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The A-Team arrived at Biel seeking a wizard’s assistance identifying the true nature of a figure of Khurgorbaeyag. After setting up their rooms at The Dragon’s Hide, the party arrived at Maloo’s Magnetic Marvels, the local magic shop, where a gnome artificer running the shop in Maloo’s absence agreed to waive the Identify fee if the party fetched some spell components in lieu of payment.

The party set out early the next morning to Sochet Lake, a medium-small sized swampy gulf with an island in the center on which rests a small ziggurat-style structure. After defeating a few werecrocodiles on guard, the A-Team swam their way across the lake with assistance from Shelby.

The ziggurat structure looked very old, and there were no doors or windows. After investigating, they discovered a loose brick, the removal of which revealed an arm’s length recess with a brass dome at the back. Etched into the surface of the dome were the draconic symbols for fire and blood. Shump shoved a torch into the hole to get a better look, and once the flames touched the surface of the dome, the symbol for fire began to glow. Shelby volunteered to supply blood, cutting herself on one of Shump’s spears and then transfering the blood on the spear to the dome. Suddenly, a section of the wall opened up, revealing a dark passage that led further in. 

The antechamber just inside the ziggurat was a square room with four pillars in each corner. On each pillar was the symbol for fire. Atop each pillar was an empty metal bowl, the interiors of which were blackened with soot, making the party believe the pillars were to act as torches. On the floor and on the wall opposite the entrance were round, 10-foot-diameter stones with the likenesses of crocodiles engraved in their surfaces. Finally, there were 2 plain wooden doors to their left and right.

The party suspected something might be up and attempted to apply fire to the empty bowls on the pillars. Nothing happened. They tried applying fire to the the fires symbols themselves. Nothing happened.They tried applying fire to the crocodile carvings. Again, nothing happened. They tried applying fire to all four metal bowls at the same time. Still, nothing.

Finally, frustrated, they decided to choose one of the doors, heading to the right. They followed a stone pathway for roughly twenty or twenty-five feet, and then noticed the pathway had started to take on water. After roughly 20 or 30 more feet, the water had risen to ankle deep. They pressed on cautiously.

About the time the water reached their knees, they reached another doorway on their left. Curious, they entered it, finding a completely empty room, save a large, ornate archway to their right. Around the archway was ornate script in Old Draconic. Shump, able to speak Draconic, tried to translate it. After some difficulty, he was finally able to determine it said, “Hasten friend, lest thy be bogged down and thine spirit dissolved in the thick of things.”

They studied the archway and the tunnel beyond from a distance. None of them could see all the way to the end. Shelby grew suspicious, worried they may run across more guards and decided to throw her torch down the hallway to illuminate it further. Instead of travelling down the hallway, the torch suspended in mid-air, the flame extinguished. It was then the gelatinous cube moved forward to attack.

The group was caught off guard, and there were a few close calls, including Shump nearly being absorbed into the cube’s form. Shadyboi took a hard hit from one of the cube’s tendrils, but the group was able to defeat the cube without too much difficulty. Deciding to get the hell out in case there were anymore cubes hiding, they returned to the hallway. However, they couldn’t resist exploring the tunnel to the end.

As they pushed further on, the water became deeper still, rising up to their waists. Ahead, those with dark vision were able to see the end of the tunnel where something poked out of the surface of the water. Shump was sent ahead to investigate. He found a drain that lead out to the swamp outside, but nothing else. As he was turning to leave, he was ambushed and wounded by a pair of crocodiles before anyone could react.

Thinking quickly, Rose disguised herself as a werecrocodile and cast Speak with Animals, convincing the two crocodiles that she was their god and displeased with their behavior. The crocodiles fled, and the A-Team made their way back to the antechamber.

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As I developed the rooms of the dungeon, I began to somewhat understand what the story behind this place is. This whole thing up until this point has been very seat-of-my-pants. I just wanted an excuse to delay the party from Identifying the totem and give my brother a chance to use the totem more and unlock more features, but now I have a fairly fleshed out idea of the dungeon’s background and what the endgame looks like for the party.

One thing I’m not particularly great at is coming up with puzzles. That said, I love a dungeon that has some fun puzzle rooms and isn’t just hurling waves of encounters at you, so I did some googling and got some ideas to design the rooms around. As I designed each room and came up with roughly what I wanted the purpose of that room to be, I realized how I wanted this whole dungeon to culminate and give it a sense of scale and history.

I can’t say much yet as they’re still very early in the dungeon, but let’s just say that I’ve heard some things from some of the players that made me practice my poker face.

As for the gelatinous cube encounter? I just wanted an excuse to throw in a classic D&D monster encounter, and what better place than a dungeon?

I actually made my own mini for this encounter, too. None of the places I’d checked locally had any Gelatinous Cube minis, and ordering one on Amazon would’ve been pretty expensive and taken too long. So, I took a glass mixing bowl with a flat bottom, place it on top of my D&D mat and traced a 10×10 square. Then I flipped the bowl over to the other size and used a hot glue gun to make 2inx2in squares, then carefully used more hot glue to fuse them together. It ended up working pretty well, AND I chose not to put a bottom on it, so I could have it actually engulf their minis. The only disappointment was that I ended up not being able to use it since they kept saving out of it, ha ha.

The party still has one unexplored door, which I imagine they’ll go through next. And then? Who knows?

‘Til next time.

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