Slime City

After the events of the campaign that I made this post about, I introduced a new antagonist in the form of the Lady of Slime City and the agents of her authoritarian government which was expanding its influence to other settlements in the area. Much of the sessions that followed involved going to places and talking to people inside the city, and while I will post the maps and stuff from the adventures outside of the city, I am presenting pretty much everything I have made to detail Slime City here. I took a long time to post all of this stuff partially because I was working on other things but also because I couldn't really figure out a good way to present all of this without rewriting everything into a spreadsheet, which I don't feel like doing at this time.

This is the Banner of Slime City, a golden snail on a field of purple. Allied towns are expected to fly this banner and pay a 50% tax on all exports to the Lady of Slime City in exchange for protection from her army.

This is the version of the map I made to hand out to players. Slime City and Slimeburg used to be smaller, but they both grew into each other over time.

This is the GM version of the map I originally made with less of an eye appearance.

Some more detail on the various neighborhoods of the city, to give them flavor.

Two pages describing all of the important buildings and landmarks. This would've been a spreadsheet for sure if I wasn't running this location in a place with limited wi-fi.

I also made a series of charts showing who is in charge of each major faction in the city and who is loyal to them. These turned out kind of hard to read but I managed to run the game with them just fine.

I made a quick chart to come up with quests for the various people on the org charts to give out. I didn't end up using this because the group managed to come to people with goals and quests already in mind, but I had this ready in case they ever walked up to someone without doing any preparation and wanted to know how to get on their good side.

This is a random encounter table I came up with for when the group traveled between neighborhoods. It honestly created some pretty fun scenes, but that might just be a result of my group being a bunch of solid role-players.

Ultimately, the party wanted to overthrow the government and liberate the people under Slime City's control, so I made a list of things they can do to make that happen. They ended up doing a few things that weren't on the list, but those were events that got a lot of public attention and made the government look bad.

I only ever needed to develop the Lady of Slime City's Court and the training grounds for her army as individual maps for combat and exploration, as far as locations in the city go. The court is where the Lady Herself hears petitions from her citizens and has a lot of information the party might want while also being where criminals are held before their sentencing. The training grounds commander tries to keep everything going on inside a secret, so getting in and causing some chaos is a great way to bother the government of Slime City.

The group I ran this for had never tried a city-based adventure before and wasn't super used to having such a large sandbox to play in, but they managed to figure it out in time. Their adventure here ended with the entire city getting destroyed by one of the player characters, setting that character up as the next villain, but I wouldn't mind running this setting as a starting place for a group of characters, even. Maybe all of this stuff will only make sense to me since I made it in the first place, but I think it's a solid take on a fantasy city.

The Kobold City States: Cultural Profile

While they are yet to really feature in the campaign I'm running there, the Kobolds native to the Cephalus Mountains have developed a complex and technologically advanced society and I don't really want to sit on this document without posting it anymore.

Introduction: The Kobold Lands are, for the most part, dominated from under mountains by the kobolds. Kobold society is, above anything else, rigid and hierarchical. The laws they follow, much like the cities they build, are etched from stone and difficult to change. Although some of their city states have fallen or declined in the last 250 years, the kobolds still generally hold onto the laws and customs from 3,000 years ago. The kobolds worship the gods of the rivers that support them, maintaining shrines at the headwaters of rivers that water their cities. Kobolds are divided into many distinct castes that each fit into a nearly incomprehensible (to outsiders) hierarchy with one kobold at the top. Each city is a government and hierarchy unto itself, so each city has one leader, known as the First Kobold. Each city state is known to have unique rivalries and values that prevent them from presenting a united front against any kind of invasion.

Magic and Technology: Very few kobolds are known to be able to cast spells, but kobold artisans still know the secrets of imbuing items with magic, allowing them to produce enchanted objects of great power. While this ability is unknown outside of the city states, it represents the only magical abilities commonly found in kobold society. These magic items are very difficult and expensive to make, so each one is usually entirely unique and created at the command of the First Kobold of a city.

Kobold technology, on the other hand, is analogous to the technology of early 18th century Europe. While the truly marvelous pieces are too expensive for most castes, clockwork is reasonably common, gunpowder weapons with rifled barrels aren’t unheard of, although they are all muzzle-loaders. The soldier castes of the city states are universally equipped with smooth-bore muskets and fight in a manner not unlike the 18th century British army. Although they have clocks that tell time very well, the kobolds have never developed a true calendar system because they prefer to live below ground, where calendars mean little.

