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The PCs are plane shifting into Elturel blind: They know the city has been sent to Hell, but they have no way of really knowing what the situation on the ground is (so to speak).

Let’s talk about the use of maps in RPGs. Actually, that’s too broad a topic. Let’s talk about the use of city maps in RPGs. Broadly speaking, there are two scenarios: First, you have diegetic maps. Like the map of pre-Fall Elturel that I mentioned the PCs might want to grab in Part 4C, diegetic maps are those actually possessed by the characters. They can be:

• Not represented in the real world. (The map is something your character possesses and references, presumably to some effect, but you, as the player, cannot see it.)
• Given as a prop in the real world which attempts to accurately represent exactly what the map would look like to your character.
• Given as a prop in the real world which is analogous to what your character would see, but not the same thing they’re actually looking at.

In practice, this is more of a spectrum than distinct categories. For example, even Thror’s Map from The Hobbit ultimately makes concessions to the reader by being an English “translation” of the diegetic map:

Second, there are non-diegetic maps. These are maps which the players can see, but not their characters. For example, when I was running Dragon Heist I put a huge map of Waterdeep up on the wall. This didn’t represent a map that the characters were carrying around with them; it was a reference that existed purely in the physical game space (along with a Harptos calendar and a map of Faerûn).

Non-diegetic maps may represent character knowledge (i.e., the map they have in their head). But they can also simply be a concession for easy reference. In much the same manner that handing the players a picture of an NPC can be the quickest way to distinguish them (even though their characters don’t have a pocket portrait of them in hand), so, too, have I found that the most efficient way to conjure up a cross-town trek in the minds of the players is to simply point the laser pointer at the poster map on the wall and trace the route with brief descriptions.

Which, finally, brings us to the poster map of Hellturel included in Descent Into Avernus. When should you give this map to the players?

ARRIVING IN ELTUREL

First, a brief digression. By and large, we are not going to be changing the initial beats of what happens in Elturel:

• The PCs arrive.
• They get a first impression of the city.
• The person who brought them to Avernus (probably Traxigor) panics and abandons them.
• A woman with two toddlers comes running around the corner, pursued by a couple of bearded devils.

But we are going to finesse them a bit.

Let’s start with this chunk of boxed text from the book:

When looking at a BIG MOMENT like this, it can be tempting as a GM to just pile the whole thing up on the players. That can work, but I’ve found that it’s often more effective to break the BIG MOMENT into its distinct parts — each major detail, each revelation, each meaningful moment — and then space them out (even if only a little).

This is partly about pacing, but it’s also about slowly building up a mental image for the players over time. By layering in additional details sequentially over time, in my experience, it’s easier for the players to really immerse into the environment. You get more buy-in.

I’ve been doing this long enough that I kind of do this instinctively. But in breaking down the arrival in Elturel, I identified these moments:

• Arriving in the street. Hot air. Crumbling buildings. The sky of Hell and the transformed Companion above you.
• Traxigor is nervous.
• Spotting the High Hall on a distant bluff.
• Huge clouds of smoke to the east; the city is on fire.
• DEVILS!
• Traxigor panics and flees.
• The first earthquake.
• WE ARE FLOATING IN THE GODDAMN AIR!

(That last beat probably happens much later. We’ll come back to it.)

Note that there’s nothing sacred about this sequence. For example, you could easily rearrange and remix the middle beats:

• Spotting the High Hall on a distant bluff.
• DISTANT EXPLOSION! to the east. There’s huge clouds of smoke. The city is on fire. Traxigor panics and flees.
• DEVILS!

And in actual play the players could easily shift these things around. For example, if they immediately look up into the sky and try to get their bearings you can immediately mention them seeing the High Hall and the huge clouds of smoke to the east before mentioning Traxigor getting nervous or triggering the distant explosion. The basic idea, in fact, is to give the players at least a couple of beats to react to what’s happening.

This might be even clearer if we look at the next block of boxed text (which actually happens in the middle of this sequence):

Although all glommed up as one moment here, imagine it lightly restructured as:

• You hear a scream from around the corner.
• [Players have a chance to quickly declare one thing they do in response.]
• A woman with two toddlers runs around the corner.
• [Players have another chance to quickly declare their response to this. Maybe the woman can shout out something to them in response.]
• Devils come around the corner.
• [Ask the players to roll for initiative.]
• Traxigor panics and flees.

I think you can see how this draws the players into the scene: By the time the devils actually show up, they’re already involved and invested in the actions that are playing out.

Here’s the key thing: When the PCs arrive in Elturel they are confused, disoriented, and need to get their bearings. Traxigor abandoning them should escalate that feeling, isolating and trapping them. They should feel simultaneously claustrophobic and overwhelmed by the vast unknown which surrounds them.

The take-away here is that simply whipping out the Hellturel map as soon as they arrive would cause most or all of these distinct moments to collapse into each other, simultaneously undercutting the emotional tension of the situation.

GETTING THEIR BEARINGS

So when should they get the Hellturel map?

First, this is obviously a non-diegetic map. (Nobody is doing cartographical surveys in the middle of the apocalypse.) Second, we’ve framed the PCs into a situation where they’re effectively lost and need to get their bearings. So the real question is: What is the meaning of the map? And the meaning of the map is that the PCs have gotten their bearings.

So when the PCs have gotten their bearings, you should give the players the map.

How can they do that? Well, I can think of a few options (and your players might come up with something else):

• They could seek out a tall building and climb to its top, allowing them to look out over the city.
• They could use magic to similar effect (a clairvoyance spell, for example).
• They could question NPCs in Elturel. (The initial woman they run into is clueless about the wider state of the city, but others might be well-informed enough to give them a briefing on the current situation.)
• They could use their diegetic map of Elturel (if they have one) to attempt to figure out where they are in the city.

