First Secret of Prep: It will always, always, always add value to your game and make for a better session IF (and this is a very important if) you focus your prep on the stuff you can’t improvise at the table.

Second Secret of Prep: What you can improvise effectively will depend on your own strengths as a GM, it will change over time, and it will vary based on the system you’re running. I talked about one facet of this in The Hierarchy of Reference, but it applies across the board. Maybe you struggle with having dynamic battles featuring clever tactics, so you spend a little effort prepping Tucker’s Kobolds. Maybe you find it easier to run Pathfinder monsters if you make a point of highlighting feats you’re unfamiliar with and jotting down a note about what they do. Personally, I know that I get too tight-lipped with NPCs revealing the deep secrets of a campaign (because I ruined a campaign once by getting too loose-lipped with those secrets and it’s a Pandora’s Box you can’t close — if the PCs don’t know something they can always learn it later; if they learn too much they can’t forget it), so personally I focus a certain amount of effort on prepping exactly what NPCs know.

Third Secret of Prep: Some stuff you find hard to improvise can be made easy to improvise if you prep the right tools. Procedural content generators are an obvious example of this. But it can also include stuff like “if you’re bad at coming up with names on the fly, prep a list of names”.

Particularly valuable prep targets, of course, are the things that can never be improvised on the fly. Props and handouts are perhaps the most obvious example of this.

Go to Part 1

THE BLACK POUCH

The black pouch is an insidious device, designed to punish the greedy and prey upon the indigent. It appears as a normal coin bag, made out of black leather. When it is first found, the black pouch will contain a single gold coin. When someone withdraws the coin, they will lose 1 hp as the black pouch drains the living energy from their body. Unfortunately, the magic of the pouch will also work to disguise this parasitic act from the victim’s consciousness: The victim must make a Wisdom check (DC 20). If the check is a failure, the DM should keep a secret total of the victim’s total hit points (this damage heals normally).

The next time the pouch is opened, it will contain 1+1d6 coins. Each coin removed will, once again, inflict 1 hp of damage. (A Wisdom check should be made each time a character reaches into the pouch. Note that characters can remove more than one coin each time they reach into the bag.) Each time the black pouch is opened after it has been emptied of coins, it will have generated the same number of coins as the last time, plus an additional 1d6 coins.

Recipients of the black pouch will often count themselves blessed – but if they are not careful, they will be killed by their supposed boon. If the character withdraws a number of coins from the pouch sufficient to result in death, have them roll a Fortitude save (DC 20). If successful they will survive with 1 hp remaining (and be aware of what the black pouch is doing to them, if they weren’t already). If the roll is a failure, then the black pouch has drained the last of their life from them.

Those who discover the truth of the black pouch will at least count themselves lucky for the wealth it has given them. But even that, unfortunately, is nothing more than a cruel trick: The black pouch does not create the gold it offers, it merely teleports it from the nearest available source… which is almost always the money pouch of the very person drawing from the pouch.

Caster Level: 9^th
Prerequisites: Craft Wondrous Item, vampiric touch, teleport
Market Price: 50,000 gp

CHEST OF ENTANGLEMENT

In many tomes of arcane knowledge, the chest of entanglement is known by the name of kingbane. To most, the origins of this obscure title are lost to the long tides of time. Those fortunate enough to have obtained a rare copy of Nardonne’s A History of the Kings and Their Follies, however, know of a tale that may lie at the heart of this matter: King Edan XIII of Oldren (a kingdom long since lost to the surface of the world), it is written, waged a long and terrible war with the elves of the wood.

In the end, Edan was victorious. But the elves were bitter in their loss, and so they plotted their revenge even as their enemies celebrated their triumph: When King Edan demanded that his new subjects gather his bounty, they did so – placing it within great chests of oaked, each carved with all the skill the elves could muster. Such skill was great, and, indeed, the chests themselves were a treasure beyond value.

But they were also a trap. King Edan marveled at their beauty, and stepped down from his throne of war when they arrived at his woodland court. “And so,” Nardonne writes, “Their trap was sprung. The king was bound and those who lurked in ambush struck. And King Edan was no more.”

Although Nardonne’s narrative does not positively identify the nature of the trap contained in the chests, the description he provides of the chests leads many to suspect they may have been chests of entanglement – the bane of King Edan.

