other areas earlier (like the Inner Sanctum), allows them to go around monsters they don't want to fight, and lets them sneak up behind monsters that they do want to fight.

1. 

One of the giant statues is holding a treasure chest.  Find a giant key, unlock the chest, and you can crawl through it into a new area (or maybe it just contains treasure).

(Might make for a fun, simple AHA! moment when the party finds a giant stone key.)

2.

Fountain pipe comes out of the wall, and water spurts from a fish head.  Examining it reveals that the pipe connected to the fish head is pretty big.  Knock the fish head off and start crawling.

(For exploration completionists.)

3. 

Behind a mirror.  No clues for this one--you just gotta smash it.

(For exploration completionists, and vandals.)

4. 

The bottom of a pit trap.  The floor and 3 walls are covered in spikes.  The fourth wall is hollow.  One of the wall spikes can be rotated to open the door.

(Maybe too easy?  It's tough to tell.  Players walk past this kind of stuff all the time.)

Dwarven Gender, Continued

Remember that post I did about dwarven gender?  

If you haven't read it--you're in luck.  You can be just as confused as Podrick, below.

It occurs to me that dwarves would also struggle to understand human genders, and would ask us as many stupid questions as we would ask them.

So this is some fiction about that.

Some Dwarves Learn About Human Gender

Featuring:

    - Podrick, human, age 41, male, father of 2, knight of the realm

    - Snorri, dwarf, age 191, blacksmith, 3288 total lbs forged, total debt 2400 silver

    - Osto, dwarf, age 284, blacksmith, 5910 total lbs forged, total debt 10,500 silver

Snorri

Look, I don't want to be rude, but Osto says its not rude to ask a human this, but, eh, what are ye?

Podrick

Am I a what?

Snorri

Are ye, hmmmmm, are ye . . . a blacksmith?  Or a miner?

Podrick

. . . what?

Snorri

And don't say that humans don't have blacksmiths and miners.  I know they do.  I just can't tell what ye are.  No offense!  Of course.

Podrick

Er, I'm a knight of his majesty the king.  I've never mined nor smithed.  

Snorri

Yeah, sure, sure.  But what are ye really?  You got a bronze belt buckle but your boots lace all the way up.  Little bit of cross-dressing, eh?  I'm not against it!  No judgement here.  I know a few dwarves that enjoy the same.

But how were ye raised?  Did yer parents dress you in bronze buckles or did they lace your shoes all the way up?  

When ye were little, I mean, on your name day.  Not what ye decided for yerself later.

Podrick

Have you gone mad?  Explain yourself.

Snorri

Calm your heels, man!  I apologize.  Osto said that humans weren't shy discussing stuff like this so I thought I could ask ye without being a prat.  'Pologize if I made ye feel a bit tetchy.

Podrick

You asked me if I've ever been a blacksmith?  And then if I wore bronze?  Is this something dwarves do?

Snorri

Yes, but not usually at the same time.  *laughs*

Look, let's try this a different way.  When does your heart sing?  When yer getting something?  Or when yer making something?

I'm sure you've done both.  (Hell, even I've done both, but don't tell Osto.)

Y'know.  What was your body born to do?

Podrick

I feel most at home when I pray in the House of the Authority, before the nine icons of the Prophetessa (may she live again).

Snorri

*tugging his beard* Okay. . . hmm.  There are two genders, right?

Podrick

Right.

Snorri

And which one are ye?

Podrick

I am male.  I have--

Snorri

That's not what I asked!  Who cares about yer pisser?

Osto

*entering the room* Humans are always talking about their pissers.

Lad, why are ye asking the man about his pisser?  I told ye to mend the tent.

Snorri

I asked him if he was a blacksmith or a miner.

Osto

Humans don't have--

Snorri

Yes, they bloody do!  Who makes their armor, then?  Who pulls their ores out of the earth?

Osto

All of them do both.  Each one is 50/50, right down the middle.  The Authority saw fit to make them all the same.  Don't know why, but I'm sure it was done in wisdom.

Snorri

That makes sense.  Then why's he talking about his pisser?

Osto

*straightening his monocle*  Well, humans divide everything into field and seed.  It's because they're obsessed with breeding.  Breeding children, breeding livestock.  It's the accumulation of things, see?  Can't have money without cows to sell.  Can't have land without children to work it.  That's why they always pair off, a seed with a field, every time.

Plus, they don't have much time to breed, so they have to start early.  Makes sense when you think about it that way.

Podrick

Do dwarves always talk so coarsely?  I have children of my own, but their purpose is not to work my fields.  And my wife's purpose is not to bear children.

Snorri

I'm sure your "wife" is a nice lad, but if he were here I'd ask him the same questions.

Podrick

My wife is a woman!  She is referred to as "she" not "he".

Snorri

Why are ye bringing yer wife's pisser into the conversation?  No one's talking about his pisser.

Osto

Snorri, at least try to use the human's pronouns.

Snorri

Okay, I'll bloody well try, but I don't know if I can remember them.

Osto

Good lad.  You'll sound less ignorant when we get to human lands.

Snorri

I'll try!  But it's a bloody infuriating thing to ask of me.  Does this mean I don't know how to refer to someone until I know what kind of a pisser they have?

Podrick

*sighs* I'm going to go tend to my horse.  Good day, dwarves.

Snorri

Angels below, I hope I didn't offend the boy.  There's really nothing wrong with being half and half.  I'm not prejudiced!  I'm not.

Do you think the human thinks I'm prejudiced now?

Osto

Snorri, yer a good lad, but you ask too many questions.  Go fix the tent, and then I'll tell you about the two kinds of human bathrooms.

Snorri

What?  Two?  Do they expect me to go into a different bathroom based on what kind of pisser I've got?  That's none of their bloody business!

Osto

Nah, all dwarves use the bathroom for seed.  They all get huffy if you ever go into the one for fields.  Don't know why, but I guess only human pissers matter.   

Snorri

It's still another hundred miles to the human kingdom, huh?  This is a long fucking trip.

Damn, I wish we had some miners with us.

*not a Patreon post, just for fun.