Followers of the Twisted Gear

It is a mistake to think that all Dwarves act alike.  Sure, most of the Dwarves you meet will love to mine, have a fondness for gold and would happily spend entire lifetimes digging, finding secret doors and collecting gold.  That is because the other kind of Dwarves don’t hang out in bars and mines.  They are too busy making really weird shit.

They call themselves the Followers of the Twisted Gear.  These Dwarves have left their homes in search of something more intellectual than digging and mining.  Many times their numbers include adolescent Dwarves who are rebelling against the old ways.  They have shave their beards in an act of defiance for the old ways and instead let their hair grow to ridiculous heights; often using the blood of others for their hair gel.  They pierce their skin with gears and tools.  The Followers of the Twisted Gear is a refuge for Dwarves of a Chaotic alignment.

And what do these Twisted Gear Dwarves do?  They invent.  They seek out dark places of wicked evil to absorb inspiration.  They lurk in infamous tombs.  They have long drinking parties in cursed cemeteries.  They squat in abandoned hideouts of long dead villains.  Anywhere that evil once reigned; the Followers of the Twisted Gear will take residence for inspiration.

In time, one Dwarf will get an inspiration.  He will develop a mania to build a great device.  The device is almost always made from the remains of living creatures and these devices are often mistaken as tools of necromancers.  Sometimes living creatures are trapped in the devices as if their very suffering is part of the mechanism.  These manic Dwarves will incorporate magic and technology in strange hybrid manners that

The purpose of the device vary from creation to creation.  They rarely create something practical as that is too much like the normal Dwarves that they scorn.  No, the Followers of the Twisted Gear might make a mirror that shows you random events across time and space.  They might make a ship that travels through underwater but it never stops traveling; condemning the passengers to eternal wondering.  Or they might make a pair of pointy shoes that bestows any effect on the potion table every time you put them on. 

Dwarves of the Twisted Gear will have the same stats and organization of normal Dwarves in your campaign.  Despite their desire to be different, some habits are just hard to break.  Each lair of the Followers will have D3 random devices that are each unique in the world.   

Barbaric Math

After a two week delay, I have finally had enough peace of mind to do some party math.

The players received 315 gold pieces each.  Filling in the fog of the map doesn't pay much.

Because the experience points was split three ways between the survivors, the exp is 143.  Kind of measly but dungeoning ain't easy.

Axe-Boots of Door Kicking

Often found in the occasional Dwarven tomb buried with those warriors who subscribed to this unusual fashion trend, Axe-boots of Door Kicking are a rather garish accessory designed for those who have a particular loathing for wooden doors of all types. Though not often prone to dancing, the dwarves of the Diggerbollox clan at one point developed a peculiar type of partner dance using these axe-boots that required a modicum of grace and skill in order not to prove fatal for bystanders.

In Basic D&D, it requires a 1 or 2 rolled on a d6 to force open a stuck door (which tends to be most of them). Wearing Axe-Boots automatically increases that chance to 1 through 4, strength bonuses/penalties applying (though still no greater than 1-5). What's more, the door is destroyed and no longer prevents passage until repaired, making for easier flight from the dungeon if needed (though also easier for those chasing).

However, on a 6, the kicking character does not in fact manage to break the door, and their boot is stuck at kicking level, making things awkward, especially if a creature, hearing something, decides to open it from the other side. It takes a least a round to pull the foot free from the door.

Other disadvantages to wearing Axe-Boots might be easy trackability, slower speed, occasionally challenged to dwarven dance-offs, and the potential for inadvertant haircuts or decapitations when the Axe-Boot wearer is drunkenly swinging from chandeliers.

If a pair of Axe-Boots are found, there is a chance they are magical, consult the chart below:

1. A normal, mundane pair of Axe-Boots.
2. A normal pair of Axe-Boots, except with heels.
3. These Axe-Boots are fucking fabulous.
4. These Platform Axe-Boots add 6 inches of height to the wearer, as well as increased pimpitude.
5. The rare alternate, a pair of Hammer-Boots. Wearer can always be heard coming on all but the softest ground, but Hammer-Boots work on stone doors as well as wooden.
6. These Axe-Boots are specially engineered for groin kicks and can be used as a 1d6-damaging weapon if a week is spent practicing with them, doing triple damage on criticals against sensitive-groin-possessing enemies.
7. These Axe-Boots have a minor enchantment to enhance the dancing of the wearer - Any dancing they perform will be of such consummate skill as to impress all observers, however there is a 10% chance that any combat will be interpreted by the boots as an excuse to start dancing.
8. These Axe-Boots work as +1 weapons, as listed as above, and are considered highly valuable.
9. If worn by a non-dwarf, these cursed Axe-Boots cannot be taken off, and unless remove Curse is cast, in one week the wearer will gradually turn into a dwarf with an overwhelming hatred of all wooden doors everywhere. If worn by a dwarf, they function as regular +1 Axe-Boots.
10. Axe-Boots of Portalmancy. There is a 5% chance that these Axe-Boots, when destroying a door, opens a 2-way teleportation portal (on a 1-2) to the entrance of the dungeon, (on a 3-4) to the nearest town or city, (on a 5) to a random door on the next level of the dungeon, if there is one, (on a 6) directly to the most powerful creature in the dungeon, though surprise chance is doubled. The portal lasts for one hour.