What constitutes enough knowledge for them to be considered to have gotten their bearings? Well, it probably depends on their approach. On the one hand, we want to look at the type of information the map is giving them: Have they gotten that information in-character? On the other hand, while the map does contain information on every single block in the city, it’s overkill to withhold the map until they’ve somehow gained that block-by-block knowledge.

What I would do is look at the key revelation: Remember how “WE ARE FLOATING IN THE GODDAMNED AIR!” was the final moment we identified above? Well, the map is going to reveal that. So we want to make sure that the characters have experienced that moment before revealing the map. (And that could happen by them climbing a building and seeing out over the edge of the city, being told the situation by an NPC, etc.) That moment might be simultaneous with them getting their bearings, or it might happen before they get their bearings (so they don’t get the map until later) depending on how it plays out.

Go to Part 5B-B: Streetcrawl in Elturel

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As both a writer and a GM, I often use the Random Name Generator at Behind the Name. In the case of Descent Into Avernus, I began hitting the generator hard in Part 3 of the Remix when I needed names for murder victims. The generator ended up randomly giving me a couple of Limburgish names, and after diving into that a little bit I thought it would be a fun way to give the Elturians a distinct flavor.

Having done this, of course, I realized I would need to stick with it. And that would notably include improvising names for incidental NPCs in both the refugee camps outside Baldur’s Gate and in Elturel itself.

Which, of course, brings us to this addendum of Elturian names (which is somewhat idiosyncratic and not purely Limburgish). A full list of male, female, and last names appears on the next page for convenient printing and reference at the game table.

You might also check out my ol’ trusty list of fantasy names, Infinity: A List of Names, and The Names of Legend for other discussions of names (improvised and otherwise) in RPGs.

ELTURIAN NAMES

Go to the Avernus Remix

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Before the PCs arrive in Elturel, we need to talk about the current state of the city, because there are some basic issues that should be addressed.

First, the city is broadly described as if the Fall of Elturel just happened. There’s one reference to a family’s supplies running out (although not how many supplies they had to start with), but other than that pretty much everything in Chapter 2 is described as if the city were still in the earliest hours and confusion of the crisis.

Except this isn’t true: It would take at least ten days for the first refugees to reach Baldur’s Gate. Even if we assume the gates were immediately closed (although that’s an iffy reading of the text), the PCs still need at least a couple of days to investigate the murders. Then it’s four days to Candlekeep. So Elturel was actually taken at least 15-20 days ago by the time the PCs show up.

On the flip side, when the PCs are done in Elturel they’re going to head out on a quest to find the Sword of Zariel. As they leave, they must suspect that they will be gone for at least days. In point of fact, it’s likely that they will be gone for weeks before they can return to save the city.

The problem is that nothing about the current situation in Elturel makes it seem plausible that there will be anything worth saving by the time the PCs get back: Demons and devils are freely roaming the streets of the city, more or less systematically slaughtering people in their homes. There’s no organized resistance and no reasonable expectation that there’s going to be one. (Ravengard supposedly “organized a defense,” but has actually just spent 2+ weeks cowering in a basement and now his meager retinue of guards has been wiped out.)

This creates a situation where the PCs need to do X in order to save the city, but have no reasonable expectation that they can actually achieve X in time to save the city. The result is not a sense of urgency, but rather a conclusion that the plan can’t work. A plan that doesn’t work, of course, will be discarded, and the PCs will end up looking for a different solution: They might stay in Elturel and try to spearhead a defense themselves. Or they might abandon the entire idea of “saving the city” and look for other alternatives, like simply escaping themselves or organizing some kind of inter-planar evacuation for as many people as possible.

Of course, you could use an NPC to say, “I promise you, as the Dungeon Master, that you’re supposed to go on this quest and I guarantee that the city will not fall and a bunch of people won’t be slaughtered in a devilish genocide while you’re gone.”

The result, however, still won’t be urgency: The players will probably go and do the thing, but Elturel will lose any sense of reality for them and the “crisis” will lose all meaning. Like a video game where the world remains frozen in a state of status quo until you hit the button labeled Next Plot Point, the world will be reduced to two-dimensional cardboard cut-outs.

So what we need are two things:

1. A clear understanding of what’s been happening in the city in the fortnight since it was sent to Hell, and what the current situation is when the PCs arrive.
2. Some form of status quo in which the city seems secure enough that the PCs can leave, do their quest, and have a reasonable expectation that there’ll still be a city to save when they come back.

However, we don’t want the status quo to feel too safe. The city is in Hell and being dragged to its destruction in the River Styx. There’s a very fine line that needs to be walked here between the PCs feeling that Elturel will still exist if they can hurry up and save it and the PCs feeling like there’s nothing to worry about.

For similar reasons, although we can easily imagine a scenario in which the status quo has already been firmly established by the time the PCs arrive (most likely some variant of Ravengard actually securing the city), that’s probably also the wrong direction to go: The PCs are walking into Hell. We want them to feel that; not enjoy some weird Pax Elturian.

WHERE ARE THE LEADERS? In the adventure as written, the highest surviving authority of Elturgard is supposedly a lone acolyte named Pherria Jynks. Descent Into Avernus tries to explain this with a meteor that fell out of the sky and destroyed most of the High Hall.

But that still doesn’t make a lot of sense, does it? Even in a Designated Survivor situation where the “entire” government is in a meeting that explodes, you still have the vast majority of the military and civilian infrastructure and chain of command intact. You don’t end up in a situation where the entire government is just one DMV clerk.

WHERE ARE THE DEVILS? Descent Into Avernus tries to explain why the legions of Avernus haven’t overrun the city already with the Battle of Elturel. At the very moment that Elturel popped in, a huge army of demons crossed the Styx and attacked the assembled legions. A huge battle broke out.

