September Short Adventures 17: A Light In The Darkness

Preamble

A September of Short Adventuresis an OSR Challenge initiated by Matt over at the Asshat Paladinsblog. You can click on the Moustache Dragon over on the right-handside-bar (just above Features) to learn more about all of this stufffrom Matt directly. All of our 25 (possibly more...) entries areformatted along the lines of what Matt calls the Get Ready, GetSet, Go! format. In a nut-shell, this approach breaks eachadventure into a Title, Three escalating sections of adventuredetails (the Ready section is limited to an elevator pitch only 2sentences...), and a final catch-all section for any NPC notes/stats.The idea is to keep it short, simple, easy to read without any maps,drawings, diagrams or 8X10 glossies. Keep description to a minimum,avoid lengthy exposition, and no casts of thousands -- unless it's aninvading horde of three-eyed orcs or goblins riding purple wombats.

We're also going to aim to keep thingsgeneric, setting agnostic and thus portable or adaptable to anycampaign/setting using the particular rules-set we'll be using in anygiven September Short Adventure such as Mutant Future,Labyrinth Lord, Swords & Wizardry (White Box), etc.

FreeRules

Labyrinth Lord:http://www.goblinoidgames.com/labyrinthlord.html

Mutant Future:http://www.goblinoidgames.com/mutantfuture.html

Swords and Wizardry (White Box):http://www.swordsandwizardry.com/whitebox.htm

SeptemberShort Adventure Number 17

Title: A Light InThe Darkness

Rules: Labyrinth Lord

Ready

Your group just entered a series ofcold, dark and draughty caverns. All your torches are pretty-muchuseless, even if they can stay lit.

Set

The walls are covered with a thick,viscous black slime with the consistency of body-temperature tar. Theair becomes slightly warmer, denser, more humid as the groupprogresses and the floor is soon covered in this stuff as well. It ishighly sticky, and quickly coats everything it comes into contactwith, but at least it is not animated.

The draft blowing through thesepassages is persistent until the group gets past the section coatedwith the black residue seeping through the walls and ceiling.

Then the draft stops. The torches canbe lit now, if they like.

Go!

Lighting a torch orotherwise causing a spark or open flame within 30' of the last bit ofthe tarry black residue will have a base 80% chance to start itburning, which will produce cloying, suffocating black smoke thatwill quickly fill the available space and call for Saves to avoidsuffocation; or a 15% chance that the residue just fizzles and goesinert; or a 5% chance of a massive explosion that runs away from thePCs back the way they just came, collapsing tunnels and shakingthings up enough that 1d4 random/wandering monsters will come outfrom the devastated area in an attempt to flee the destruction.

The explosion willdeafen everyone within 30' of the residue for 1d4 turns, butotherwise will not cause any damage to the PCs directly.

The creaturesdriven out of their nests and dens and lairs by the explosion, well,that's an entirely different matter.

There is also agood chance, DM/GM willing, that the explosion might open-up anotherwise unknown and hither-to unexplored section of dungeon or apassage to some new sub-level, etc.

Notes

TheCaves & Caverns Hazards Table might comein handyhere: http://netherwerks.blogspot.com/2011/07/cave-tunnel-hazards-table-one.html

It might also be a good time to try out someGeomorphs...just saying...