St. Severine’s Skull: The Wulfswald

The players have only been through this region once, but I plan to make much more use of it in future.  I think their encounter with the Wraith back in the village’s abandoned church rattled them a bit, so they tended to leave everything alone as they progressed through the woods up into the forest (refusing to enter the plague-cabin or the barrow).  They made it over the river with the aid of a felled tree.

Soundtrack

Crossing the decrepit stone bridge that leads out of town, you press on into the depths of the Wulfswald.  The road becomes steep, and the already chill weather quickly worsens, and snow begins to fall from the corpse-grey sky.  Black, leafless trees rise to either side of the winding path.  Here and there loom standing stones, rune-graven monoliths swathed in moss and creepers.  Ravens watch you from the trees, while weasels and dark-furred foxes scurry through the undergrowth.  Somewhere, distantly, a wolf howls.

Cold weather Fortitude save DC 15 (+1/hour) or suffer 1d6 nonlethal cold damage.  Remember that characters with the Survival skill can make a DC 15 check to gain a +2 bonus to this save, and that this doesn’t stack with furs.

Anyone who can read Druidic (or make a DC 20 Linguistics check) can decipher the writing on the menhirs, which are prayers to spirits of the forest and can be “cast” by Druids like spells from wands or scrolls, creating the following spell effects: Endure Elements (Cold), Pass Without Trace, Cure Light Wounds, Barkskin, Bear’s Endurance.  Each menhir can be used once per day on one target.

If the players start wandering off the path, they have a good chance of accidentally tripping a hunter’s snare or trap.

Random Encounters

On the first time up to the castle, don’t have too many encounters.  In future (and especially if/while the party is retreating to the town), hit them with wolves, bandits, Ghouls, and other creatures as desired, making a trek back through the woods harrowing.  Here’s a table with a variety of encounters, if desired – note that wolves show up several times (when in doubt, throw wolves at them):

Don’t be excessive with the table; roll on it every other trip through the woods or so, or if characters insist on exploring the woods themselves because they’ve been driven out of the Castle by Goblins, Grugnar, or the murderous Red Cap.  An encounter with a flesh-eating tree, Ginny Greenfang, or a terrifying number of wolves should hopefully persuade them to return to the dungeons, where at least there’s gold and magic items to be had.

Huntsman

The huntsman will approach stealthily – he has +10 to Stealth in wooded areas, so characters will likely need to roll well to spot him.  This description assumes they didn’t, but if they did, just add in that a branch broke and he’s just suddenly “there.”

You hear the soft sound of a bowstring being draw behind you, and a voice says “Heel, Bridget.  I don’t think they’re bandits.”

Behind you stands a tall, sinewy man dressed in poorly tanned furs, a huge black dog beside him.  The pair must have approached you almost silently.  The man is incredibly grizzled, his face deeply lined and grimy, his eyes deeply sunken, his thin lips curled back in a sneer.  A large wen in visible on his face, and he suffers from goitre as well.  He carries a longbow and an axe at his waist.

The huntsman’s name is Frederick, though he doesn’t volunteer this information.  He disapproves of outsiders and will try to warn players away with phrases like:

“If you know what’s good for you, you’ll head back the way you came.  There’s nought but death up in these hills.”

“The Light has forsaken these woods.  Its servants are no longer welcome here.”

“Mark my words – if you go into that castle, you won’t come back out.  That place is cursed.”

After reciting his cryptic warnings, Frederick melts back into the gloom.

Wolf

The snow falls even more thickly, and a soft wind moans through the wood, making branches creak and murmur.  The path begins to zigzag upwards.  Following it round a sharp turn you find yourself face to face with a large, white wolf – at first you didn’t even see it in the snow.  The creature regards you with incurious, piercing blue eyes.  It takes you a moment to realize that the object held in the beast’s jaws is a bloody human arm.

Give the players a moment to react, but have the wolf lope unhurriedly back into the wood pretty swiftly.