A chest of entanglement is an ordinary, wooden chest, decorated with exquisite carvings of vines and foliage. Attempts to detect traps – either with the Rogue class ability or the find traps spell, for example – will fail, as the chest is not trapped. A successful Search check (DC 25), however, will reveal that one of the carved leaves is a concealed panel, which can be swiveled to one side to reveal a small hole, no larger than a man’s thumb. A detect magic spell will reveal a faint aura emanating from inside the chest.

A chest of entanglement is filled with two thousand gold coins. When the chest is opened, the coins will fly out of the chest and begin clinging to the skin and clothes of whoever opened the chest (if more than one character opened the chest, the coins will attack one of them randomly). The afflicted character must make a Reflex save at DC 20 once every round in order to evade the coins – a failure, however, indicates that the coins have successfully coated the character’s body, placing them under the effects of an entangle spell (-2 penalty to attack rolls, -4 penalty to effective Dexterity – characters attempting to cast a spell in this condition, or while being attacked by the coins, must make a Concentration check at DC 15 or lose the spell).

As with the spell entangle the character can escape the coins with a successful Strength check at DC 20, but the coins will continue to pursue them (forcing them to, once gain, make Reflex saves). The coins will not relent until the lid of the chest has been closed – at which point they will fly back into the chest through the concealed panel.

Caster Level: 3rd
Prerequisites: Craft Wondrous Item, entangle
Market Price: 6,000 gp

REFLECTIONS ON COINS OF THE DAMNED

The first thing I remembered upon rediscovering this article was the difficulty I had writing a new introduction that basically covered the exact same ground as the introduction from the first article.

I think this similarity of introductions also contributed to why the article lay forgotten on my hard drive for so long: I’d see the file, but end up just assuming that it was a different title for “Gilted Fiends”. In fact, “Coins of the Damned” was the original title of “Gilted Fiends” and it was changed during the development process because Dragon Magazine didn’t want the word “damned” appearing in their pages. Campaign Magazine didn’t have such qualms, and so it made sense to recycle the title for the sequel. (Which no doubt also contributed to my confusion.)

Go to Part 1

I was playing in a sci-fi game and my hacker wanted to set up a dead man’s switch on the environmental systems in a space station: When the melee characters launched their assault, I’d pull the dead man’s switch. The GM had me roll to set up the dead man switch… and then roll every single round to maintain it… and then roll again to throw it even after I’d set it up successfully.

Eventually, given the endless series of checks, I inevitably failed.

Laying aside the fundamental misunderstanding of what a dead man switch is, the negative effect of this sort of thing can be quite severe in an RPG session. In this case, the group quickly realized that we should never, ever try to make a plan: If we just improvised something, it would be resolved in a single roll and we’d have a chance to succeed. If we actually put together a plan, on the other hand, it would just invite lots and lots of dice rolling until the plan failed.

The solution is fairly simple: Let It Ride. Have the character make a single skill check that determines the ultimate success or failure of their endeavor.

Another solution is a complex skill check (making multiple checks until X successes are achieved). These tend to be very elegant in dice pool systems, and when you want multiple checks to be made they’re an effective framework for allowing that without the all-or-nothing of a single check ruining the entire attempt.

GM DON’T #2.1: FAILURE IS POINTLESS

The flip-side of rolling to failure is the “roll pointlessly until you succeed” thing. For example, you’ll often run into games where the PCs need to unlock a door: There’s no time pressure and no consequences for failure, and yet the GM will sit there and have the PCs roll over and over and over again until they finally succeed.

One way to deal with that is something like the Take 20 mechanic: If you can eventually succeed at this, then we can assume that you will eventually succeed at it and we can move on. Letting it ride can also solve this problem by providing the opposite outcome: Your failure on this Open Locks check tells us you are simply not good enough to pick this lock at this time and in this way. (The single check determines your relationship with the lock and until you can substantially change the situation, your character is going to be stymied by that lock).

