So a terrible idea for an ancient near east desert ruined necropolis of a forgotten empire. A bronze age megadungeon in an area still used by people. At night its haunted and guards by entrances imprison anyone after dark and wait by the roads.
It's basically a circular canyon with:
three pyramids
three sphynxes
huge temple with three reliefs carved colossal kings
a necropolis with hundreds of small tombs and mastabas
cliffs with many hidden buried tombs down deep angled shafts
all in a hidden valley shunned by the living at night
mummy gangs fighting over grave loot
grave robbers and monsters pretending to be graverobbers
cultists up to some evil
spectral chariots of spirits roam roads at night
there are ancient secret plateaus and defiled tombs now lairs of evil
adventurers needed to cleanse certain threats and avoid others
stealing any grave loot makes undead more hostile
the trick is to harm only the illegitimate dangerous undead not the important famous ones related to nobility
d12 Common Day Encounters
1 Procession of pilgrims
2 Noble having a chariot ride
3 Families of well off and servants visiting a tomb
4 Workers dragging huge stone blocks
5 Pilgrims come to see a tomb or grave
6 Labourers working on a tomb
7 Guards hunting robbers
8 Someone selling shiny grave trinkets
9 Vermin d4 1=scorpion 2=spitting cobra 3=baboon 4=jackal
10 Herd beast d4 1=ostriches 2=gazelle 3=wild desert ass 4=wild camels
11 Preditor d4 1=Cheets or panther 2=Lion 3=Wild Dogs 4=Hyena
12 Rare or mounted nomad camel raiders (2 warriors per camel)
d12 Rare Day Encounters
1 Rude noble in chariot no time to stop for pedestrians
2 Procession of nobles visiting family tomb
3 Procession of priests visiting temple or for funeral
4 Royal person and enterage (possibly in disguise or with full regalia and staff)
5 Bandits disguised as mourners
6 Cultists in disguise as mourners
7 Witch looking for corpse dust
8 Guards leading of grave robbers for execution
9 Giant scorpion
10 Monster d4 1=Manticore 2=peryton 3=griffon 4=
11 Evil spirit possibly in a found trinket
12 Funeral of a state official
d12 Night Encounters (also for tunnels under necropolis)
1 Skeletons or zombie guards
2 Ghouls, 1in4 led by a ghast
3 Shadows, 1in4 led by wraith
4 Mummy, 1in4 leads zombie minions
5 Procesion of cultists off to secret ritual in a cursed tomb
6 Leucrotta, 1in4 mated pair with d4 young learning to hunt
7 Spectral minions d4 1=chariot team 2=guards looking for grave robbers 3=anguished noble 4=sobbing over rejection by the gods
8 Abhuman beast folk guarding sacred places d4 1=jakal folk tomb guards 2=crocodiles seek sinners to eat 3=ibis folk monks seek sacred texts 4=ass folk warriors
9 Gibbering mother crawled from some cave
10 Lycanthropes d4 1=Werehyena 2=werejackal 3=werepanther 4=werevultures
11 Succubus/Incubus
12 Lamia and some charmed lovers
Awesome and timely as I'm working on a necropolis "campaign" right now.
ReplyDeleteyes - use m a-z desert ruins generator on it possibly
Deleteim thinking of making it so can be babylonian or egyptian style or some hybrid gonzo fantasy version
Excellent idea, thanks!
ReplyDeleteMine is shaping up to be a mixture due to overlapping civilizations using the area for the same purpose.
was my original plan
Deletebut i like my plan of either or both as options