The party I’m GM’ing for has just inherited the deed to a property in Waterdeep called The Cloak & Stagger Inn…what they don’t quite comprehend yet is that the property is quite haunted; among other things.
Yadda yadda…a cult of Vecna used the site over a century ago to conduct their macabre rituals…a tear into the Abyss exists miles below within the Underdark…and the location exists upon a nexus where the dark planes of existence overlap.
It isn’t all bad, though…there are NPC’s inside the inn that provide help to the party: a dismembered corpse in the cellar who apparently has retained their consciousness; but whose memory has slowly rotted away (but has kept their sarcasm)…and a shy plasmoid who travels through the inn’s various pipes in the walls, whispering helpful advice to players (who think the ooze is a ghost).
Anyway, every night, a random spooky encounter will occur during the witching hour on the property…the remnants of the evil that has stained the hotel.
Sometimes, for ease, the occurrence will be harmless…flashes of terrifying images in the mirrors, or bloody messages seeping from the wall, or the sounds of tortured residents from years passed.
Other times, the encounters will involve combat…I already have a plan for using a “Soul Shaker” from the “Journeys Through the Radiant Citadel” in a basement encounter (masquerading as poor souls who’ve been buried alive, arms waving from the dirt).
Similarly, I’ve another encounter with poltergeists & animated objects in the kitchen (the party will hear loud banging coming from there).
Then I have killer clowns from the Astral Sea wandering the gardens…a fractine disguised as a bedroom mirror in the love suite…a “boneless” hanging up in a party member’s walk-in closet…and one player at random will wake up in the Ethereal Plane, and attract a swarm of blink spiders.
…this is going to be an ongoing location, as the players will eventually have to restore this lavish inn to it’s former glory.
Anybody have any other suggestions for clever, spooky encounters inside this very haunted inn?
Hearth Ghost in the Kitchen, might even be benevolent - as long as they don't steal from the pantry. The Invisible Servant is also always a good thing, as long as the Characters don't make a mess...
I ran this in a similar situation during a ravenloft game
1st night have one of the party wake to find themselves with what looks like a nasty spider bite, nothing major itches like heck but otherwise harmless some medicine/a minor heal spell soothes it and dull the itching but its still a little red. Then second night the victim wakes mid rest to find the first bite has swollen and there are several more the itching is overwhelming if/when they show the rest of the PCs it doesn't look so bad to them certainly no worse than the previous night again healing seems to help a little. On the third the initial bite begins to feel like its got something moving inside to the pc afflicted but just looks like they have been scratching it to much to everyone else. On the forth and final night the PC wakes to find themselves alone in the room their friends are gone and they can hear scuttling, the itching is unbearable then over the head of the bed rises a twisted malformed spider. The situation follows nightmare logic if they flee through the door they find themselves running back into the room, smashing the window reveals a brick wall behind they must confront the nightmare spectre that has been haunting them (make up a challenging solo encounter statblock that they should struggle against and let them contest against the spider). Meanwhile outside the dream the other party members find the afflicted party member screaming or otherwise sleeping unsoundly but they cannot wake them. However attempts by the group to calm them or ease their nightmare manifest into the dreamworld as encouraging voices (grants advantage) and let the PC hear they are not alone. This help should let them prevail where they then awake in a cold sweat or if they die have their body spasm their mouth open impossibly wide and spiders flow forth from their throat slowly deflating the body till all that is left is a empty skin.
If party death is not much of a thing at your table have the skin disappear and the pc turn back up in the morning as if everything is fine then have the rest of the party keep seeing small spiders crawling on the returned pc's skin and in and out of their mouth, the pc is now 10000 spiders in a human skin (but can't be convinced of this)
Hearth Ghost in the Kitchen, might even be benevolent - as long as they don't steal from the pantry. The Invisible Servant is also always a good thing, as long as the Characters don't make a mess...
I ran this in a similar situation during a ravenloft game
1st night have one of the party wake to find themselves with what looks like a nasty spider bite, nothing major itches like heck but otherwise harmless some medicine/a minor heal spell soothes it and dull the itching but its still a little red. Then second night the victim wakes mid rest to find the first bite has swollen and there are several more the itching is overwhelming if/when they show the rest of the PCs it doesn't look so bad to them certainly no worse than the previous night again healing seems to help a little. On the third the initial bite begins to feel like its got something moving inside to the pc afflicted but just looks like they have been scratching it to much to everyone else. On the forth and final night the PC wakes to find themselves alone in the room their friends are gone and they can hear scuttling, the itching is unbearable then over the head of the bed rises a twisted malformed spider. The situation follows nightmare logic if they flee through the door they find themselves running back into the room, smashing the window reveals a brick wall behind they must confront the nightmare spectre that has been haunting them (make up a challenging solo encounter statblock that they should struggle against and let them contest against the spider). Meanwhile outside the dream the other party members find the afflicted party member screaming or otherwise sleeping unsoundly but they cannot wake them. However attempts by the group to calm them or ease their nightmare manifest into the dreamworld as encouraging voices (grants advantage) and let the PC hear they are not alone. This help should let them prevail where they then awake in a cold sweat or if they die have their body spasm their mouth open impossibly wide and spiders flow forth from their throat slowly deflating the body till all that is left is a empty skin.
