FUCK IT DOUBLE TRACK DRIFTING, BACK TO BACK HALLOWEEN POSTS, HALLOWEEN FOREVER HAPPY HALLOWEEN
This is a little dungeon that I originally started writing like a full year ago but never finished. Figured this was as good a time as any to work on it some more and put it out there!
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A small abandoned manse, the ground on which it sits slowly sloughing off into the sea. Its foyer is inhabited by the ancient vampire squid Sosteiromachus, with his henchmen and familiars holding the upper floors. Sosteiromachus slips out of the chateau under cover of night, to slurp the blood out of fishermen and skinny dippers, leaving row upon row of pierced holes on their drained skin.
Map Key
D: Old dining chamber, beautiful ornate silver dining set (worth 600 gold) arrayed on table -- 2-in-6 chance of hermit-man presence.
K: Half-flooded kitchen, dumbwaiter connects to W (wine/brine cellar).
F: Main flooded foyer area. There is a 3-in-6 chance that Sosteiromachus is in the flooded portion, 100% chance at day. The bodies of Sosteiromachus' victims float, some with jewelry worth 200 gold on their necks and wrists. The rafters are teeming with bloodthirsty doves that swarm when agitated, while the ragged rug-shewn seating area is ensnared with thin strands of hagfish mucus (if tripped, they act as wires, loudly knocking over furniture).
C: Half-flooded cave. Home to crabs and lampreys. Provides access to the foyer, via an underwater passage.
W: Wine/brine cellar. Barrels and bottles float in the waist-deep water. Each bottle is a rich vintage, worth 100 gold, with 18 such bottles bobbing there.
T: Turret. The creaking of the steps on the spiral staircase can alert the hermit-men that nest on the roof.
R: Roof. Open-air hovel of Sosteiromachus' hermit-man servants. There are 16 crustacean men that huddle together on the roof. They sleep on ragged mats and build statues of their master out of mud and seashells. There is a single such idol of Sosteiromachus with a golden cameo locket for an eye, worth 300 gold (and with the face of a woman whose body decays in the foyer inside it).
Wandering Monsters
Roll 1d6:
1-2: 1d8 Hermit-men
4-5: Swarm of bloodthirsty doves
6: Intruding otters
Monster Stats
Hermit-Man
Number Encountered: 1d8
HD: 1+1
Attack: 1 claw (1d6) + 1 cutlery (1d4)
Armor: as chain + shield
Morale: 7
Under Sosteiromachus' thrall. Hunched, Igor-like manservant mutants uncannily merged with hermit crabs. Under the light of a full moon, they perform a ritual where they form a line and "size up" their giant mollusk shells, the smaller hermit-pages taking over the shells of their senior brethren.
Swarm of Bloodthirsty Doves
Number Encountered: 1
HD: 2
Attack: bloodletting peck (1d6 + 1 damage per round thereafter)
Armor: none
Morale: 5
Intruding Otter
Number Encountered: 1d6
HD: 1
Attack: 1 bite (1d6)
Morale: 5
Inquisitive, friendly, and will warn allies of nearby danger. They can also use rocks as simple bludgeons.
Lamprey
Number Encountered: 2d6
HD: 1-1
Attack: 1 bite (1d6 + latch on for subsequent rounds)
Armor: none
Morale: 4
Sosteiromachus the Vampire Squid
Number Encountered: 1
HD: 4+1
Attack: 2 filament lash (1d6) OR 1 bloodsucking bite (1d6 + latch on + 1 damage per round thereafter), OR spell
Armor: as chain
Morale: 10* (will not check morale, can be turned as a vampire)
Psychic seaborne undead cephalopod. Can cross moving water (of course), but cannot crawl on land for more than a few scant moments. Otherwise same weaknesses as a normal vampire. Knows mind control spells (such as charm and hold person) and the spell Darkness, all of which he can cast at-will.
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This is so stark and small because I was squeeeezing it into the front and back of a little graph paper notebook (the same one that I also wrote The Carven Carapace in!), so really a "final" version of this would be much more detailed and probably much larger. But, hopefully this is enough evocative sea-horror, enough wandering monsters, and enough hagfish mucus based traps for a nice little dungeon morsel :)
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