The battle has continued, without change, for 15-20 days.

It will continue, without any change, for the next several weeks.

Despite this, the battle is incredibly isolated: No reinforcements are arriving. No one in the area even seems to be aware of it.

In short, the Battle of Elturel is a valiant effort to explain why Elturel remains largely unmolested, but it actually contributes greatly to the sense that Elturel can’t possibly survive long enough for the PCs to save it. Yes, we know that the battle is just a permanent, unchanging video game instance with the same actions playing on an endless loop, but if you accept the situation at face value, then it would seem as if the battle would certainly conclude shortly and the city would be overrun.

THE PHYSICAL & METAPHYSICAL

The Companion now hangs low and large in the sky, basically on a level with the High Hall. It emits a strange, purplish-black light that mixes kaleidoscopically with the reddish light of Hell itself. Thunder from the lightning crackling across its surface intermittently cascades across the city.

Elturel is floating in the sky above the Avernian plains, connected to the Dock of Fallen Cities by huge chains.

THE CHAINS: The chains obviously have a physical reality, but they are also a metaphysical construct. They both represent the corruption of the city and are operant upon it. They are not just physically dragging Elturel down into Hell, they are also dragging down the souls of everyone in the city.

This is possible due to the influence of the Companion and the Writ of the Pact. To be clear, this process doesn’t mind control the people in the city or somehow make them evil. It’s subtler than that; a contamination of the city’s collective souls with something akin to original sin. Conversely the city remains afloat because the souls of the city are fighting against this taint.

As described in “The Metaphysics of Elturel’s Fall” (Part 4B), the final stroke comes when the city completes its descent into both sin and the Styx: The population drowns not only in the waters of the river, but in their own sin at the very moment that their minds are wiped clean and the Pact completes.

DOCK OF FALLEN CITIES: Elturel is not the first city to suffer this fate. It is actually tethered to an ancient facility known as the Dock of Fallen Cities. The chains are connected to huge pillars that rise out of the Avernian plains. Between and around these pillars are the overlapping layers of countless cities which have been pulled down and drowned in the Styx. The river still floods their broken and forgotten streets.

These cities are most likely drawn from across the multiverse, so when the PCs pick their way through the ruins you should feel empowered to get romantic with your descriptions of the melancholic, cyclopean ruins. They are most likely haunted by strange will o’ wisps, which are perhaps related to the Many Colours Out of Space that are here the spiritual detritus left behind by a dozen dead civilizations.

WHERE ARE THE DEVILS? The Dock of Fallen Cities here takes the place of the Battle of Elturel: There was no demonic invasion. There is no endless, looping confrontation.

So why hasn’t Zariel sent her legions into Elturel to pacify the city?

Largely because she doesn’t need to. With a few key exceptions (described below), killing the population before they can drown in the Styx is actually contradictory to her goals. There are some devils stationed around the pillars to make sure no one messes with the chains (not that there’s actually anything the PCs or anyone else in Elturel can do to the chains without a lot of help, see Part 6), but they honestly don’t care if a few people manage to “escape” the city.

HOSTILES

Even though Zariel isn’t motivated to stage an invasion of a city she’s already conquered, that doesn’t mean that the city is in any way safe.

ZARIEL CULTISTS: Zarielites from across Faerun had learned what was coming and made the city a sort of pilgrimage site in the final days before its Fall. (They knew it was going to Hell and they hitched a ride.)

Once they arrived in Hell, groups of these jubilant cultists emerged onto the streets in a millenarian orgy of sin and destruction. Many have indiscriminately pillaged and burned. Others have set up little gangland fiefs of oppression and misery. Regardless, they all know the party ends when the city hits the Styx, and they’re mostly okay with that (believing that in the moment of the Pact’s completion they will be exalted as powerful devils).

In addition, while many members of the Cult of the Companion (see Part 3B and Part 4B) fled the city before its Fall (much like Thavius Kreeg), others remained. Many of those became Hell Knights (see below), but others remain as a sort of fifth column. (Adding such a fifth columnist to the refugees in the High Hall is an obvious choice.)

Devil cultists have the shadows of devils here. Those in the former group tend to delight in this; those in the fifth column will obviously take efforts to hide it.

HELL KNIGHTS: Before the Fall, the High Knights were the upper echelons of the Elturian government. The term originally applied to those who could lead (or had led) a grand expedition of the Hellriders, including the High Rider and the High Watcher of Helm’s Shieldhall. The use of the title formalized and then expanded over time until essentially every senior member of the government was a High Knight (along with a fair number of lower positions as well).

By the time Thavius Kreeg became High Observer, many of the High Knights were already Zarielites, and Kreeg made sure that most of the remaining High Knights were also replaced by cultists.  By the time of the Fall, the High Knights were largely synonymous with the inner circle of the cult. These cultists had sworn special oaths above and beyond the Creed Resolute, and as Elturel was pulled into Hell they immediately transformed into devils, becoming Hell Knights.

These Hell Knights had two immediate goals: First, they began slaughtering the other knights under their command. As noted previously, any Elturian knights who had sworn the Creed Resolute and were killed after Elturel was sent to Hell had their souls immediately claimed by the Pact. Here in Hell itself, this meant that any knight killed was immediately transformed into another Hell Knight.

Second, as their ranks swelled with devils, the Hell Knights targeted wizards, clerics, and other high-level or important characters who might pose a threat. Most of their targets were eliminated within the first few hours of chaos, and the Hell Knights continue hunting for those who escaped the initial purge.

(You can use any devil stats for a Hell Knight, with specific recommendations being given in Part 7G. They generally still wear the armor of their former orders.)