Society: Kobold society is built around supporting the strength and overall power of the city state. Personal and private property do not exist in kobold society. Citizens are provided everything they need to perform their jobs and survive from day to day, and in exchange they perform the labor associated with their caste. After 3,000 years, castes have become highly specific, with most professions constituting castes in their own right. The rules of how various castes are supposed to interact and who has authority over whom are well understood by most kobolds, but no outsider has ever been able to make sense of it. Kobolds are told from birth that there is no greater honor than to spend their lives in service to their city, and they generally believe it.

City-states are led by the First Kobolds, the only individuals who are truly at the tops of their respective hierarchies. In a kobold city-state, every chain of command eventually leads to the first kobold, the kobold in charge of deciding what the laws, customs, and overall goals of the city. In most cities, the first kobold maintains a leadership council known as the Council of Trades, made up of the leaders for every caste in the city. The purpose of the council is to meet with the first kobold to give them counsel and receive orders on a regular basis. These orders are then taken to the rest of the caste members so that the first kobold’s orders can be carried out. The Council of Trades also has the duty of electing a new first kobold from among their number whenever the time arises.

Any form of insubordination or questioning of the caste system is punished brutally by both superiors and the law enforcement caste, so although some kobolds may not enjoy their place in kobold society, they will rarely voice such feelings. Among the first kobolds, these kinds of policies are considered important and necessary in order to maintain the status quo that they benefit from so much. Despite all of this power, there is quite a bit of pressure for first kobolds to treat their subjects well and not live in opulence. In kobold society, the success and failure of a society is seen as the responsibility of the first kobold, and there is always another kobold on the council willing to take the job if the Council of Trades holds a vote of no confidence. To avoid execution and replacement, first kobolds try to live life in line with the tenets of austerity and morality endorsed by kobold religious dogma.

Religion: Kobold religious beliefs are centered around worshiping the headwater springs that supply their city-states at the heads of the great valleys of the Cephalus Mountains. In trying to emulate the nature of a high mountain spring, the religion values cleanliness, both moral and physical, simplicity, and individuals following the paths laid out for them. Members of the priest caste are charged with maintaining headwater shrines and giving advice to those that seek it. They also are charged with performing cleansing rituals of the entire city every 10 days, as well as funerals, coming of age ceremonies, and any number of social functions. Each city-state’s practices are somewhat idiosyncratic, but it is generally believed that the spirits of the headwaters sponsor the cities that grow around them and bestow good fortune to cities with virtuous and intelligent first kobolds.

Cities: Kobold cities are exclusively built underground as large tunnel networks with many small rooms branching off. These cities are built around the headwater springs of major rivers, so they are also usually at the heads of valleys as well. This results in population centers higher up in the mountains with hinterlands extending downstream as far as each city can control. Unlike cities on the surface, every inch of a kobold city has to be dug into the rock, and the digger caste treats every inch with the same care they'd give to the first kobold, so every inch of a kobold city is an expertly carved piece of art. Citizens of kobold cities take great pride in the beauty of their homes, as well as the hard work that went into making them.

The Department of Modron Violations

 This adventure was a side quest from the main campaign and took place directly after this adventure, although this adventure is more-or-less standalone.

The Setup

    One of the characters' parents have been kidnapped by modrons for violating the rules of the cosmic plane of law. After several weeks of research, the party has discovered a way to teleport themselves to where the parents are being held. This place, the Department of Modron Violations, is in the middle of what appears to be an endless field of grandfather clocks, and looks like a single-story brick building, although it also has a basement. Outside the main entrance are two modrons wearing security guard uniforms and standing around a weird grey arch.

The DMV

Key: A dot with a curved arrow one square away represents a door, the arrow indicating the direction the door swings open. If there is a letter "L" inside the curve of the arrow, that door is locked and the party must find the key, pick the lock, or break the door down to get through. The triangles made of lines represent stairs, with matching shapes in the corners of the stairs indicating which stairs connect to each other on the two levels. The stars indicate the items that are found inside the room.

    The Department of Modron Violations, or the DMV for short, is the place on Mechanus, the cosmic plane of law, where spirits of law and mortals that have broken the rules of Mechanus are sent as punishment. Most of the building is devoted to bureaucratic tasks, and there are not many cells due to the low rates of crime on Mechanus. When the party arrives, pretty much all of the staff in the building are in a meeting in the conference room. The only modrons not in the meeting are the receptionist, the injured file jockey, and whatever guards are posted around the building. Only the receptionist is upset about not being at the meeting, everyone else is too busy with their work to care.