If party death is not much of a thing at your table have the skin disappear and the pc turn back up in the morning as if everything is fine then have the rest of the party keep seeing small spiders crawling on the returned pc's skin and in and out of their mouth, the pc is now 10000 spiders in a human skin (but can't be convinced of this)
VERY macabre…might have to verify that doesn’t go too far over the line with some at my table.
A haunted inn is gonna have a lot of linen in it... could do a series of encounters with Something under a sheet like a Scooby-Doo ghost, only the Something is different every time
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Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock) Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric) Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue) Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
A haunted inn is gonna have a lot of linen in it... could do a series of encounters with Something under a sheet like a Scooby-Doo ghost, only the Something is different every time
A haunted inn could have ghost, shadow, specters etc... but it doesn't necessarily have to be undeads. It could be constructs ...
The last adventure of the sort i designed involved the vacant tower of a mage gone missing rumored to be haunted by locals after being recently barricaded to prevent unauthorized entry. At one point the party was approached because 2 kids broke into the tower and one fled, frightened of furniture moving by themselves! The other boy was still inside and needed to be rescued.... when they entered the tower, they were attacked by everything inside, from tables to chairs, buffet, cuttelery flying at them! Little did they know was that it was not undeads moving things around, but an protection alarm system in the basement that would animate objects when intrusions was detected without proper code to desactivate the system. All attempts to strike in the air or turn undead failed so battled their way through the "haunted" tower! It ended with a arcana skill challenge at the eldritch panel downstairs and the rescue of the boy, hidden in a closet. ☺
Hearth Ghost in the Kitchen, might even be benevolent - as long as they don't steal from the pantry. The Invisible Servant is also always a good thing, as long as the Characters don't make a mess...
Interesting…don’t know that one!
Ah, the Hearth Ghost is Homebrew. It has telekinesis and animate objects. but unlike the Poltergeist it isn't undead, but of fey nature, and i let it communicate via pictures from the past and emotions, which can create a hallucinatory effect on PCs.
Hearth Ghost in the Kitchen, might even be benevolent - as long as they don't steal from the pantry. The Invisible Servant is also always a good thing, as long as the Characters don't make a mess...
Interesting…don’t know that one!
Ah, the Hearth Ghost is Homebrew. It has telekinesis and animate objects. but unlike the Poltergeist it isn't undead, but of fey nature, and i let it communicate via pictures from the past and emotions, which can create a hallucinatory effect on PCs.
Yeah my group enjoy body horror which I only found out after giving them a whole host of pieces of paper with different potential nastiness that might come up to their characters in game and asking them to sort into categories of "Yes!" "Sounds Good" "Tentative Consent handle carefully" "Fine with the inclusion but not to my character" and "Hard no". Final party at the end of the game consisted of a PC Revenant Paladin who crumbled to dust with the death of the main villain, A GOO warlock that didn't start as a GOO warlock but as a Sorcerer, the aforementioned spiders in a skin Rogue/battle master and one poor deeply traumatised cleric of Lathander.
Greetings!
The party I’m GM’ing for has just inherited the deed to a property in Waterdeep called The Cloak & Stagger Inn…what they don’t quite comprehend yet is that the property is quite haunted; among other things.
Yadda yadda…a cult of Vecna used the site over a century ago to conduct their macabre rituals…a tear into the Abyss exists miles below within the Underdark…and the location exists upon a nexus where the dark planes of existence overlap.
It isn’t all bad, though…there are NPC’s inside the inn that provide help to the party: a dismembered corpse in the cellar who apparently has retained their consciousness; but whose memory has slowly rotted away (but has kept their sarcasm)…and a shy plasmoid who travels through the inn’s various pipes in the walls, whispering helpful advice to players (who think the ooze is a ghost).
Anyway, every night, a random spooky encounter will occur during the witching hour on the property…the remnants of the evil that has stained the hotel.
Sometimes, for ease, the occurrence will be harmless…flashes of terrifying images in the mirrors, or bloody messages seeping from the wall, or the sounds of tortured residents from years passed.
Other times, the encounters will involve combat…I already have a plan for using a “Soul Shaker” from the “Journeys Through the Radiant Citadel” in a basement encounter (masquerading as poor souls who’ve been buried alive, arms waving from the dirt).