DEVIL RAIDERS & DEMON INVADERS: Although Zariel is not sending in her legions, Elturel is not free from devils. Small groups of devil raiders from the Avernian plains have snuck into the city to loot and rend what they can before the city’s final destruction. (Would you sell your soul to escape Hell? They can offer that, too.)

In addition, a lieutenant of Yeenoghu named Liashandra has led a platoon of demonic troops into the floating city. They’re perhaps the most immediately dangerous to the common people of the city, reveling in wanton destruction as is their demonic wont. However, Liashandra’s primary mission is to sabotage the Fall of Elturel if she can and prevent Zariel from recruiting the entire city into the ranks of her legions.

This means that all of these hostile factions (Zarielites, devil raiders, and the demonic incursion) are as likely to be fighting each other as anyone else. Liashandra might also be an unexpected ally in saving the city.

THE VAMPIRE LORD: When the Companion first appeared in the sky above Elturel, the vampire lord High Rider Ikaia was not destroyed. He fled into the vast cavernworks beneath the city and lurked there for decades. Now the Companion is gone and the High Rider has emerged.

He does not, however, command a slavering horde of vampires. He and a select few “sons and daughters” are actually a bastion in the northeast of the city: Elturgard maintained vast storehouses in the caverns beneath the city, with supplies that could support hundreds of thousands of people for months if the surrounding farmlands had to be evacuated into the city and a heavy siege were laid. Ikaia has secured some of these storehouses that were scooped up along with the rest of the city and is now distributing them to people in need (see Part 5C).

A STABLE ELTUREL

Last but not least, what needs to happen for the situation in Elturel to feel stable enough that the PCs will feel comfortable leaving?

Well, to some extent I think we’ve tweaked things enough so that the city still feels like a warzone without feeling like such a genocidal horror that the PCs would reasonably expect everyone to be dead within a week. So it’s possible that you’ll just glide past this point without the PCs thinking about it.

Failing that, there’s also the clear cosmological deadline of the city being drawn down into the Styx. Yes, you could help here, but it’s all meaningless unless someone can get the sword and save the day!

But it’s quite possible that the players will still feel it necessary to help stabilize the situation in Elturel. Or maybe you’re just interested in exploring that idea.

Unless you want to radically expand this section of the campaign, what you’ll want is a Grand Gesture That Turns the Tide; i.e., one big thing that the PCs can do (or help do) that can be framed as essentially putting things on the right track. Possibilities might include:

• Joining the east and west sides of the city. This might be leading attacks on the bridges, clearing them of demon infestation, and helping Ravengard set up garrisons there.
• Forging alliances between the surviving enclaves. This would send the PCs around the city essentially as ambassadors.
• Securing the supplies necessary for survival. Ravengard, for example, might know that somebody on the east side of the city has a cache of supplies. When the PCs investigate, they find High Rider Ikaia. They might negotiate with him for access to the supplies; or they might track Ikaia’s people back to the cache they’ve secured and then clear them out.
• Some sort of mass combat (most likely with Ravengard and his men). That might be leading a siege on Helm’s Shieldhall and shattering the stronghold of the Hell Knights. Or returning to the cemetery and cleaning it out.

I’d recommend following the players’ lead here: They’re unlikely to just say, “We need to secure the city… but how?!” Rather, they’ll have some specific problem that they’re looking to solve (the population is starving, Ravengard doesn’t have enough soldiers, etc.). They might even have a plan. You just need to make sure to give them the opportunity to carry out that plan and then frame the outcome as the city turning a corner in its struggle for survival. “This has made all the difference. Now go get that sword!” says Ravengard (or whoever).

If you DO want to radically expand this section of the campaign, then you’ll want to provide a structure for the PCs’ efforts. This will most likely consist of specific needs that the city has and flexible options for how those needs can be achieved. Off the top of my head:

• Food & Water. Seizing or gaining access to Ikaia’s storehouse. Finding alternative storehouses. A magical fountain. Organizing rationing.
• Security. Eliminating specific threats. Forming alliances. Restoring one of the demonseals which once protected the major citadels of the city by scavenging components from each.
• Shelter. Forming neighborhood patrols. Securing citadels which can house refugees in safety away from the demon-infested streets.

Once again, be flexible in responding to and empowering ideas the PCs come up with to fulfill these needs. I would go so far as to track these needs with specific gauges; i.e., put hard numbers on this and let the PCs’ schemes score points towards filling those gauges. (And, conversely, allow enemy factions to damage the gauges.)

THE RETURN TO ELTUREL

Later in the campaign, the PCs will return to Elturel. What do they find when they come back? How has the situation developed?

To a large degree, the answer to this should be extremely idiosyncratic and heavily based on what the PCs did: The version of Elturel where the city ended up divided between Ravengard in the west and Ikaia in the east is very different than one where the PCs managed to form a Council of the Resistance which included Liashandra as a prominent member.

If we’re talking about a baseline situation where the PCs did very little to shift the status quo in Elturel, then here’s what I’d suggest:

• High Rider Ikaia has secured the eastern side of the town. Citizens have volunteered to become vampires in order to have the strength to defend themselves and their fellow citizens, and these Vampire Riders run regular patrols and control the bridges.
• Things are much worse in the west. The Hell Knights have mustered their forces and laid siege to Ravengard in the High Hall.

Go to Part 5B-A: Arrival in Hellturel

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Gargauth in the Shield of the Hidden Lord has the potential to be a persistent element that accompanies the PCs for the entire campaign… or he might be gone before they even realize what and who he is.

GARGAUTH: ROLEPLAYING TEMPLATE

NAME: Gargauth (Once-Treasurer of Hell, the Tenth Lord of the Nine, Lost Lord of the Pit, the Hidden Lord, the Outcast, the Lord Who Watches)

APPEARANCE: A shield of silvered, vanadium steel embellished with bronze decorations suggesting the horns, eyes, and fangs of a pit fiend.