Upper Level: Before the party can even get inside the DMV, they must get past the two security guards who stand in front of the door. They operate a grey, plastic arch that looks like a modern metal detector. The arch is magical and will sound and alarm if anyone walks through it while carrying a weapon. The arch is magical and can detect things that are considered weapons. The guards are not particularly strong, but they are able to call for the building to be locked down if the party gets violent with them.

    Once inside, the receptionist will say hello and offer to help the party. They will readily explain why the one player's parents are imprisoned and they will explain that there is a "simple" paperwork process that can be followed to get them out. The issue, however, is that this process could take years and may even fail. The receptionist is, however, upset that they are missing the meeting that the rest of their coworkers at the DMV are attending, and can be convinced to give the party the security and accounting keys from the office out of spite. 

    The meeting room and conference room are full of several dozen modrons who perform various office functions around the DMV. They are entirely entranced by the information being given by their manager, and the manager is too deep into their own speech to notice anyone walking around in the rooms. The workers, entranced as they are, will only respond to loud noises or physical contact, not that the party is aware of this. One of the workers in the conference room has a bright blue folder in front of them that is cold to the touch.

Lower Level: The mail room is very well organized, although the only interesting thing inside of it is a bright red folder on one of the upper shelves. Inside the file room is an injured modron, showing signs of both burns and frostbite, and several massive filing cabinets. The modron will explain that there are three colored folders (red, blue, yellow) that need to be retrieved and put in the matching cabinets. The modron is too injured to do this right now and will give the party 3 magic files that unleash the power of a single spell when opened if they help. The only real complications are finding the files and safely putting them back in the correct cabinets. Opening the blue cabinet unleashes painful amounts of cold that will cause frostbite after a few seconds, red unleashes fountains of fire, and the yellow cabinet shoots out lighting bolts when opened. The spell files that the modron gives as a reward can be either random or player choice, depending on how nice you want to be.

    Inside the vault, in addition to piles of gold, is a powerful magic item known as the Blindfold of Law. When wearing the blindfold, one is blinded and takes psychic damage if they break any laws after putting it on, but they find that they are significantly smarter, wiser, and more perceptive while they wear it. These effects are not readily explained unless someone with prior knowledge of the artifact is there to do the explaining.

    The first cell with several skeletons inside also contains a standard set of polyhedral dice made out of pure diamond. The dice have no special effects but they are worth a lot of money. The cell with the rogue accountant is relatively clean. The accountant was imprisoned for embezzlement, but managed to steal the yellow file on their way in, just to cause some chaos. They want to be free to explore the multiverse, and will trade the yellow file for help in that goal. Crazy Steve does not know how or why he ended up in his cell, but he is also willing to exchange "helpful information" for a bit of food. This helpful information will turn out to be knowledge of the secret escape route hidden behind the wall of the parents' cell.

Running Notes

    There isn't much to say about this one. My group ended up missing a lot of the side content for this adventure and really focused on saving the parents, so I can't really speak to how it all would play out. This was designed to be a low combat dungeon, so the best advice I can give is to have fun with it and let the players know that security is light and hardly anyone is going to care to sound any alarms, given the fact that most staff are mesmerized by their meetings while the players are there.

The Battle for Polip

 This adventure was originally made as a direct sequel to this adventure, although this one probably won't matter much to a party who has not gone through several adventures in service to Polip before.

The Setup

    After finding out that the kobold invasion of Polip was coming, the day has finally come. Hopefully, the party has had enough time to gather forces and prepare defenses, because the kobolds outnumber the people of Polip 6 to 1. It is unknown what direction the kobolds will attack from, how their forces will be divided, or what they will be armed with, so whatever was done to prepare will have to do.

The Battle

    When the battle begins, about 1/3 of the kobold forces will be above ground, barely visible in the distance, and then the other 2/3 will come out of tunnels in the ground about 100 feet from the walls of Polip. The kobolds are armed with spears and swords, but they are highly determined to take back the valley they view as their ancestral homeland. The kobolds will most likely fight to the last man unless one of their leaders can be convinced to negotiate. 

