Encounter of the Week: Frost and Fear in Fireshear

Are you prepared to journey to Icewind Dale, the frozen north of Faerûn? Times are strange, and countless rumors swirl around this cold and isolated land, like so many snowflakes in an endless blizzard. The next D&D adventure, announced at D&D Live 2020, is dark fantasy horror story titled Icewind Dale: Rime of the Frostmaiden. This encounter is the second part of a five-part (or perhaps more?) encounter series called “Icewind Mail: Special Delivery” is a non-canon dark comedy that leads into the official adventure. Well, sort of. It’s more like it tosses players in the general direction of the official adventure with some silly props and tells them to go have fun.

The First Delivery

As described in Loadin’ Up the Icebreaker, the first part of this series, the characters are members of the Luskar Deliverers, a mercenary courier service that delivers parcels and missives to the most dangerous parts of Icewind Dale and the Sword Coast North. In that adventure, they loaded their vessel, the Icebreaker, with parcels from a number of colorful characters in Luskan. In that adventure, they had a choice of which three characters to pick up the packages from; don’t worry, all of the other packages were collected by other members of the Deliverers. From this point onward, each adventure in this series will see them arriving in a new location to deliver one of these parcels—and risk their lives to do so!

The Icebreaker has just made its way north up the Sword Coast from Luskan. The air grows colder and colder with each passing day, and bits of seaborne ice now regularly drifts past the Icebreaker throughout the day. The characters are destined for Fireshear, a large coastal mining town over 100 miles northwest of Luskan. The town has a population of about 15,000 people, around half of whom are dwarves, and most of the rest are human. These hardy folk often travel out into the snowy hills to mine for iron and other common ores, though occasionally a deposit of the rarest and hardest workable metal of them all—adamantine—is found near Fireshear.

This map of the Sword Coast North was created by Mike Schley for Legacy of the Crystal Shard, an adventure for 3.5e, 4th edition, and the D&D Next playtest. You can find high-res versions of this map and others for sale on his website.

This adventure sees the characters delivering a letter from a drow known as the Black Spider to an acquaintance in Fireshear. The letter is addressed to someone named Griggle Duskloch; if the players are worried that they won’t know how to find this person, one of the other members of the Luskar Deliverers on board the Icebreaker tells the rookies that the first step for any Deliverer once they make landfall is to find whoever’s in charge of the town and ask where they can find the recipients of the packages they’re carrying!

Griggle Duskloch and the Trouble in Fireshear

The recipient of the Black Spider’s coded letter is a chaotic neutral duergar blacksmith that has an interest in elemental magic and their applications in smelting. He is currently experimenting with drawing power from the elemental planes to make it easier to smelt raw adamantine into adamantine bars, making it much easier (and much less expensive) to create adamantine weapons and armor.

This wise-cracking duergar cares more for the success of his experiments than the safety of others, but this more because he’s single-mindedly focused on his work, not because he’s totally without a conscience. His experimental elemental forge looks like a piece of slapdash junk, but it truly does work as promised! There’s just one problem. Griggle Duskloch is totally oblivious to the fact that his experiments with elemental planar magic has caused a swarm of mephits to pour into Fireshear about two days ago. These elemental creatures have begun wreaking havoc all across town, but have wisely left Griggle’s smithy alone—so that he can cluelessly continue allowing more mephits into the Material Plane.  

Most of the people in Duskloch’s neighborhood have already fled, and have taken refuge in the taprooms of a number of dockside bars. A local community leader, a human woman named Kalannai Grayfur, has taken up the task of protecting the huddled people of Fireshear. When the characters arrive, they will learn of the dangers in town from her. She doesn’t know that Griggle is the source of the danger, but the characters may put two and two together as they battle mephits through the streets of the Fireshear on the way to Duskloch’s furnace.

Combat Encounter: Frost and Fear in Fireshear

This encounter is suitable for 1st-level characters.

The characters arrive in Fireshear harbor. Read or paraphrase the following to set the scene.