GM DON’T #2.2: TOO MANY SEARCH CHECKS

A somewhat related problem is when a multi-step action resolution gets broken down into too many discrete parts. This can take many forms, but the most cancerous form I’ve seen in the wild came from GMs who took the Search guidelines for 3rd Edition D&D way too seriously. Those guidelines specified that it took a full action to search a 5-foot square. That’s a useful guideline for combat (when you might want to know how much area you can search during a single round), but some GMs took this to mean that you needed to make a separate Search check for every 5 foot square. So if you searched a 10-foot-wide hallway that was 40 feet long, you’d have to make sixteen (!) separate Search checks.

This isn’t rolling to failure because each chunk is a legitimately separate task. (Failing to search in Square #1 doesn’t mean you won’t find anything in Square #2.) But it murders pace – which is either directly undesirable or undesirable because it discourages players from using the specialties affected by the problem.

The solution here is to collect the tests into meaningful chunks: Searching an entire room (or even suite of rooms) is obvious. Alternatively, if they want to search the dungeon hallways as they move along, let the result of the check ride until they either make a meaningful choice to do something other than search down the hall OR until that check result produces a result (either success or failure) that they can recognize as such (i.e., until that check either finds a trap or secret door or until it fails to do so and the trap happens to them or the ambush pours out of the secret door they missed).

Sometimes you’ll end up with a player who demands multiple checks. In some cases this is because they, too, are following bad mechanical advice (like the “make a check for every 5 feet” misinterpretation of the Search rules). In other cases, it’s a manipulation of metagame information (“I know I rolled poorly, so let’s have that only apply to this one specific area and then I’ll make another check”). Often it’s because they’re irrationally trying to manage risk (“I’ll only search this little chunk so that if I roll poorly the effects will be minimalized” — which doesn’t make sense because your odds of discovering any given hazard remain unaltered, but that doesn’t mean people don’t do it).

Most of the time your response to this is fairly simple: You tell them no.

The exception would be the rare instance where it’s actually effective pacing to stretch out the mechanical resolution. Like a slow motion shot in a film, these are the times when specifically highlighting each small, discreet, tension-filled moment serves to escalate the crisis and leave the table on the edge of their seats.

Identifying these moments is a gut-check, not a science. For example, I was just about to say that it would never be Search checks down a dungeon hall… but then I realized that there actually was a time that I followed a player’s lead in the Tomb of Horrors to separately search every single inch of corridor because that mechanical resolution was so completely right in capturing the paranoia and terror the group was experiencing in that moment.

LET THE GOOD TIMES ROLL

On a closing note, let’s be clear that not every series of sequential rolls with a non-discrete outcome is rolling to failure. We’ve already discussed the situation where each individual check is a separate, meaningful accomplishment. But it’s also true that, for example, combat isn’t a roll to failure even though it involves multiple checks culminating in a single outcome of life-or-death.

It’s also useful to note that rolling to failure can be an effective choice if you’re actually looking at a situation where failure is assured and the interesting question is how long a character can stave off that failure. For example, how long can you say conscious in a vacuum? How long can you hold the door against the werewolves pounding on it from the other side?

Go to Part 3: Resolution Dithering

Go to Part 1

COINS OF APHASIA

When the coins of aphasia were first created, they were known as the Coins of the Realm. These were the most impressive accomplishment of the legendary mage Salestro, who crafted a set for each of the Nine Kings. Through their diplomatic use, the Nine Kingdoms negotiated a peace which lasted for generations.

Each of these coins are keyed to the language of the kingdom from which it hails. Anyone who has the coin on their person will not only understand the language for which the coin was designed, but will automatically speak it fluently as well. Originally they served as perfect translation devices, which, as noted, helped bring peace to the land.

Unfortunately, the age of the Nine Kingdoms ended close to four thousand years ago – and the languages spoken during that age have long since been lost to time. Thus the Coins of the Realm have become known as the coins of aphasia, because those who unwittingly possess them will find themselves speaking languages no one around them will comprehend. The victim will not understand what’s wrong unless it’s explained to them (they can not only understand what everyone else is saying, but also think that they’re speaking normally).

To make matters worse, the coins take 1d20 minutes to acclimate themselves to the user’s mind (and only take effect after that time has expired). As a result, a person afflicted by a coin of aphasia may have a difficult time figuring out what’s causing the problem (since there’s no direct connection between the coin and the effect it’s having).