    Run this battle using whatever mass combat rules you are comfortable with. I ran mass combat rules that only barely gave the effect I wanted, so I don't really feel like sharing them here. What is important is that the goal of the battle is to defend the town from the enemy forces. I gave the town walls and the town itself hit points and if both pools got depleted I would've considered that a win for the kobolds. The party was able to build extra defenses and do special training to get various bonuses during the battle, but that was highly improvised based on what the players came up with for defenses.

Running Notes

    When I ran this adventure, I ran it basically as described above. The party had been able to gather several groups of allies that they could use to fight the kobolds and was able to prepare several different defenses that added to the hit points of the wall and gave their allies bonuses to things like perception. I also ruled that characters could train with their armies to give the troops better stats during the battle. As I said, I wasn't super satisfied with the mass combat system I used for this, but I think I could tweak it for a better experience. I'll make another post if I ever do run a more effective mass combat encounter.

The Octopus Cult in the Ancient Outpost

 This adventure was originally made as a direct sequel to this adventure, but does not necessarily require that the party play the previous content.

The Setup

    After successfully convincing two companies of mercenaries to assist them in their fight against the invading kobold army, the party returns to Polip ahead of their new allies. Upon their return, the party discovers that Mayor Octavia has been kidnapped by a cult that worships octopuses. Enraged by the way the party treated the Octopus Queen, the cult has demanded the release of their captive god or they will destroy the town. 

    Most people in Polip weren't even aware that there was an octopus cult in the valley, but 1 in 10 will have heard rumors. Nobody has seen Oswald, the leader of the Arboreal Octopus Hunting Guild, since the mayor was kidnapped, and most people will say he was generally a private man who spent a lot of time at home. The town guards will say that he would leave just before the town gates closed once a month and not come back for 24 hours, never explaining what he was doing.

    Searching Oswald's home will reveal that no one is home and it seems like Oswald left in a hurry several days ago, leaving behind a lot of essential items for long-distance travel. Close inspection of his writing desk will reveal a locked drawer. The drawer is trivially easy to break open or pick, and contains a map leading to the ancient kobold outpost that the cultists live in.

The Dungeon

Key: A dot with a curved arrow one square away represents a door, the arrow indicating the direction the door swings open. If there is a letter "L" inside the curve of the arrow, that door is locked and the party must find the key, pick the lock, or break the door down to get through. The triangles made of lines represent stairs, with matching shapes in the corners of the stairs indicating which stairs connect to each other on the two levels. The stars indicate the items that are found inside the room.

    The ancient outpost, called a fort by the cultists, was built by the kobolds and was one of the first buildings taken by the colonists several hundred years ago. While the building is still sound, it is weathered and has not been well-maintained. The cultists have done their best to improve the long-abandoned outpost, but none of them have the skills of the ancient kobold builders.

    There are about 20 regular cultists in the fort, 4 regular octopus priests, including Oswald, their leader, Otto, and 6 mutated arboreal octopuses that have become feral and vicious through magic. During the day, about half of the cultists will be on level 1 (L1), and the other half, as well as the priests, Otto, and the mutated octopuses, will be below ground on level 2 (L2). At night, all cultists will be in the dormitory, all priests will be in their room, and Otto will be roaming the halls restlessly. Otto has done a lot to transform himself to be more like his objects of worship. He has extended his torso to make room for 2 extra pairs of arms, half of which have been turned into tentacles, and can summon waves of salt water or ink to attack his enemies. Despite his monstrous form, Otto is still and intelligent and charismatic, having strong control over his cult.

    The Mayor is tied up on the altar of the ritual room. There is a 50% chance that the cult is in the process of sacrificing her for a ritual when the party first arrives at the fort. If this is the case, the party has about 1 hour before the mayor is killed. If she dies, the ritual is complete and the Octopus Queen gains much more power and grows to the size of a house so she can destroy Polip. This problem may be more or less of an immediate issue depending on where the Octopus Queen is and her relationship with the town. It should be noted that the cult sees any direct interaction with the Octopus Queen as a heresy worthy of their current action, which the party probably did if they played the first set of adventures.

L1: This is the level that is above ground. Without knowing of the level built into the hill, the outpost looks like 3 buildings. There are 2 watchtowers and a larger hall. The towers are three stories tall and each one provides a good view of the Slimewater's Headwater Valley as well as the valley beyond the rise of the end moraine, the Great Joinder Valley. These towers are guarded during the day because they contain stairs to the lower level. The main hall contains the room where sermons are held, a room with a large statue of a golden octopus. The guarded room has at least 2 cultists in it at all times who only allow other cultists in. One of the books in the library is a book that teaches one a spell that sprays ink out of the caster's hands.