QUOTE: “You have no idea the secrets which I could share with you! If you would only serve me!”

ROLEPLAYING:

• Wants nothing more than to be released from its prison.
• Craves power, with little care for what form it takes.
• Speaks in either a sibilant, seductive whisper or a baritone roar.

BACKGROUND: See “Lore of Gargauth” in Part 3B: Lore of the Vanthampur Investigations.

STAT BLOCK: See Descent Into Avernus, p. 225.

MEETING THE SHIELD OF THE HIDDEN LORD

When the PCs first find the Shield of the Hidden Lord, Gargauth will claim to be the Shield of Silvam and that the Vanthampurs stole him from the Hhune family.

The Shield of Silvam is one of the Kuldannorar artifacts once held by the Tethyrian royal line. A DC 16 Intelligence (History) check will reveal that the Shield of Silvam was created before the Eye Tyrant Wars, was lost during the Strohm Dynasty (between the 5^th and 9^th centuries), and briefly resurfaced in the 14^th century before vanishing again.

A DC 18 check will recall that the chronicles record that it was a mithral shield with an inset “eye” of crystal (i.e., not at all what the Shield of the Hidden Lord looks like). If confronted with this fact, Gargauth will at least initially attempt to claim that the Shield of Silvam recovered in the 14^th century was a forgery.

FREEING GARGAUTH

Gargauth’s overriding objective is to free himself from the shield, so let’s briefly discuss how he can do that.

First, he can fulfill the pact with Zariel by bringing thirteen cities to Hell. Having succeeded with Elturel (which may or may not be his first success), he’s now looking for the next viable target.

Second, the shield can be unmade in Bel’s Forge in Avernus. As it was originally created there, so can it be destroyed.

Third, Gargauth can be freed by Asmodeus or any Archduke or Archduchess of Hell who touches the shield and says his name.

Finally, Gargauth can be temporarily freed by casting dispel evil and good on the shield. Each casting has a 1% chance of freeing him for 1 minute. Using a higher level spell slot to cast the spell can either increase the percentage chance of him being freed (stepping 5%, 10%, 25%, 50% for each additional spell level), the duration of his release (stepping 10 minutes, 1 hour, 12 hours, 24 hours for each additional spell level), or a combination of both. (For example, a 9^th level spell slot could have a 10% chance of releasing him for 1 hour. Or a 50% chance of releasing him for 1 minute.)

Note: This section explicitly supercedes the “Freeing Gargauth” section of Decent Into Avernus.

THE MANY AGENDAS OF GARGAUTH

Gargauth is an incredibly clever, incredibly perceptive, and incredibly persuasive devil who is keenly aware of how vulnerable he is while trapped within the Shield of the Hidden Lord. He will adapt to whatever situation he finds himself in. He will deceive freely. He will prey on trust, but not abuse or alienate it needlessly. To be most effective, he needs to be in the possession of someone who will do what he says; but what he needs to avoid at all costs is to be stuck in a position where he cannot influence anyone around him. He will endure a weak position and bide his time for an opportunity to turn it to his advantage, rather than losing his temper and burning his bridges.

Upon encountering (and most likely being acquired by) the PCs, his first agenda will probably be to get away from them. He’s been around the block enough to know that wandering heroes who go around trying to save the world are terrible candidates for helping him achieve his goals, and Baldur’s Gate is filled with far more promising prospects.

Thus, his first strategy of posing as the Shield of Silvam so that they’ll return him to his “rightful owner.”

If that fails, another plausible strategy Gargauth might employ is using his telepathy to “call for help” from anyone nearby who might be more receptive to him. You can use this to justify the “Knights of the Shield” encounter in Part 4A: The Road to Candlekeep, for example, by assuming that at some point while they were walking through Baldur’s Gate with the Shield of the Hidden Lord, the PCs happened to pass a member of the Hhune family and Gargauth telepathically contacted them. (You can easily imagine any number of similar hijinks.)

If there comes a point where Gargauth perceives the PCs as perhaps being in a serious position to save Elturel, then he would be highly motivated to stop them from doing that. (Sucking cities to Hell is not particularly easy, he needs thirteen of them, and he put in 50+ years on this one.) My guess is he’d go for subtle misdirection and disinformation here.

In Part 4C: At the Threshold of Hell, when Sylvira says she’d like to keep the Shield of the Hidden Lord to study it, Gargauth might have one of two reactions: If he thinks it will be easier to take advantage of Sylvira’s fascination with the Nine Hells and corrupt her, he’ll happily jump ship. If he’s already got a good thing going with one or more of the PCs, on the other hand, he may make some strong offers to convince them to keep him.

On the other hand, when Traxigor tells the PCs that they should drop the shield into the River Styx in order to destroy it, Gargauth is going to get real serious real quick. He might telepathically reach out to Sylvira and offer to help her in her research, potentially seeding a debate about whether the shield should stay or go. Alternatively (or if that fails), he’ll try to make himself appear as useful as he possibly can to the PCs. (First up: He knows Avernus and can serve as a valuable guide.)

Once they’re in Avernus, Gargauth is likely going to try to get them to take him to Bel’s forge and then manipulate them into destroying the shield (and freeing him). One tactic might be to telepathically convince someone the PCs are interacting with to tell them how the shield can be destroyed at Bel’s forge (while conveniently not mentioning that this will free Gargauth, not destroy him). Another might be to simply take the PCs to Bel’s forge while pretending to guide them somewhere else (and then hoping he can spin the situation accordingly).

If the PCs are intransigent, Gargauth will probably continue trying to arrange for his escape. (Signaling nearby devils and ruining PCs’ attempts to sneak through Elturel, for example.)