Level 1 So Far

One night Bill starts drinking and a friendly scribe begins making a map of the adventures that have been had so far in the "Croney Pit of Goblin Genital Mutilation"

A Report to the Tower of Secrets

I would like to thank the Tower of Secrets for assigning me this interesting problem.  I am glad to have earned a chance to redeem myself after the unfortunate outbreak of Black Pudding that I most likely had something to do with.

For those of you that have been busy working on your potions, scrolls or Black Pudding fighting, I shall inform you of the strange occurrence of magic that happened this past Thursday.

According to a one handed barmaid at the Coffin Nail, two adventurers were sitting at a table with their new henchmen.  Of the adventurers, one of them was a cleric of the Blue Oyster by the name of Imadead and other was the mage, Pepto. 

Of the henchmen, one was a lowly ratcatcher while the second was the dread dog, Murder.  I recommend that everyone read Asiton the Shaking’s account of the Massacre of the Kobold Warren for more information about that grim beast.

Back to the magical incident.  The two adventurers, the henchman and the abomination of nature were sitting at their table when a yellow wind pushed through the tavern doors.  The yellow wind was filled with sand and blinded every one at the bar.  When the wind was gone, so was the table of adventurers!

Curiously, in their place was a worn sleeping bag.  It was identified as belonging to Sbijjin the Warrior, who disappeared one year ago on a quest to explore the Tomb That We Do Not Name #5.

An hour later, at the Coffin Nail, another mage by the name of Balduric came in for a drink.  He sat at the bar and had a mug of the house ale.  Once again a yellow wind came in and blinded everyone.  When the wind was gone, so was Balduric.  Sitting in his place was a thief by the name of Marva or Murva; accounts differ on her name.  The thief however was dead as if dropped from a height of twenty feet.  Curiously, she was already looted.

The thief had been missing for a week; last seen entering the Tomb That We Do Not Name #5 with a fighter named Bill the Mauler.

Late that night, a group of adventurers loaded with treasure came in.  Among their numbers were Bill, Pepto, Balduric and Murder.  Bill the Mauler explained while bouncing the one-handed barmaid on his knee that the thief, the cleric and their henchmen had died.  He also explained that various members of their party appeared in the dungeon right after they had taken losses.

Fellow wizards, I have a radical theory that may explain these strange teleports.  As we all know, the Tomb That We Do Not Name #5 has been around for quite a few ages.  We have been unable to get an accurate date for its construction due to the well documented effect the place has on wizards.  It has been there forever and it may still be there when we are all Black Puddings.

My theory is this; perhaps the forces of Destiny want this cursed place plundered.  As the great Gaxx once theorized; mysterious places underground exist to be conquered.  The incredible longevity of this forsaken place is simply unnatural.  Some hero should have plundered it by now and returned with treasures beyond imagining.  Instead, the Tomb That We Do Not Name #5 just keeps killing adventurers.

I propose that the yellow wind is the hand of destiny.  We all now that the surviving Gods are too weak to care about one dungeon of despair but Destiny may not.  Perhaps it is destined that a group of heroes will break this horrible abode and when a party takes casualties, the hand of Destiny restocks their numbers.  Destiny itself wants this terrible tomb destroyed and Destiny will alter reality to make it happen. 

It is my hopes that my Wind of Destiny theory could be funded for further research.  It is also my hope that this paper will encourage the Tower of Secrets to get me out of Black Pudding Removal Duty. 

~~~~~~Deppix of the Club Foot.

Generous Math

The brave heroes finally emerge from the Tomb of the Blasphemy of Flowers.  They oddly came out with more people then they went in with.

Bill, Pepto, Balduric and Murder come out a crap load of treasure.  There is a spellbook, some boots of leaping and assorted other treasure.  The treasure, split three ways come out to boggling 1,928 gold pieces each.

Experience points wise, you got to split the experience of monsters and treasure with the carnivorous Murder.  This comes out to 1604 experience points each. 

Dude, maybe some of the Riders of Lohan should retire now.

MIA: One Adventuring Party

It has been a week since Bill the Fighter, Marva the Theif and their henchmen, Yor the Fisherman went down into the Croney Pit of Goblin Genital Mutilation.  They did not return that day.  The Crone came back to the Coffin Nail and has been seeking new recruits. 

But what happened to our fearless heroes?  All sorts of crap including a trap that made them lose a week of their lives without even noticing.  Well, the henchman that starved to death certainly noticed.  Now the party is deep in the dungeon with no rations and down to 2 people.  Ouch.

They have amassed quite a bit of treasure.  Sadly, Dungeons and Dragons only gives you credit for treasure if you get back out of the dungeon.  They only get experience for what they have defeated/killed/tricked to go into the starving room.

Bill and Marva have earned 184 experience points to be split 2 ways for a total of 92 exp.