L2: This is the level below the ground, built into the hill at the end of the valley. The guarded rooms have 2 cultists inside at all times who are tasked with making sure only cultists are on the lower level. If the cult has managed to take back the Octopus Queen as well, she will be in the same room as the mutated arboreal octopuses. The room that the priests sleep in has 4 beds in it, and above each bed is a ceremonial mask made of gold. High Priest Otto's room contains a spell book that teaches one how to cast a spell that permanently turns a human arm into an octopus-like tentacle and requires the use of an altar like the one in the Ritual Room. The Ritual Room is where Mayor Octavia is being kept, tied up, on the altar. The common room has several tables with chairs around them, upon which are two magic items. The vault is not only locked, but has a heavy metal door that has been added by the cultists, making it very hard to get into without the key.

Running Notes

    When I ran this for my group, the overall context was the result of the party ignoring a threatening note left by the cult before they left to hire mercenaries in Jointown. Because they were gone for half a week, the cultists not only kidnapped the mayor, but took the Octopus Queen with them as well. They decided to split the party and ended up leaving one character to deal with almost all of the cultists alone. Otto was a tough fight for them because I meant for the party to work together to beat him, but they instead had only like half the party in the room for the fight. I had described the cultists as masked and robed so that it would be easy for the party to disguise themselves before starting a huge fight, but they ran in guns blazing which was also fine.

The Cephalus Mountains: Setting Notes

 Introduction: The Cephalus Mountains include the most northern point of the largest landmass of Tero, making them a generally cooler environment that can see snow-capped peaks into mid-summer. Most of the range is densely forested with coniferous trees, although deciduous trees can be found at lower elevations. The entire area is considered the domain of the kobolds, although there have been several waves of attempted human colonization over the last couple thousand years. 

Geographic History: The Cephalus Mountains are primarily volcanic, forming near a fault line which encircles the north pole of Tero. The fault is not particularly active in the Cephalus Mountains these days, but there are still plenty of active volcanoes and hot springs throughout. Earthquakes are also somewhat common in the region, often resulting in landslides. 

The Kobolds: The kobolds are two feet tall, furry, bipedal, and look like an unholy mixture of a dog and a rat, but they are also the native inhabitants of the Cephalus Mountains, as well as the reason why the entire area as well as the plains directly to the south are sometimes known as the Kobold Lands. The first intelligent kobolds evolved in the central part of the mountain range several million years ago, but did not develop beyond simple hunter-gatherer societies until 3,000 years ago with the invention of digging techniques which allowed them to begin building stable underground settlements, leading to the creation of city-states. These cities were generally situated at the tops of major river valleys and could control several miles downriver as farmland and hunting grounds. The governments of the cities were universally authoritarian and collectivist. Individuals had no rights to private or personal property and were required to fulfill whatever role was required of them by the commands of their overseers. While generally harsh, the kobolds doing all of the work believed that it was worth it to repay their debt to society for the resources they used as infants and that they would use when they became too old to work. Due to the recent waves of human colonization, some of these ancient cities are in a state of decline. About half of the river valleys that once supported significant kobold cities have had their kobold populations exterminated or evacuated, the valleys now supporting meager numbers of humans after the armies that did most of the actual conquering have moved on. After several decades of recovery, the displaced kobolds have realized that the humans assume them extinct and are now plotting to retake their valleys. The city-states that never fell also have their eyes on the conquered valleys, hoping to wipe out the humans and colonize the valleys in the names of their cities. These modern city-states are more or less the same as they were 3,000 years ago when they were founded.

Human Settlers: The most recent wave of human settlement was about 250 years ago and involved the hiring of a large army to escort settlers into valleys, force the local kobolds out, and then have the army move on to the next valley, leaving a group of settlers behind. While this was effective, it means that the humans living in these valleys are unable to muster the same amount of force that was needed to take over the valley in the first place. Most humans living in these valleys believe the kobolds to be either extinct or too weak to get their territory back. The human villages support their populations by trading goods found in or derived from the local environment. Each valley seems to have its own unique resources for the humans to exploit. Despite being there for a while now, most humans still see themselves as invaders occupying the Kobold Lands with no strong connections between villages. Each village has needed to figure out its own form of government and industry, leading to many unique settlements and cultures. Technology levels vary, but the closest parallel to the real world would be that of the English colonies in North America during the 17th century. The settlers are often too busy trying to make a living to worry much about religious practice. Although there are several religious orders and many cults found in the Cephalus Mountains, they do not have much affect on the average person's life.