If pushed absolutely to the wall (i.e., they’re on the banks of the Styx and about to throw him in), Gargauth will be willing to negotiate his knowledge for how to save Elturel. He’ll be able to tell them that they have to destroy the contract, destroy the chains, and arrange for Elturel to return to the Material Plane (see Part 7). He can even offer up his own services (if they free him!) in destroying the chains.

INTO THE RIVER STYX

What actually happens if the PCs do throw the Shield of the Hidden Lord into the River Styx? (Which is, I think, the most likely outcome.)

Option #1: It’s destroyed. Trapped in the shield as he is, Gargauth is entirely an entity of nous (or mind). His memories are thus the entirety of what he is, and when the shield is dipped into the River Styx he is utterly destroyed. As Gargauth is the source of the shield’s powers, all that is left is a well-crafted, mundane shield.

Option #2: A tabula rasa spirit. Gargauth’s mind is wiped clean. What’s left inside the shield is an incredibly powerful pit fiend with no memories and no innate form. In a campaign about Hell, damnation, and redemption, this has the potential to become a powerful thematic opportunity: How is this essentially newborn entity possessed of tremendous power influenced by the PCs and their actions? Is this new entity saddled with Gargauth’s sins? As this entity’s personality develops, does that influence what powers the shield manifests? If the PCs lead this new entity down a path to goodness and then later free it from the shield, what actually appears? A reformed pit fiend? An angel? Something else?

Option #3: Punt it down the road. Traxigor emphasizes that the shield has to be immersed in the Styx for several days (or a week or a month or whatever). The only realistic option is to just toss it into the deepest part of the river and walk away.

Go to the Avernus Remix

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At this point the NPCs are going to give the players a huge infodump. This sort of thing can be really fraught with problems, not only provoking a lot of glazed eyes around the table, but also making it difficult for players to actually retain vital information.

So let’s talk about how we’re going to make it work.

First, we’ve already put a lot of work into the campaign before we ever got to this point. I talk about this in more detail in Random GM Tips: Getting the Players to Care, but if you’ve set things up so that the players have spent a half dozen or more sessions actively struggling to piece this information together, then they will be (a) actively invested in seeing it all come together and (b) incredibly excited to receive a glut of information after spending so much time fighting over little tiny scraps of data.

On a similar note, we’re going to deliberately frame this information as a reward: You worked hard to get the Shield of the Hidden Lord and the infernal puzzlebox to Candlekeep, and now you can turn in your plot coupons and get very specific rewards (in terms of information received) for each one.

Third, although I primarily frame stuff as “things Sylvira knows” for the sake of simplicity, the other reason I recommended in Part 4A that you should include Traxigor in this scene is that you can use the sequence of introducing new NPCs — Sylvira, then Traxigor, then Lulu — to break up the tidal wave of information.

There are also some places where I recommend that Sylvira and Traxigor disagree with each other, particularly over what course of action they recommend. Feel free to push that farther as you improvise the scene. (For example, Sylvira might say that Gargauth joined an alliance with Bane, Bhaal, and Loviatar to invade Hell. And then Traxigor says, “No, no, no. Lothiak’s Infernal Chronicle is quite clear on the point that Talona, the Lady of Poison, was also part of the alliance and an absolutely crucial part of the campaign.”) Not only will these back-and-forths between the NPCs break up the scene, they will (a) encourage the PCs to also engage with the scene as a conversation and (b) force the players to think about the disagreement and make their own decision about what they believe.

We’re also going to break up the infodump with some action (i.e., the infernal puzzlebox being cracked open and possibly Traxigor asking the PCs to help him find his planar tuning fork). You can enhance this option, if you’d like, by using the suggestion in Part 4A that opening the puzzlebox might take a full tenday (giving the PCs a chance to research topics at Candlekeep). That way you’d have a small infodump, a big break, and then another infodump (launching off the revelation of what’s inside the puzzlebox).

Finally, we’re going to proactively prompt PC expertise. Although the initial revelations obviously need to come from the Candlekeep experts (otherwise the PCs wouldn’t need to have come here in the first place), once those doors of knowledge have been unlocked, it’s quite possible that one or more of the PCs will have relevant knowledge. (For example, they might recognize the infernal contract inside the puzzlebox and know it’s significance.) This not only gives players another opportunity to be actively involved with the scene, it also frames the scene so that Sylvira and Traxigor are peers who are working with the PCs, not lecturers who are giving them a homework assignment.

Some of what’s summarized below appears elsewhere in the Remix. It’s comprehensively listed here so that it will be crystal clear exactly what information Sylvira, Traxigor, and Lulu give to the PCs (including the information they get wrong) and what information they don’t have.

SYLVIRA: THE SHIELD OF THE HIDDEN LORD

If shown the Shield of the Hidden Lord, Sylvira will recognize it as an infernal artifact:

• It was created by Gargauth, an archduke and demigod of Hell.
• Gargauth can speak through the shield.
• Anyone in contact with the shield is said to hear the Whisperings of the Hidden Lord. It’s unclear whether Gargauth can read or control the wearers’ thoughts, but it can definitely communicate telepathically with them.
• In some accounts, the wielder of the shield can create walls of fire and fireballs.
• It’s possible that there are multiple such shields, each allowing Gargauth to speak through it but perhaps manifesting a unique cluster of magical powers. In any case, the shield has turned up repeatedly throughout history, always as the instigator of great evil.

