So my players are wrapping up LMoP and I am prepping potential story arcs and quests for the next phase of the campaign. One thing my players are are loot whores. They LOVE getting new items and finding hunting for the most power things they can find. So What I am doing is setting up a side storyline that can run concurrent with whatever else they decide to do, they can work on this on the side.
The basic premise is that in the last days of the Phandelver Pact, the members saw the orc armies sweeping across the north and in preparation for the possibility of attack built a massive secret vault where they stored as much of the wealth and riches of the Pact as well as the most powerful and valuable items created in the Forge of Spells. The Phandelver Vault was built deep underneath Tresendar Manor (explaining why Aldith Tresendar was trying to get down there during the attack and the ambient magic that drew the nothic.) As they explore Wave Echo Cave they are going to find a scrap of a document referencing the hidden stockpile of riches and treasures hidden beneath the manor. In order to access the vault they will have to unearth it and then overcome the security of the vault which they will have to figure out what it is and how to do, involving quests and exploration to find answers as they adventure, and level up. They will be level 6 when they finish LMoP, but I intend this to be a long term side quest that they shouldn't realistically be able to open beat the final level of security until at least level 14ish.
My idea is that each of the faction members of the Pact designed one of the levels of security for the vault:
The first level of security, and the one I need help refining, is provided by the Dwarves and is the vault itself. My thought is to have the vault require a special key, an amulet that was worn by the head of the dwarf clan that was the member of the pact and they need to find and secure the key. I was thinking about adapting the Prisoner 13 adventure from Keys of the Golden vault, the Axebreaker clan was the dwarf clan in question and the key was stolen with their riches and is in the vault that they need to get the key to from Prisoner 13. It's fine, but I think there could be a better adventure on how to find the key but am struggling to come up with something cool so any ideas would be appreciated.
The wizards created a challenge based on intelligence, they have to solve a series of riddles. I have three planned riddles, and they can make as many guesses as they want and hey can come and go but each wrong answer imposes 1d4 levels of exhaustion on any creatures that are within the vault entrance area. The riddles I have in mind are:
1. Your mother is an orc, your father is a dwarf, what are you? Answer: a dork (this one is supposed to be a joke, my party will get a kick out of this)
2. Listen closely, I'm hard to understand
I am as elusive as is a handful of sand.
Even if you perceive me, you know me not
before you can tell me, what I have forgot.
Answer: A riddle
3. I speak without a mouth and hear without ears. I’m invisible, but you can call for me. What am I? Answer: An echo
My thoughts are that if they are clever enough they might just be able to figure the riddle out themselves, but if they get stuck they can go seek out help from descendants of the original wizards or find a sphinx to consult with for help, that kind of thing.
Last, the gnomes created a pair of Iron Golem guards for the vault. This is the most straightforward of the challenges as it will be a straight combat one. The creators are gone so the golems can't be reasoned with or shut down by any means, will have to be a straight fight. This will be the last challenge they face given that they won't have much of a chance of survival against two IG before the party is at least 12-13 level.
The last thing I need to figure out is what to populate the vault with. By the time I plan on them being able to access the vault they should have accumulated, and are earning, sufficient gold to meet their needs that the riches in the vault will be of secondary draw, I'll just put enough in the vault to still be impressive based on how much they already have at the point they get in, but I want to have some awesome items in there are rewards. I want to have basically one very rare or legendary item specifically targeted to each party member, and a selection of lesser rares and uncommons they can divvy up as they see fit. So far on my list of potential items for each member (i'll narrow it down as we get closer based on how the party has evolved) consists of:
The Fighter - a set of Armor of Invulnerability
The Cleric - a Rod of Resurrection
The Artificer - an Abracadabus or Danoth’s Visor or cubic gate (the artificer is originally for Eberron that got transported to Faerun in an accident when an experiment went wrong and has been trying to get home)
The Bard - a staff of charming or Ollamh Harp
The Ranger - the Oathbow
The Druid - Hide of the Feral Guardian or Cauldron of Rebirth
The Barbarian - the Axe of the Dwarvish Lords (the curse turning him to physically appear as a dwarf will be HILLARIOUS to this party)
Miscellaneous other potential items
- Hither-thither Staff
- Ring of Three Wishes
- Helm of Brilliance
Any suggestions on better items to put in the vault or any personal favorites you'd suggest?
I've been thinking about it and thinking maybe the dwarf challenge should be a more mechanical challenge of some sort; instead of just finding a key and opening the door, they need to figure out how the door works and fix/hack/manipulate the door in some way to get it to open. Has anyone ever done a challenge like that before?
Something I think might be a fun idea would be to personify different stone or ore types as part of a riddle. For example, you could have a riddle where there are5 different figurines, each carved from a different rock or stone, and you have to figure out their names, which might be an anagram for the ore they're carved out of.
Also for a combat encounter, something that might be neat if there were some animated stone dwarf statues. Another idea would be a hoard mimic inside the vault, they're in Fizban's treasury of dragons, usually more intelligent, and they sometimes strike deals with sentient creatures to guard their hoards in exchange for food and shelter. The vault seems like a neat concept though, feel free to PM me if you want to talk about it more.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Quokkas are objectively the best animal, anyone who disagrees needs a psychiatric evaluation
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
So my players are wrapping up LMoP and I am prepping potential story arcs and quests for the next phase of the campaign. One thing my players are are loot whores. They LOVE getting new items and finding hunting for the most power things they can find. So What I am doing is setting up a side storyline that can run concurrent with whatever else they decide to do, they can work on this on the side.