On a positive note, the coins have a high value in certain scholastic circles, due to their ability to function as a gateway to languages long lost to the mists of time. Some of these individuals may even have a desire to hire adventurers to find the coins.

Caster Level: 5^th
Prerequisites: Craft Wondrous Item, tongues
Market Price: 30,000 gp

THE BEGGAR’S FRIEND

The beggar’s friend was another creation of the Scarlet Coven – who, it seems, felt a certain poetic justice in using cursed coinage as a weapon against the wealthy. The beggar’s friend predated the wealth bane (described above), and was a far less demanding item for the coven to create; but, ultimately, the beggar’s friend was abandoned because it was not accomplishing the goals of the Coven quickly enough.

Any character who comes into possession of a beggar’s friend while in possession of 100 gp or more must make a Will save (DC 20). If they fail the roll, the character will be placed under a compulsion to give away half of the money they are currently carrying to a beggar. Until they fulfill this obligation, they will find it impossible to spend or give away their money. (They will also find it impossible to explain their situation to anyone else until the obligation is fulfilled.)

Nor is the curse of the beggar’s friend necessarily lifted once the obligation is ended: Unless the character thinks to give the beggar’s friend away at the same time they fulfill their compulsion, then they must make a second Will save (DC 20) or be faced with the same compulsion a second time (assuming that they still have more than 100 gp on their person). (If a character does not specifically give away the beggar’s friend, assume that they kept it.)

If a character comes into possession of a beggar’s friend while they are not in possession of at least 100 gp, then the beggar’s friend will have no effect. However, if they are still in possession of the beggar’s friend when the wealth they are carrying on their person exceeds 100 gp, the coin’s effect will begin.

Also, note that the beggar’s friend will not only take into account any of the character’s personal wealth which they possess, but any money which the character possesses or comes into contact with while the beggar’s friend is on their person.

Go to Part 4

This mini-scenario was originally incorporated into my first 3rd Edition campaign in 2000 or 2001. In 2003, I adapted it as a submission to Atlas Games’ En Route II adventure anthology. Unlike my other submissions, this was one was rejected. I retooled it for Dungeon Magazine in 2004, which also rejected it. In both cases, the objection was to the inclusion of time travel. If you don’t like time travel, the odds are you won’t be a fan, either. Otherwise, I think you’ll enjoy this little taste of the weird.

The following encounter has been designed for four characters of 8^th level. Although not a full adventure unto itself, it can be used to add a little spice to an existing adventure or fill a gap when the need arises. It can be incorporated into any journey which takes the PCs along a road.

SUMMARY

While traveling down a road, the PCs have an opportunity to save the Duke of Alasson – also known as the Black Eagle – from worg-riding orcs. An hour later, the PCs have an opportunity to save another Duke of Alasson, this time from wolf-riding ogres. In the process, they discover that they have been at the center of a strange temporal anomaly: The first Duke of Alasson they met lived and died two hundred years before they were born.

THE FIRST EAGLE

The PCs are traveling down a road. Have them make a Listen check (DC 15). If they succeed, read the following to them:

It’s early in the afternoon. The road before you gently rises into a low hill. From beyond the hill, however, you can hear the clear sounds of combat – the clash of sword, the shouts of men, the cries of the wounded.

If the PCs fail their check, tell them that they’re approaching a hill. As they reach the top of the hill – whether they heard the sounds of combat or not – read the following to them:

As you reach the top of the hill, you are met with a scene of fierce and desperate combat below you. More than a dozen squat, swarthy figures astride monstrous wolves have surrounded a group of mounted men in full armor. The men seem to have fallen back some distance from the road now, forming a defensive circle. One man, dressed in black plate with a gold design embossed upon the chest, stands out from the rest – and you easily spot a heraldic banner flying above the group, bearing a golden eagle upon a background of black.

Erren, the third Duke of Alasson is returning from breaking the siege upon Dweredell by the orcish hordes. His army marches several days behind him, but he has galloped ahead after hearing news of an assassination attempt upon his son.

The orcs attacking him seek revenge for his breaking of the siege at Dweredell. Elite leaders within the horde, these orcs saw their army forced into rout and ruin. With their power destroyed or scattered, they gathered and rode in pursuit of the “black eagle of doom” which had broken them.