The Icebreaker glides into the harbor of the town of Fireshear. This town’s many houses form a crescent around the harbor, and you can see several large public houses near the wharf. A dozen thin pillars of smoke rise from the far side of town as you approach—it’s clear even from this distance that a number of houses are burning.

Your vessel is moored at the dock, and you see a blond woman in a long green dress and wearing a gray wolf pelt around her shoulders approaches from one of the public houses. She stands on the dock and holds her hand aloft in greeting.

This woman is Kalannai Grayfur, a representative of the people of Fireshear that have been displaced by the mephit attack in the eastern neighborhoods. She approaches the ship and waves down the characters as they approach. She says that she would recognize the Icebreaker anywhere, and welcomes them to Fireshear—and asks their business. If asked about the mephit problems, she explains that mischievous and destructive elemental creatures have started appearing in the eastern neighborhoods, but no one can fully explain why. If asked about Griggle Duskloch, she points them towards his forge in the eastern neighborhoods, and describes him as a reclusive eccentric who is always experimenting with magic to soup up his forge; she notes that he hasn’t escaped his dangerous neighborhood yet, and wonders if he might be in danger.

She warns the characters that they may be walking into great danger, and urges them to be careful. She adds that if they’re able to do anything to slow the advance of the mephits, she’ll grant them a bounty of up to 25 gp for helping to stop the invasion.

Exploring Fireshear

Most of Fireshear is still in relatively good condition, untouched by the small horde of mephits that is slowly spreading from the neighborhoods on the east side of town thanks to Griggle’s elemental experiments. The characters encounter three groups of mephits as they travel through the town:

  1. A group of 3 magma mephits breathing fire at a row of houses, attempting to burn them down.
  2. A group of 4 smoke mephits emerging from the scorched ruins of market stalls in an abandoned marketplace.
  3. A group of 3 ice mephits hanging on the eaves of Griggle’s house like icicles.

Describe the locations that the characters encounter first, improvising whatever additional details you think are necessary. These mephits are all single-mindedly interested in causing destruction. They attack on sight, but the characters will notice the mephits before the mephits see them. They can attack head-on, or they can attempt to sneak past them, overcoming the encounter nonlethally. To sneak past a group of mephits, the characters must make a successful group Dexterity (Stealth) check with a DC equal to that mephit type’s passive Wisdom (Perception) score.

If the characters defeat these mephits, take note. If they defeat at least 10 mephits, Kalannai is impressed and takes them seriously at the end of the adventure (see “Conclusion,” below).

Meeting with Griggle Duskloch

Read or paraphrase the following when the characters reach Griggle’s furnace:

Smoke filled with strange blue and crimson sparks billows from the smokestack of this furnace. Inside the smithy, you can see a stout dwarf with light gray skin and shock-white hair working a bellows and occasionally throwing small cups of colorful powder into the flames.

This duergar is Griggle Duskloch. As described in the “Griggle Duskloch and the Trouble in Fireshear” section, above, he’s singularly focused on perfecting his elemental furnace and has not noticed the mephits running rampant through the nearby neighborhoods. In fact, he ignores characters that don’t make a successful DC 11 Charisma (Persuasion) check to get his attention. If the characters reveal that there are elemental monsters running amok, he shakes his head and says that the situation is very sad, but he can’t just stop his research; its results will someday benefit all people of Faerûn!

When the characters deliver the letter from the Black Spider, he lets out a yell of recognition and asks after his “dear old friend.” He remarks mirthfully about the Black Spider’s usual flair for the dramatic, and quickly scans the note. His eyebrows shoot up as he read the coded letter, and then shouts in excitement and slams the note down on a table and begins gathering new cups of alchemical powders. If asked, he explains that the Black Spider sent him a formula for a new combination of elementally infused powders that he found in his travels—one that will produce a more stable reaction between the fabric of the Material Plane and the Elemental Planes, effectively keeping the elemental powers more focused and lowering the risk of extraplanar creatures tumbling into the Material Plane.