The basic premise is that in the last days of the Phandelver Pact, the members saw the orc armies sweeping across the north and in preparation for the possibility of attack built a massive secret vault where they stored as much of the wealth and riches of the Pact as well as the most powerful and valuable items created in the Forge of Spells. The Phandelver Vault was built deep underneath Tresendar Manor (explaining why Aldith Tresendar was trying to get down there during the attack and the ambient magic that drew the nothic.) As they explore Wave Echo Cave they are going to find a scrap of a document referencing the hidden stockpile of riches and treasures hidden beneath the manor. In order to access the vault they will have to unearth it and then overcome the security of the vault which they will have to figure out what it is and how to do, involving quests and exploration to find answers as they adventure, and level up. They will be level 6 when they finish LMoP, but I intend this to be a long term side quest that they shouldn't realistically be able to open beat the final level of security until at least level 14ish.
My idea is that each of the faction members of the Pact designed one of the levels of security for the vault:
The first level of security, and the one I need help refining, is provided by the Dwarves and is the vault itself. My thought is to have the vault require a special key, an amulet that was worn by the head of the dwarf clan that was the member of the pact and they need to find and secure the key. I was thinking about adapting the Prisoner 13 adventure from Keys of the Golden vault, the Axebreaker clan was the dwarf clan in question and the key was stolen with their riches and is in the vault that they need to get the key to from Prisoner 13. It's fine, but I think there could be a better adventure on how to find the key but am struggling to come up with something cool so any ideas would be appreciated.
The wizards created a challenge based on intelligence, they have to solve a series of riddles. I have three planned riddles, and they can make as many guesses as they want and hey can come and go but each wrong answer imposes 1d4 levels of exhaustion on any creatures that are within the vault entrance area. The riddles I have in mind are:
1. Your mother is an orc, your father is a dwarf, what are you? Answer: a dork (this one is supposed to be a joke, my party will get a kick out of this)
2. Listen closely, I'm hard to understand
I am as elusive as is a handful of sand.
Even if you perceive me, you know me not
before you can tell me, what I have forgot.
Answer: A riddle
3. I speak without a mouth and hear without ears. I’m invisible, but you can call for me. What am I? Answer: An echo
My thoughts are that if they are clever enough they might just be able to figure the riddle out themselves, but if they get stuck they can go seek out help from descendants of the original wizards or find a sphinx to consult with for help, that kind of thing.
Last, the gnomes created a pair of Iron Golem guards for the vault. This is the most straightforward of the challenges as it will be a straight combat one. The creators are gone so the golems can't be reasoned with or shut down by any means, will have to be a straight fight. This will be the last challenge they face given that they won't have much of a chance of survival against two IG before the party is at least 12-13 level.
The last thing I need to figure out is what to populate the vault with. By the time I plan on them being able to access the vault they should have accumulated, and are earning, sufficient gold to meet their needs that the riches in the vault will be of secondary draw, I'll just put enough in the vault to still be impressive based on how much they already have at the point they get in, but I want to have some awesome items in there are rewards. I want to have basically one very rare or legendary item specifically targeted to each party member, and a selection of lesser rares and uncommons they can divvy up as they see fit. So far on my list of potential items for each member (i'll narrow it down as we get closer based on how the party has evolved) consists of:
The Fighter - a set of Armor of Invulnerability
The Cleric - a Rod of Resurrection
The Artificer - an Abracadabus or Danoth’s Visor or cubic gate (the artificer is originally for Eberron that got transported to Faerun in an accident when an experiment went wrong and has been trying to get home)
The Bard - a staff of charming or Ollamh Harp
The Ranger - the Oathbow
The Druid - Hide of the Feral Guardian or Cauldron of Rebirth
The Barbarian - the Axe of the Dwarvish Lords (the curse turning him to physically appear as a dwarf will be HILLARIOUS to this party)
Miscellaneous other potential items
- Hither-thither Staff
- Ring of Three Wishes
- Helm of Brilliance
Any suggestions on better items to put in the vault or any personal favorites you'd suggest?
I've been thinking about it and thinking maybe the dwarf challenge should be a more mechanical challenge of some sort; instead of just finding a key and opening the door, they need to figure out how the door works and fix/hack/manipulate the door in some way to get it to open. Has anyone ever done a challenge like that before?
Something I think might be a fun idea would be to personify different stone or ore types as part of a riddle. For example, you could have a riddle where there are5 different figurines, each carved from a different rock or stone, and you have to figure out their names, which might be an anagram for the ore they're carved out of.
Also for a combat encounter, something that might be neat if there were some animated stone dwarf statues. Another idea would be a hoard mimic inside the vault, they're in Fizban's treasury of dragons, usually more intelligent, and they sometimes strike deals with sentient creatures to guard their hoards in exchange for food and shelter. The vault seems like a neat concept though, feel free to PM me if you want to talk about it more.
Quokkas are objectively the best animal, anyone who disagrees needs a psychiatric evaluation