There are eighteen wolf-riding orcs facing off against the Black Eagle and his eight men. The orcs are fierce fighters and fairly intelligent, but they are not particularly cunning: One group has already charged into combat, and is now engaging in melee. The others are held in reserve. If the PCs make any move to engage the orcs, the nine orcs circling in reserve will charge once at them, and then engage in melee.

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THE ORCS OF THE WASTES: Ftr4; CR 4; HD 4d10+11; hp 33; Init +2 (Dex); Spd 30 ft.; AC 17 (+2 Dex, +5 chain shirt); Atk +7 melee (1d8+4/x3, heavy lance) or +6 ranged (1d6/x3, short bow); AL CE; SV Fort +6, Ref +3, Will +0; Str 16, Dex 14, Con 15, Int 10, Wis 8, Cha 8

Skills and Feats: Listen +4, Ride +6, Spot +4; Mounted Combat, Power Attack, Spirited Charge, Toughness

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RIDING WARGS: Medium-size Magical Beast; CR 2; HD 4d10+8; hp 30; Init +2 (Dex); Spd 50 ft.; AC 14 (+2 Dex, +2 natural); Atk Bite +7 melee (1d6+4); Face 5 ft. by 5 ft.; Reach 5 ft.; SA Trip; SQ Scent; SV Fort +6, Ref +6, Will +3; Str 17, Dex 15, Con 15, Int 6, Wis 14, Cha 10

Skills: Hide +7, Listen +9, Move Silently +7, Spot +9, Survival +2*

Trip (Ex): A worg that hits with a bite attack can attempt to trip the opponent as a free action without making a touch attack or provking an attack of opportunity. If the attempt fails, the opponent cannot react to the trip of the worg.

Skills: A worg receives a +1 racial bonus to Listen, Move Silently, and Spot checks, and a +2 racial bonus to Hide checks. A worg has a +4 racial bonus to Survival checks when tracking by scent.

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AFTER THE FIRST FIGHT

Assuming that the PCs join the fight and help to destroy the orcs, they are approached by the Black Eagle (although the Duke’s men keep a wary eye on the PCs until they have proven themselves trustworthy). The Black Eagle professes, truthfully, that he carries with him no wealth or reward to give in boon to the characters. But he promises that, if the PCs will but ride with him for another three days, then a just reward will be theirs.

If the PCs Continue on Their Way: If the PCs decide to continue on their way, the Black Eagle thanks them again for their heroism – promising that their deeds will be praised in the songs of his halls. He and his retinue then ride out of sight down the road and back into history – the PCs probably never see him again. About an hour later, trigger the encounter with the Second Eagle (below).

If the PCs change their mind and try to catch up with the Black Eagle, they will be unable to find them. PCs who attempt to locate the party’s tracks may make a Survival check at DC 20. On a success, they will be unable to find any tracks but have a certainty that they would have if any existed.

If the PCs Accompany Him: The PCs ride astride with the Black Eagle as part of his entourage for the rest of the day. The Black Eagle will regale them with tales of his deeds (see below) and ask for tales of their deeds, as well. Allow PCs to make a Spot check (DC 25). On a success, let them note that something about the road seems oddly out of place – as if this weren’t quite the same road they had come down. But don’t let them put their thumb on what it is, exactly, that unsettles them.

At dusk, the party makes camp – raising a number of fine tents in an open field. Try to discourage the PCs from keeping a watch (the Black Eagle might take it as an insult if they don’t trust his entourage, for example). If they don’t, then when they awake in the morning they will find the Black Eagle and the entire camp gone without trace. If someone does keep watch, then mid-way through the night they will see the camp fade out of sight and disappear without trace. Either way, when the PCs begin traveling down the road again, trigger the second encounter (see below).

TALES OF THE FIRST EAGLE

The Secret Triumph upon the archery fields of Seranth. The Duke, in defiance of the king’s edict that none of noble blood should compete upon the tourney field in any event save the joust, secretly journeyed to Seranth to participate in the archery contest. There he competed against a man dressed all in black, who was almost his equal with the bow. In the end, the Duke split his own arrow upon the bull’s-eye twice in order to win. His opponent than unmasked, and was revealed to be the king himself.