Similarly, I’ve another encounter with poltergeists & animated objects in the kitchen (the party will hear loud banging coming from there).
Then I have killer clowns from the Astral Sea wandering the gardens…a fractine disguised as a bedroom mirror in the love suite…a “boneless” hanging up in a party member’s walk-in closet…and one player at random will wake up in the Ethereal Plane, and attract a swarm of blink spiders.
…this is going to be an ongoing location, as the players will eventually have to restore this lavish inn to it’s former glory.
Anybody have any other suggestions for clever, spooky encounters inside this very haunted inn?
Hearth Ghost in the Kitchen, might even be benevolent - as long as they don't steal from the pantry. The Invisible Servant is also always a good thing, as long as the Characters don't make a mess...
I ran this in a similar situation during a ravenloft game
1st night have one of the party wake to find themselves with what looks like a nasty spider bite, nothing major itches like heck but otherwise harmless some medicine/a minor heal spell soothes it and dull the itching but its still a little red. Then second night the victim wakes mid rest to find the first bite has swollen and there are several more the itching is overwhelming if/when they show the rest of the PCs it doesn't look so bad to them certainly no worse than the previous night again healing seems to help a little. On the third the initial bite begins to feel like its got something moving inside to the pc afflicted but just looks like they have been scratching it to much to everyone else. On the forth and final night the PC wakes to find themselves alone in the room their friends are gone and they can hear scuttling, the itching is unbearable then over the head of the bed rises a twisted malformed spider. The situation follows nightmare logic if they flee through the door they find themselves running back into the room, smashing the window reveals a brick wall behind they must confront the nightmare spectre that has been haunting them (make up a challenging solo encounter statblock that they should struggle against and let them contest against the spider). Meanwhile outside the dream the other party members find the afflicted party member screaming or otherwise sleeping unsoundly but they cannot wake them. However attempts by the group to calm them or ease their nightmare manifest into the dreamworld as encouraging voices (grants advantage) and let the PC hear they are not alone. This help should let them prevail where they then awake in a cold sweat or if they die have their body spasm their mouth open impossibly wide and spiders flow forth from their throat slowly deflating the body till all that is left is a empty skin.
If party death is not much of a thing at your table have the skin disappear and the pc turn back up in the morning as if everything is fine then have the rest of the party keep seeing small spiders crawling on the returned pc's skin and in and out of their mouth, the pc is now 10000 spiders in a human skin (but can't be convinced of this)
Interesting…don’t know that one!
VERY macabre…might have to verify that doesn’t go too far over the line with some at my table.
A haunted inn is gonna have a lot of linen in it... could do a series of encounters with Something under a sheet like a Scooby-Doo ghost, only the Something is different every time
Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock)
Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric)
Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue)
Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
Perfect!
A haunted inn could have ghost, shadow, specters etc... but it doesn't necessarily have to be undeads. It could be constructs ...
The last adventure of the sort i designed involved the vacant tower of a mage gone missing rumored to be haunted by locals after being recently barricaded to prevent unauthorized entry. At one point the party was approached because 2 kids broke into the tower and one fled, frightened of furniture moving by themselves! The other boy was still inside and needed to be rescued.... when they entered the tower, they were attacked by everything inside, from tables to chairs, buffet, cuttelery flying at them! Little did they know was that it was not undeads moving things around, but an protection alarm system in the basement that would animate objects when intrusions was detected without proper code to desactivate the system. All attempts to strike in the air or turn undead failed so battled their way through the "haunted" tower! It ended with a arcana skill challenge at the eldritch panel downstairs and the rescue of the boy, hidden in a closet. ☺
Ah, the Hearth Ghost is Homebrew. It has telekinesis and animate objects. but unlike the Poltergeist it isn't undead, but of fey nature, and i let it communicate via pictures from the past and emotions, which can create a hallucinatory effect on PCs.
I see.
Yeah my group enjoy body horror which I only found out after giving them a whole host of pieces of paper with different potential nastiness that might come up to their characters in game and asking them to sort into categories of "Yes!" "Sounds Good" "Tentative Consent handle carefully" "Fine with the inclusion but not to my character" and "Hard no". Final party at the end of the game consisted of a PC Revenant Paladin who crumbled to dust with the death of the main villain, A GOO warlock that didn't start as a GOO warlock but as a Sorcerer, the aforementioned spiders in a skin Rogue/battle master and one poor deeply traumatised cleric of Lathander.
Basically The Shining in a sense but with more to it, I like your ideas.
You could try having a door at the end of a hallway with creepy twins that disappear, when the door is opened blood like liquid floods out?
(Yes I took this from shining so what huh?)
Ah ha ha…yes, there will be a moment when the blood exits the lift.
I fully expect at least one of my players to understand the reference.
…when it happens again with a black pudding, well…