He asks the characters for their help delivering a half-ounce of smelling salts, a quarter-ounce of powdered earth, a full beaker of solid water, and a stoppered tube of extinguished fire residue. Characters that want to help him can make a DC 13 Intelligence (Investigation) check to find these elemental substances. On a success, he thanks them for their aid and will think better of them at the end of the adventure (see “Conclusion,” below).

When Griggle throws the elemental substances into the furnace and says a few mystical words, the furnace flares with violet flame and then cools to a tiny white fire. Griggle hops about joyously and shouts the name of the Black Spider to the heavens. He places a payment of 5 gp per character before them for delivering the letter, and also gives them a bonus of three bars of solid adamantine as a personal thanks. He says he’s no blacksmith, but maybe they’ll find some use for them elsewhere in their journeys. He then returns to his work and does his best to ignore any further interruptions from the characters.

Conclusion

When the characters return to the docks, Kalannai Grayfur greets them once more and says that she is proud they survived the chaos in the eastern neighborhoods. If the characters killed 10 or more mephits while exploring the city, she notes that the chaos has subsided somewhat, and thanks the characters for their bravery—and provides them each with 5 gp for their aid, up to a total of 25 gp.  Then, a shadow passes over her face. She says that a number of the townsfolk think that Griggle is to blame for the chaos in town, and want to exile him into the wastes. She asks grimly if Griggle is truly responsible.

If the characters reveal that Griggle was responsible, she nods sadly and says that the dwarf will have to be removed from town. By dawn, a mob will no doubt form around his smithy. If the characters want to help Griggle leave, they can try to convince the obsessive experimenter that his experiments are in danger of being destroyed if he doesn’t leave. A successful DC 13 Charisma (Persuasion or Intimidation) check convinces Griggle to disassemble his forge and depart, possibly onto the Icebreaker where the characters can help him decide where to set up shop again. Otherwise, he blows off their concerns. By midday tomorrow, his forge will be destroyed by a mob and Griggle gone without a trace.

If the characters lie and tell Kalannai that Griggle wasn’t behind the chaos, they must make a successful DC 13 Charisma (Deception) check to fool her. If the party defeated at least 10 mephits earlier, they have advantage on this check. On a success, she sighs and says that she was hoping it was all a misunderstanding, and says that she will convince them townsfolk to leave the eccentric smelter alone. On a failure, she scowls and says that she doesn’t appreciate being lied to—and she rightly assumes that Griggle is responsible after all (see above).  

No matter what happens, the characters’ adventures in Fireshear are at an end! They gather their things and return to the Icebreaker. Next stop, the iceberg town of Aurilssbarg! Get ready for more icy adventures in Icewind Dale: Rime of the Frostmaiden by preordering the digital version on D&D Beyond, and get free preorder bonuses like the Glacial Digital Dice Set. 


  

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Did you like this encounter? Check out the encounters in the Encounter of the Week series. You can also pick up the adventures I've written on the DMs Guild, such as The Temple of Shattered Minds, a suspenseful eldritch mystery with a mind flayer villain. My most recent adventures are included in the bestselling Encounters in Theros, a collection of over 70 unique encounters created by the Guild Adepts, which can be used to enhance your campaign in Theros or in your Greek mythology-inspired campaign setting. Also check out the Platinum Bestseller Tactical Maps: Adventure Atlas, a collection of 88 unique encounters created by the Guild Adepts, which can be paired with the beautiful poster battlemaps in Tactical Maps Reincarnated.


James Haeck is the lead writer for D&D Beyond, the co-author of Waterdeep: Dragon HeistBaldur's Gate: Descent into Avernusand the Critical Role Explorer's Guide to Wildemounta member of the Guild Adepts, and a freelance writer for Wizards of the Coast, the D&D Adventurers League, and other RPG companies. He lives in Seattle, Washington with his fiancée Hannah and their animal companions Mei and Marzipan. You can find him wasting time on Twitter at @jamesjhaeck.

 

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