Rough Timeline

• 3,000 years ago- The kobolds discover how to dig fairly stable tunnels in the rock and this triggers the development of kobold city states

• 2,000 years ago- the first wave of human colonization in the area meets an immediate, bloody end at the hands of the kobolds

• 250 years ago- the second wave of human colonization is able to establish settlements in about half of the valleys with pre-existing kobold city-states, although these human controlled areas are still referred to as "Kobold Lands"

Major Factions

Human Settlements- The descendants of the humans who colonized the Cephalus Mountains 250 years ago. These humans are somewhat aware of the danger posed by both the displaced and settled kobolds and generally maintain some kind of defenses. Each settlement is very different from the next, contributing to the lack of cooperation between villages, but they are all united in making meager livings by exploiting the unique resources of the Cephalus Mountain valleys.

Merchants- Merchants travel the Cephalus Mountains, going between the villages trading important supplies for the unique products of each town. They take their goods to ports of trade to sell or trade for new hauls of supplies and begin the cycle again. Their livelihoods are based on the continued productivity of the human settlements so they can usually be convinced to take actions to assist communities.

Settled Kobolds- Settled kobolds are the kobolds that continue to live in the 3,000 year old cities that their people have lived in since they learned how to build them. These kobolds are extremely communal in everything they do with a strict hierarchy with one kobold in charge of everything. The leaders of the city-states see the general weakness of the human settlements and displaced kobolds as an invitation to retake the valleys as colonies of their respective cities. 

Displaced Kobolds- The displaced kobolds are the descendants of the kobolds that were removed from their city-states by the most recent human colonization efforts. While they are still considerably weaker than they were before being displaced, they have gained enough strength to make serious attempts at driving the humans out of their ancestral homelands. In most cases, the underground cities they once called home have either decayed beyond usability or were destroyed during the conquests 250 years ago. Regardless, each group of displaced kobolds is doing its best to maintain the traditions of their city-states until such a time as they are able to restore their ancestral homes.

The Jointown Mercenaries

 This adventure was originally made as a direct sequel to this adventure, but does not necessarily require the party to play the previous scenario.

The Setup

    After discovering that an army of kobolds is going to descend upon the town of Polip, the players have been asked to go one day downriver. There, over the point where the Slimewater River meets its first major tributary, is Jointown. Jointown is built up on stilts and boardwalks and marks the end of the navigable portion of the Slimewater River, making most of its money by charging for the use of the docks. That is starting to change as the new mayor, Martin Quimbly, has decided to start marketing Jointown as a tourist destination with easy access to the Little Ooze Valley and a lively entertainment district. It is popular with mercenaries from the wars in the flatter lands south of the Cephalus Mountains.

    Upon arriving in town, the players will find that the mercenaries tend to hang out in a bar called the Three Rocks Inn, run by a red-haired gnome named Fuoco who seems to be eternally stressed out by her rowdy clientele. Upon arriving at the bar, the party will find the banners of four different mercenary companies in the four corners of the room. 

ignore the checks and the x, those are notes from when I ran this

The Complication

    These mercenaries are used to being hired out by kings and generals so it is unlikely the party can afford to hire them with gold. The mercenaries are on vacation and are looking more to spend gold than earn it as well. This means that if the party wants any of the mercenaries to help them fight the kobolds, they will probably have to get on their good sides. To get one of the mercenary leaders willing to help the party, they'll need to either give or guarantee the future giving of at least two of the things that the leader in question wants, as written under their name in the above image.

    On top of all of this, none of the companies have enough soldiers to stand up to the kobold army alone, so the party is going to have to figure out how to get two different leaders on their side. The leaders have their own friendships and rivalries, some even want each other dead, so they will have to figure out which leaders are both compatible and want things the party is willing to get for them.

    The mercenaries seem to split their time between drinking at the inn and sleeping on their docked rafts, so it is fairly easy to track them down at their most vulnerable. It is also worth noting that murder is illegal in Jointown so the party is going to have to get around that as well, depending on the choices they make.