Abandoned Cabin

Down a short track that diverges from the path a dilapidated old cabin is evident, riddled with moss and half-shrouded by the now heavily falling snow.  Scrawled on the door in crimson paint is a red X, a plague mark.

The cabin’s door is swollen shut (Strength DC 20 to force):

A musty, sour smell hangs in the air within the shack.  This must have been a woodsman’s shack – there are rows of animal pelts hanging from the ceiling and wooden racks for drying furs, as well as an array of skinning knives and other tools.  A wood-axe leans against a wall on which an unstrung bow hangs.  Contorted in a bed in one corner of the cabin is a desiccated corpse, clutching a ragged blanket.  There’s a small chest at the foot of the bed.  A wolf-skin rug covers the floor, and there’s a cold hearth on one wall.

The cabin is the perfect place to regain some health lost to the cold.

There are plenty of furs here.  The chest (unlocked) contains a Cold Weather Outfit (+5 Fortitude vs. exposure), 5 silver pieces, and a masterwork dagger set with a small emerald.  There’s also an axe and a composite longbow.  A thorough search turns up 50 arrows, as well.

Beneath the wolf-skin rug is a trapdoor, swollen shut (Strength DC 15 to force).  Finding the trapdoor requires a DC 20 Perception check, unless the players note that they specifically want to check under the rug.  Below:

You enter a small root cellar, where various preserves, dried meats, nuts, and withered roots are stored.  Most of the food here has long gone bad.  There’s also a small wine-rack here, and a wooden chest.

There are 8 bottles of common wine here.  The chest contains 126 silver pieces, 246 copper pieces, and a Potion of Bear’s Endurance (5^th level).

Broken Bridge

Soundtrack

You come to the banks of another river, or a different loop or tributary of the same river.  Here, however, all that remains of the bridge here are a few posts and splinters – flooding must have destroyed the rest.  The current here is quick and the water looks very cold indeed.  The river isn’t very broad and might be jumped, but it doesn’t look like it could be forded here.

Swim DC 15 to make it across (1d3 non-lethal on a failure), but expose yourself to some very cold water (Fortitude DC 20 or take 1d6 non-lethal cold damage).

Another possibility is to simply try and jump the river (Acrobatics DC 20).

A better solution is to cut down a nearby tree (perhaps with the woodsman’s axe) to form a makeshift bridge (crossing is Acrobatics DC 5).  However, chopping down a tree may be noisy, alerting creatures nearby to the characters’ presence.

Finally the characters could follow the river for some distance in either direction till the find a spot to ford it.  In this case, be sure to harass them with traps, snares, and wolves, wolverines, or bears.

Barrow

Soundtrack

As you progress deeper into the hills, the wind picks up, sending swirling snow across the path.  Off to one side looms an earthen mound with a huge, dead tree atop it.  Set at the base of the mound is a stone door marked with runes.

The stone door is DC 23 to open.  The runes are non-magical, simply proclaiming the barrow “The Resting Place of Sigmund Trollsbane” in Druidic (Linguistics DC 20 to translate).

The Barrow serves two purposes.  The first is an alternate route in or out of the Castle, which can be very helpful.  Characters who wish to can bypass most of the tombs and simply walk through B1, B2, and B7 to enter the gatehouse Dungeons, facing a few dangers – spiders, a trap, and an assassin vine – on the way.  Those who wish to tempt fate can attempt to plunder the tombs themselves.  Removing a few grave goods is probably safe, but disturbing the remains of the dead is definitely not.  The cairn, frost, and brute wights who lurk in the barrow are fairly powerful foes for low-level parties, more than capable of decimating a foolhardy group, and even the groups of zombies can be very challenging.  The barrow is certainly not mean to be “cleared out” easily.  The rewards of plunder, however, are rich: magical rings, masterwork weapons, amulets, and scrolls.

I’ll detail the barrow in a later post.