The Seizing of the Ruby of Westernesse from the Red Prince during the western wars. It was then given as gift to the king, and sits still within the crown.

The Breaking of the Siege of Dweredell. When the dwarven kingdoms fell, the men of Dweredell held siege upon the fallen city of the dwarves for nearly two months before they were forced to fall back. For six weeks the orcs laid siege to Dweredell. In that time, the Duke of Alasson raised a great army and led it to Dweredell – breaking the siege and freeing the city.

THE SECOND EAGLE

Once again have the PCs make a Listen check (DC 15). If they succeed, read the following to them:

About an hour passes before the sound of combat again reaches your ear: Over the next rise it seems as if you hear again the clash of steel, the cry of men, and the bestial howl of the inhuman.

Read the following as the PCs reach the top of the hill:

The scene before you is eerily familiar: A handful of armored men has been surrounded by large, hairy figures astride monstrous wolves. Again, it seems the men have fallen back some distance from the road – forming a defensive circle. Again, you see the distinctive black plate of the Duke of Alasson – and their the banner of the golden eagle upon the black. The figures upon the wolves are larger now – as are the wolves themselves — and it seems that the men fare worse: At least one of their number has already fallen, and you see the signs of bloodying upon several others.

There are eight men accompanying the Duke of Alasson here. They are faced by fifteen Wolf-Riders (see sidebar).

The ogres are far more clever than the orcs of the past: They possess an uncanny advantage with their ability to perform ride-by attacks with reach, and they will not hesitate to make the most of it. Even if the PCs ready an attack against the ogre’s mounted charge, their reach should still allow the ogres to avoid it. Plus, the ogres will have their dire wolves ready an attack after the charge – so if anyone closes with them, the wolves will attack. Combined with the triple damage they do on their attacks, this should make the ogres extremely deadly in melee. The ogres are also smart enough to keep themselves spread out – hemming the duke and his men in, but keeping enough distance between themselves so that area-effect spells are as ineffective as possible.

Five of the ogres will immediately break away from attacking the duke and his men to focus on the PCs. If it becomes clear that the PCs are a credible threat, five more will break off and engage them.

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WOLF-RIDERS: Ogre Ftr 2; CR 5; Large Giant; HD 4d8+2d10+12; hp 41; Init –1 (Dex); Spd 30 ft.; AC 19 (-1 size, -1 Dex, +5 natural, +6 +1 chain shirt); Atk +9 melee (2d6+7, huge greatclub) or +9 melee (2d6+7/x3, large heavy lance); Face 5 ft. by 5 ft.; Reach 10 ft. (15-20 ft. with heavy lance); AL LE; SV Fort +9, Ref +0, Will +1; Str 21, Dex 8, Con 15, Int 11, Wis 10, Cha 7

Skills and Feats: Listen +2, Spot +2, Ride +4; Mounted Combat, Ride-By Attack, Spirited Charge

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THE RED WOLVES (Dire Wolves): CR3; Large Animal; HD 6d8+18; hp 45; Init +2 (Dex); Spd 50 ft.; AC 19 (-1 size, +2 Dex, +5 chain barding, +3 natural); Atk +10 melee (Bite 1d8+10); Face 5 ft. by 10 ft.; Reach 5 ft.; SA Trip; SQ Scent; SV Fort +8, Ref +7, Will +6; Str 25, Dex 15, Con 17, Int 2, Wis 12, Cha 10

Skills: Hide +5, Listen +6, Move Silently +5, Spot +6, Wilderness Lore +1*

Trip (Ex): A dire wolf that hits with a bite attack can attempt to trip the opponent as a free action without making a touch attack or provking an attack of opportunity. If the attempt fails, the opponent cannot react to the trip of the dire wolf.

Skills: A dire wolf receives a +1 racial bonus to Listen, Move Silently, and Spot checks and a +2 racial bonus to Hide checks. *It also receives a +4 racial bonus to Wilderness Lore checks when tracking by scent.