Running Notes

    When I ran this for one of my groups, they seemed to key into the fact that I made two of the leaders much nicer than the other two, and that I made the two nice leaders start out as friends. Erik and Amelia are certainly the most harmonious pairing of the 6 possible combinations. We had a great time roleplaying for this adventure, and it ended with the murder of one of the mercenary leaders. As a result, the party is still wanted for questioning in Jointown and what's left of Tony's mercenary company wants to have them killed. Definitely one of the better endings that a quest can have. There's also an optional encounter table I made for the upper Slimewater Watershed.

it's a 2d6 table, since I forgot to write that on the page

The Town of Polip and the Slimewater Valley

 

General Description

Polip is a small town in a high mountain valley of the Cephalus Mountain Range. The valley is a flat-floored glacial valley about 20 miles long with a stream, the Slimewater, that meanders along the center. Polip is situated along the stream in about the center of the valley, surrounded by the Tentacled Woods on all sides, with a cleared area around Polip. The primary industry of Polip is the trapping and harvesting of Arboreal Octopi, endemic to the Tentacled Woods, for their ink and tentacle meat, both of which have magical properties. The ink can be made into a potent potion of invisibility and eating the meat grants the ability to squeeze through any opening that is at least one square inch in width for a short time. People in the town trade these materials with merchants for most supplies, although there are a few farmers and tradesmen to provide some services. Most of the ~1,000 residents live inside the wooden wall, called the Mantle, that surrounds the town and which has one gate called the Siphon. The town is led by the mayor, Octavia of Polip, who inherited the position from her mother and directly commands the 12 town guards who operate the gate and enforce the laws. Lately, there have been concerning reports that kobolds, once thought extinct in the valley, have been seen in the woods, as well as reports of trading caravans going missing after they leave Polip, only to be discovered days later, skewered on the tree tops.

Adventure Hook

The session begins with the player characters, along with the rest of the townsfolk, being addressed by Mayor Octavia in the town square. She explains that the town is going to experience hardships if the trade caravans continue to be destroyed because no one will want to make the trip if it is dangerous. She also explains that kobolds have been sighted and she needs someone to go to the Kobold ruins at the head of the valley to investigate. Because town guards need to stay in town to do their jobs, she asks for volunteers to come forward to try to deal with each issue. Another group will take whichever job the party doesn't.

What is Actually Going On

The Queen Octopus, ruler of all of the arboreal octopi, is enraged that her subjects are being rounded up and killed en masse by the people of Polip, so she has been ambushing merchant caravans, resulting in the missing and skewered wagons. At the same time, the queen has been feeding rumors to the local kobolds, never fully removed from the valley, that the people of Polip are making plans to drive the kobolds out of the mountains, prompting them to start planning a preemptive strike against the town.

Enemy Factions

The Slimewater Kobolds

Driven into the high mountains at the head of the valley over 200 years ago, the Slimewater kobolds have been living a hard life in a difficult environment. Despite this hardship, their population is recovering and they have sent a group of soldiers, led by a kobold named Kassius, and a priest, named Kubuldikin, to reoccupy the ruins of their ancient headwater city. Most of the city was looted and then destroyed during the initial conquest, so the soldiers have attempted to rebuild and shore up what is left, although they do not appear to have excavated many rooms yet, and what they have done appears to be relatively crude. Kassius' orders are to scout out Polip and hold the forward location for the larger army that will be coming down from the mountains in several weeks' time.

The Queen Octopus

The Queen lives in a particularly dense patch of trees which she has cultivated into several rooms and tunnels leading to a clearing where she keeps her nest. The Queen Octopus must return to this location for at least one hour out of every 12 in order to tend to her eggs. She will defend these with her life. The Queen is horrified at the way her species is being treated, although it is worth noting that only her and the octopuses that hatch from her eggs are intelligent and have the ability to get to her size. She still feels a strong kinship with the smaller arboreal octopi and although she is open to a compromise where she is given offerings in exchange for more humane and regulated octopus harvesting, killing her would also work just fine.

Locations

• Polip

• Tentacled Woods

• Kobold Tunnels

• Queen Octopus' Lair

The Kobold Tunnels

• Room A: Entrance Chamber: The intended entrance to the tunnels that the kobolds use. The tunnel leading outside is blocked by a big, heavy gate that takes 4 kobolds to open and at least 2 normal sized people. The gate is made of wood and iron and is locked unless it is being used. To be able to open the gate, there are always at least 4 but usually 5 or 6 kobolds stationed in this room. In the center of the room is a big obvious trap door with no obvious way to open it. There is a lever in the tunnel behind the left barricade that will cause the trap door to fall open when flipped. Beneath the trap door is a 10 foot drop onto wooden spikes. If the players are exploring the tunnels after another group that failed, this trap is responsible for the deaths of all of the previous party's members.