She’s also passingly familiar with Gargauth himself:

• He was once the Archduke of Avernus, the first level of Hell, as one of the Lords of the Nine.
• He was overthrown by a devil named Bel (who was, in turn, overthrown by Zariel, the current ruler of Avernus).
• Gargauth became known as the Tenth Lord of the Nine and the Lost Lord of the Pit, among other titles.
• While wandering the material plane, Gargauth feuded with a demon named Astaroth who was seeking to become a god. Gargauth slew Astaroth before that could happen and actually assumed Astaroth’s mantle for himself, effectively impersonating the dead demon and receiving the worship of Astaroth’s cultists.
• Gargauth later joined an alliance with the Dark Gods (Bane, Bhaal, Loviatar, and Talona) when they attempted to invade Hell itself and seize it from Asmodeus. The effort failed.
• Ever since then, Gargauth has been seeking power here on Toril. He’s known to work with Astarothian cultists (who still hear him as the voice of their God) and Dead Three cultists (who honor him for his alliance with the Dark Gods). In one notable instance in the 11^th century, Dead Three cultists summoned Gargauth as part of an assault on the Sign of the Silver Harp, an inn that was used as a gathering place for the Harpers. (In that instance, it turned out the whole thing had been an elaborate trap staged by Elminster and the Blackstaff Khelben Arunsun. Gargauth and the cultists were defeated.)
• His agents have been frequently reported to have a great interest in the Imaskari Empire, for reasons which are unclear.
• If the PCs think/know that he was working with the Cult of Zariel, Sylvira will consider it an odd development given his antagonistic history with Asmodeus.

SYLVIRA’S RECOMMENDATION: Initially, Sylvira will be eager to take the Shield of the Hidden Lord into her own custody for study. (Traxigor might argue that it should instead be locked up in Candlekeep’s vaults and forgotten. “It’s too dangerous.”)

Regardless of what the PCs decide at this point, when it later becomes clear that they’re heading to Avernus, Sylvira will tell them that the shield should be thrown into the River Styx. She believes that this will destroy its link to Gargauth and end its legacy of harm. (She’s more right than she knows: Since Gargauth is actually trapped within the shield, being plunged into the Styx will erase all of his memories. See Addendum: Playing Gargauth.)

Design Note: Sylvira’s understanding of the Shield of the Hidden Lord is deliberately incorrect/incomplete, skewing closer to the item’s original continuity. The key thing being withheld here is that Gargauth is actually IN the shield, not just communicating through it. The PCs might discover more accurate information by researching Gargauth and/or the shield at Candlekeep, and will also have the opportunity to unravel more of Gargauth’s story once they go to Hell.

SYLVIRA: THE INFERNAL PUZZLEBOX

Sylvira is familiar with infernal puzzleboxes and has opened several of them in the past.

• They are crafted by devils of the Nine Hells.
• They are usually made of infernal iron, but some are made of bone or horn.
• They are designed to safeguard their contents, but also as infernal temptations. “Any lock can be picked. But a puzzle entices.”
• The process of solving the incredibly intricate puzzles which seal the box, if done incorrectly, can lure a person into unwittingly performing an infernal rite that will bind them to the devil who made the box.

Sylvira has perfected several spells and/or technomantic equipment that will allow her to open the puzzlebox safely.

MECHANICS: A creature that spends 1 hour trying to open an infernal puzzlebox can make a DC 30 Intelligence (Investigation) check. If the check succeeds, the creature figures out the trick or sequence of steps needed to open the box (and can do so reliably in the future without a check). If the check fails by 5 or more, the creature must make a DC 18 Wisdom saving throw, taking 12d6 psychic damage on a failed save (or half as much on a successful one). If this damage would drop the creature’s hit points to 0, it instead results in the creature becoming affected as per the dominate person spell by the devil who created the box: The devil can communicate with them telepathically across any distance and the victim is particularly susceptible at night (when the devil can control their body like a puppet unless they succeed on a DC 12 Wisdom saving throw). This acts as a curse, as per the bestow curse spell with a permanent duration.

SYLVIRA: THE INFERNAL CONTRACT

Inside the infernal puzzlebox is a platinum tablet inscribed with Infernal characters. One side of the tablet is jagged and rough, as if it had been ripped apart through some tremendous force.

THE TEXT: The text on the tablet is the Pact signed between High Watcher Bellandi and Zariel (see Part 4B).

INFERNAL CONTRACTS: Anyone making a DC 14 Intelligence (Arcana) or Intelligence (Religion) check will recognize this as an infernal contract. A DC 16 test reveals the following information. Sylvira is familiar with this information in any case and can brief the PCs if none of them are familiar with infernal contracts.

• Infernal contracts are magically binding agreements between mortals and devils, almost always involving the mortal’s soul being forfeit in return for some service or gift.
• When infernal contracts are signed, there are two identical copies written on the same medium (a tablet, scroll, skull, or whatever else). These are then split apart, with the mortal keeping one copy and the devil keeping the other.
• The contract can only be destroyed if BOTH copies of the contract are brought together, and even then the wards upon the contract make it quite difficult to actually do it. (Sylvira will suggest that the fire of an ancient dragon might do the trick. Traxigor will suggest dropping the conjoined contract into the River Styx, causing its contents to be forgotten. A wish spell would also work.)

Design Note: I chose to have the tablet made from platinum because it was alchemically believed to represent the durability of a union or agreement.

HISTORY OF ELTUREL: PCs can also make a DC 14 Intelligence (History) check to recall pertinent details from Elturian history. (Some of this they are likely to have already picked up, if it wasn’t part of their character backgrounds to begin with.)

• High Watcher Naja Bellandi became the first High Observer of Elturel.
• High Rider Klav Ikaia was the ruler of Elturel in 1444 DR when he was revealed to be a vampire lord. On the Night of the Red Coup, High Rider Ikaia and his vampires began a reign of terror which plagued the city for fourteen days.
• On the fourteenth night, the Companion — believed to be a gift from some unnamed god — appeared in the sky above Elturel as a second sun. Its light destroyed the vampires.
• Naja Bellandi, who had led one of the major groups of resistance fighters, was hailed as a hero and became the first High Observer.
• She was assassinated a couple years later and replaced by High Observer Cathasach Restat, who had been one of the founding members of the Order of the Companion.