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AFTER THE SECOND FIGHT

As soon as the Black Eagle, Tenth Duke of Alasson, doffs his helm, it should be clear to the PCs that this is a completely different person. Their first thoughts will probably run to impersonation of one sort or another, but if they tell their tale to the Duke his brow will furrow and he will tell them a tale of his ancestor – the third Duke of Alasson – who was beset upon this very road by orcs… and saved by a strange band of heroes. The story was chronicled in the song of the Duke’s life, and is still sung today in his family’s halls today. Marveling at the PCs’ tale, the Duke will ask them to accompany them. If the PCs go with him, he spins for them tales of his ancestor upon the road; treats them to a feast of “long-delayed and newfound honor” in his halls, and rewards them in a fitting manner.

IF THE PCs DON’T SAVE THE EAGLES

If the PCs fail to save the second Duke (the one contemporary with their own time), then the Duke is dead. It’s unfortunate, but no big deal.

If the PCs failed to save the first Duke, however, things change slightly: Now, the second Duke tells a sad tale of the death of his ancestor in a fell ambush by orcs after the breaking of the siege of Dweredell. He still marvels at the PCs’ tale, and invites them to his tent to share stories, food, and drink.

THE BLACK EAGLE AND HIS MEN

These stats can be used for both Black Eagles and their men.

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THE BLACK EAGLE: Ftr9; Medium-sized humanoid; CR 9; HD 9d10+18; hp 84; Init +1 (Dex); Spd 30 ft.; AC 26 (+1 Dex, +10 +2 plate, +4 +1 adamantine shield of light fortification, +1 ring of protection +1); Atk +15/+10 melee (1d8+7/17-20, +1 keen longsword), +15/+10 melee (1d8+7/x3, +1 heavy lance), or +10/+5 ranged; SV Fort +8, Ref +4, Will +3; Str 19, Con 14, Dex 12, Int 14, Wis 14, Cha 10

Skills and Feats: Diplomacy +3, Handle Animal +5, Knowledge (etiquette) +5, Knowledge (heraldry) +4, Ride +15, Spot +7; Mounted Combat, Power Attack, Ride-by Attack, Spirited Charge, Trample, Weapon Focus (lance), Weapon Focus (longsword), Weapon Specialization (lance), Weapon Specialization (longsword)

Possessions: +1 keen longsword, +1 heavy lance, +2 plate, +1 adamantine shield of light fortification, ring of protection +1, gauntlets of ogre strength, 2 potions of cure serious wounds, 2 potions of cure moderate wounds,1 potion of endurance, 2 potions of jump

Mount: Light warhorse, half-plate barding (+7 AC)

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MEN-AT-ARMS (x5):

Ftr2; Medium-size humanoid; CR 2; HD 2d10+4; hp 21; Init +1 (Dex); Spd 30 ft.; AC 18 (+1 Dex, +5 masterwork breastplate, +2 large steel shield); Atk +6 melee (1d8+2/19-20, masterwork longsword), +5 melee (1d8+2/x3 heavy lance), or +3 ranged; SV Fort +5, Ref +1, Will +0; Str 15, Con 14, Dex 12, Int 14, Wis 10, Cha 10

Skills and Feats: Diplomacy +1, Handle Animal +3, Knowledge (etiquette) +3, Knowledge (heraldry) +3, Ride +6, Spot +3; Mounted Combat, Ride-by Attack, Weapon Focus (longsword)

Possessions: Masterwork longsword, heavy lance, masterwork breastplate, large steel shield

Mount: Light warhorse

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CONCLUSION

There is no explanation for what caused the PCs to slip through time: Perhaps it was a sympathetic connection between the plights of the two dukes. Perhaps it was the intercession of some god (known or unknown). Perhaps the PCs didn’t slip through time at all, but instead were visited by spirits of the past (the true heroes of the tale are long dead and forgotten).

The Wolf-Riders faced by the PCs here may be only one small part of a larger organization (possibly consisting of an entire ogre tribe or more). This may mean that there are additional attempts on the Black Eagle’s life that the PCs must help fend off. Or it might mean that the PCs have earned the enmity of dangerous giants.

The PCs also have a chance here to forge a friendship with the current Duke of Alasson.

The Black Eagles of Alasson have a long history of greatness, with a single exception: The Fifth Duke, it is said, went mad and disappeared into the west – taking with him the ancestral sword of the house. Perhaps it is time for someone to uncover the sword’s resting place and return it to the Duke.