• Room B: Bridge Chamber: In this chamber, a small bridge crosses over the slimewater, completing the path between the entrance chamber and the mess hall. The slimewater itself has a tunnel leading outside from the headwater shrine. There is an iron grate with bars 1 inch thick preventing people from getting directly to the headwater shrine from this room.

• Room C: Mess Hall: This room has several tables, a long counter for preparing and serving food, and a big oven. The oven almost always has at least a few embers in it, making this room relatively warm but also smoky and hazy, giving everything that sees with conventional vision disadvantage on checks involving sight. If the alarm has not been called, there are usually half a dozen kobolds in here plus the cook.

• Room D: Sleeping Quarters: One of the most protected rooms in the area, there are probably a dozen kobolds sleeping peacefully in the various mats and piles of hay scattered in here. Kobolds are very heavy sleepers and these kobolds will only wake up if the fighting spreads to this room or if they are woken up by an alarm.

• Room E: Headwater Shrine: The center of the tunnels and a place of worship for the kobolds. There is always one kobold priest in here to give guidance to the tribe, tend the three fires on columns that surround the spring, and use the spring for regular divination rituals to hopefully figure out the future.

• Room F: Kassius' Office: This is where Kassius will be no matter what happens in the rest of the tunnels. He will sit at his desk working on his plans. If the alarm has not been called, there will be two lieutenants in here with him, discussing plans. Kassius has a huge desk with a table behind it, both are scattered with bits of paper, notes, and even a few tools and scraps of metal. Among the notes is a summary of all of the rumors the Octopus Queen has been spreading. Kassius is carrying a note from the main force in the mountains detailing the timeline for their attack on Polip.

The Octopus Queen’s Lair

• Room A: Broken Carriage: This small clearing has a mostly destroyed merchant's wagon in it. Nothing of value is left of the wagon, although most of the planks of the wagon are still intact and it could theoretically be repaired.

• Room B: Refuse Pile: This clearing has a pile of waste from the Octopus Queen, her children, and the remains of the caravans she has been attacking. There are 4 of the Octopus Queen's babies fighting over a human femur in here, although they will attempt to run to the nest if anyone walks in on them.

• Room C: Treasure Clearing: The chest in this clearing contains 6 vials of octopus ink invisibility potion and 10 servings of arboreal octopus jerky.

• Room D: The Nest: This is where the Queen Octopus rests and tends to her eggs, which hang in large mucus-y sacks that hang from the branches of the trees. There are usually about a half dozen of the queen's babies hanging out in these trees, they will try their best to hide from strangers.

Notes for Running:

    When I have run this adventure, I have the party all take the same mission of the two offered and then have another party of NPCs take the other mission. This party of NPCs will die on their mission, prompting the mayor to ask the party to complete the other mission and also figure out what happened to the other party. I think it is important to note that I run the antagonists of this adventure as being open to talk things out if the players attempt that option, since much of this conflict is based on empathetic motivations and misunderstandings.

    When I ran this adventure, I would change up the numbers of creatures and the amounts of treasure to fit the group, so take those numbers more as suggestions than anything else. I gave one group enough invisibility potions to have all five members be nearly always invisible, and that somehow never got abused, despite that being a fairly low-level party.

    What I like about running this adventure is the opportunity to present multiple moral quandaries to the party without making things too heavy. While the Octopus Queen and her children are intelligent, their complaint is really about what they perceive as unethical and unsustainable market hunting, something that has caused the extinction of many real-world species. All of the other arboreal octopuses are relatively unintelligent animals, so the issue for the party is to figure out what their characters think is a fair solution. As for the kobolds, they are the true natives of the valley and they were driven out of their ancestral homes by the ancestors of the current inhabitants of Polip. The players may very well decide that they do not support the colonists and would rather help an oppressed native people retake their home. On the other hand, the player characters may come from a background that makes the characters more sympathetic to humans and the types of civilization that they are more familiar with. Overall, I think it makes a fun first adventure for a campaign set in the mountains and valleys around Polip.