GM Tip: You might want to prep these chunks of information as handouts you can give to players who make these skill checks, allowing them to brief the other PCs in-character.

WHAT NEXT?

There are two key revelations here:

1. Elturel was NOT destroyed. It’s trapped in Hell.
2. The Pact which traps Elturel in Hell cannot be broken unless the two halves of the contract are brought together.

These are major twists. Give the players some time to think about them and really process this new information. If all goes well, they’ll reach the crucial conclusion by themselves: Even if the people in Elturel are fighting to save themselves, their cause is hopeless. Nothing they do can save the city unless someone takes THIS half of the contract to Avernus. The PCs have the key (or, at least, one half of the key) to saving the city.

Otherwise, one of the NPCs can lay this out for them.

If Reya Mantlemorn is here, she’s a strong candidate for this. “Take it to the High Knights at the High Hall!” She’ll have complete faith that the High Knights will be able to save the day if she and the PCs can just get the tablet to them.

TIME TO GO: Once the PCs decide to go to Avernus, Traxigor will ask them to help him find his tuning fork. (He’ll accompany them out of Candlekeep so that he can cast plane shift and take them to Elturel.)

MAP OF AVERNUS: While the PCs (or some of the PCs) are helping Traxigor find his tuning fork, Sylvira will dig out the Avernus poster map. She’ll explain that:

• There’s no guarantee that it will even be the right part of the Avernian plains, but it’s one of the few known maps of Avernus in existence and the only one in her possession.
• It was created by the cartographer Nico Sovanna, an infernal researcher (much like Sylvira herself) who was interested in the Charge of the Hellriders and actually journeyed to the location in the Nine Hells where he believed it took place.
• Unfortunately, Sovanna went quite mad as a result of his expedition.

Design Note: More on the map in Part 7 of the Remix. Mostly I’m providing a plausible explanation for why a random map of an infinite plane just happens to be of exactly the right region.

MAP OF ELTUREL: The PCs might like to get a map of Elturel before they go. They can dig one up in the archives of Candlekeep easily enough and copy it. (Or, if you prefer, Sylvira can just give them this map, too.)

What you’ll want for this, obviously, is a pre-Avernus map of the city. You can find one in Forgotten Realms Adventures. (Unfortunately, the resolution in the scanned PDF WotC is currently selling isn’t great.)

The mismatch between this map and the reality they find on the other side of the plane shift will lead to some potentially cool navigation and a visceral sense of the disaster. On the other hand, it will give them a notable advantage in Elturel and so you may not want them to automatically get the map (so that they only gain the advantage if they earn it for themselves).

INTRODUCING LULU

If Lulu is not being played as a PC (see Part 2), this will be the moment when she’s introduced. We’ll be doing a comprehensive look at Lulu’s background (and straightening out all of the continuity problems it has) in Part 6D of the Remix, but for right now this is the key information:

• Lulu’s earliest memory is of waking up in the red sands of the Avernian wastelands.
• She wandered down the River Styx for several years, having many adventures before finally returning to Toril.
• Sylvira became aware of a hollyphant in Amn who could tell tales of the Nine Hells. She made a special journey south and tracked Lulu down. The two hit it off and Lulu decided to come back with Sylvira to Candlekeep to continue assisting her with her research; the two of them are now good friends.
• Lulu has a few fragmentary memories of the time before her memory loss: She particularly remembers that she was friends with a beautiful warrior angel, who came to the city of Elturel long ago and led the knights of that city on a charge into Hell itself. (“I don’t remember the actual battle,” Lulu says. “But we must have lost. I guess that’s how I lost my memories.”) Sylvira is 100% convinced that Lulu was actually at the famous Charge of the Hellriders and she’s been trying to figure out how to help Lulu get more of her memories back, particularly about that event. (Because Lulu has this connection to Elturel, she’ll be particularly interested by any PCs who come from Elturel and to learn anything they know about the city’s disappearance.)

I recommend having Lulu flutter into the lab somewhere in the middle of the infodump; this will provide a nice change of pace, but should definitely happen before the infernal puzzlebox is opened. To demonstrate her familiarity with the Nine Hells, have her drop useful commentary. For example:

• She might be the one to mention Gargauth’s other titles (Tenth Lord of the Nine, Lost Lord of the Pit, etc.) because she met a devil who absolutely loathed him for his betrayal of Asmodeus.
• She likely recognizes the infernal puzzlebox for what it is, and could babble excitedly about how much she loves seeing Sylvira open them. (“It’s like getting a Caravance gift!”)
• She could be the one to reveal how infernal contracts can be destroyed… but then have no memory of why she knows that.

Here’s the key bit, though. When the infernal contract is read out loud, Lulu will suddenly recover a key bit of her memory:

“Zariel! That was the name of my angel!”

And this is mind-blowing (to Sylvira and Traxigor if nobody else). The angel who led the Charge of the Hellriders is Zariel, the Archduchess of Hell? And Lulu was her good friend?

Yes! Yes! I remember! Through the gate we went, tearing through devils like a song through the air! And Zariel was singing songs, with the knights joining her celestial voice!

But then… we were betrayed? Yes. I remember the betrayal. But who? I don’t know. I just… No. I don’t know.

And that’s all she remembers. (For now.)

Of course, when the PCs decide to take the infernal contract to Avernus, Lulu will volunteer to go with them: She’s the only one there with first hand experience of the Nine Hells, and she wants to help however she can. (If the PCs turn her down, she’ll insist. And then she’ll try to sneak into their bags.)

Go to Part 5: Hellturel