d20 Goodman Games Temple of Blood.pdf

TEMPLE OF BLOOD

By Luke Johnson

Cover Art: Slawomir Maniak

Concept Design and Cartographer: Jeremy Simmons

Graphic Design: Alvin Helms

Interior Art: Nick Greenwood

Editor: Elizabeth R.A. Liddell

Editor-in-Chief: Luke Johnson

Publisher: Joseph Goodman

Playtesters: Joe Beatty, James Johnson, Jason Nelson, and James Sullivan.

www.goodman-games.com

TEMPLE OF BLOOD

INTRODUCTION

Y our adventures are already exciting. Characters explore

ADVENTURE

BACKGROUND

T wo hundred years ago, priests dedicated to the Goddess

dungeons, crush monsters, and score loot. But maybe

you want your adventures to be more. Maybe you want

adventures that are over-the-top, in-your-face, BADASS

THRILL RIDES! Maybe you want adventures that are

things of LEGEND! Maybe you want adventures that are

WICKED SICK! That’s what Wicked Fantasy Factory gives

you: axes hacking, spells exploding, and blood spewing.

Don’t just crawl through dungeons — make them sorry

they ever met you!

Temple of Blood is an introductory Wicked Fantasy Factory

adventure for four to six heroes of 1st level; 2nd-level he-

roes won’t ﬁnd the adventure too easy, either. The party’s

total levels should be 4-6. All character types will have a

good time in this adventure; the party should include at

least one healer (like a cleric) and one or two characters

with serious combat potential (ﬁghters, barbarians, pal-

adins, and so forth).

Adventure Summary: A mysterious character is kidnap-

ping people from the streets, and not just any people: all

the victims are young, beautiful women, usually from

wealthy families. In fact, even the king’s latest wife has

gone missing! The heroes descend beneath the city streets

to confront the kidnapper and ﬁnd themselves in the ruins

of an ancient temple. The villain — who has given himself

to dark powers — draws on the magic of the place to com-

plete his vile rituals. The heroes confront vicious kobolds,

giant vermin, and the magic of the ancient temple. Finally,

they defeat Belzin and free the captured women.

of Blood erected a temple on ground that would later

play host to the city of Almack (or whatever city you’d care

to substitute in your campaign). After a century or so, the

temple sank into the soggy ground and the priests aban-

doned it. However, a fanatical few remained, viewing their

brethren’s desertion as sacrilege. They used magic to ex-

tend their lives and retain their potency, and stayed in the

broken and sunken temple even after the ﬂedgling town

that would later become Almack appeared above them.

The cultists fought a lengthy battle against the growing

town — a battle that culminated in their destruction. Fifty

years ago, a group of ﬁve knights descended into the temple

and slew the cultists in mighty combat. As the last cultist

fell, bathed in red, he swore that the knights’ blood would

betray them and they and their precious city would fall.

The kingdom lauded the knights, then promptly forgot

about the cultists, the temple, and the entire incident.

Fast-forward to several months ago. Belzin Darr, a cursed

and fanatic worshipper of the God of Writhing Secrets,

discovered the temple beneath the city, sealed for ﬁve

decades. He learned the tale of the blood cultists and the

knights, and his way became clear.

Belzin believes that blood holds supernatural power, but

that only the Blood Goddess knows what these secrets are.

Belzin plans to claim at least some of this knowledge by

seeing that the dead cultist’s curse comes to pass. He’s sure

that when that cultist swore that the knights’ blood would

betray them, he was referring to the knights’ descendants.

A bit of snooping revealed a fact too remarkable (in Belzin’s

opinion) to be coincidence: the knights now all have grand-

daughters in their early twenties. These ﬁve women would

be the key to Belzin’s plan. He would capture them and use

the power of the ancient temple to bring the cultists’ curse

upon them, using their bloodline to send the dark magic

through their families — including the elderly knights. When

that happens…well, Belzin isn’t sure exactly what will hap-

pen, but he’ll take extensive notes. He is a bit crazy, after all.

Belzin put his plans into motion soon after. Knowing that

some people might take issue with his kidnapping and come

looking for him, he located a group of ferocious tribal kobolds

and enlisted them as his warriors, promising ﬂesh and power

should they serve him. The kobolds (of the Pissed Lizards

tribe) agreed and serve as his bodyguards and lackeys. Belzin

then used connections throughout Almack’s criminal under-

ground to kidnap the women he needed. He has them all

now, and it won’t be long before he puts his plan into motion.

Someone needs to stop him, and that someone is a party

of brave adventurers.

TEMPLE OF BLOOD

JUICE UP YOUR GAME!

W icked Fantasy Factory adventures are like other adven-

the pain to this guy!” or maybe “Finish him!” The general

rule of thumb is that the GM should let slip this information

when the bad guy is down to about 10% of his hit points. Of

course, if you think you can take him out before this point,

you’re welcome to try your ﬁnishing move at any time.

¤ Finishing moves work the same way on all monsters, no

matter if they’re incorporeal, ethereal, or whatever. Even if

your ﬁnishing move doesn’t incorporate a magic weapon,

you do not suffer a miss chance against these creatures.

tures, but with XTREME!! added in big, red, under-

lined letters. Send your game blasting to the next level with

the following (optional) components!

Phat Lewt!

All WFF adventures have awesome loot scattered through-

out, but only one piece of phat lewt, somewhere in the adven-

ture — maybe in the boss’s stash, maybe in some secret

room. This piece of phat lewt is — wait for it — worth at least

as much as the rest of the adventure’s treasure combined!

Yes, that’s right: WFF adventures provide double the normal

amount of treasure compared to your standard adventure,

and half that loot is wrapped up in a single item. That means

there’s at least one crazy-cool piece of loot in each adven-

ture, and it also means that GMs can easily remove the phat

lewt if they prefer adventures of a poorer nature.

I NVENTING Y OUR F INISHING M OVE

The ﬁrst step is to decide what your ﬁnishing move looks like.

Remember: ﬂashy, gruesome, and over-the-top! Remember

that you might have to use it on creatures with various

anatomies, so make sure it’s versatile, or invent a different

one for different creature types (or just variants on your pri-

mary move). Also remember that your ﬁnishing moves don’t

have to involve the weapon you normally wield or the spells

you normally cast — or, in fact, any weapon or spell at all.

Then, determine whether your ﬁnishing move is melee,

ranged, or magic. The answer should be obvious, since you’ve

already decided what it looks like.

Finish Him!

You chop the monster. It dies. Cool, but how much cooler

would it be if you planted a foot on its chest, ripped out its

arms, and golf-clubbed it out of the dungeon?

In WFF adventures, heroes have ﬁnishing moves. Each hero

gets to make up his own ﬁnishing moves. Here’s what you

need to know about them:

¤ The most important thing about ﬁnishing moves is that

they are ﬂashy and over-the-top. Think video games in

which you dismember, decapitate, and explode your op-

ponent — and seven rib cages clatter from the sky. You

want your ﬁnishing move to strike terror into your ene-

mies; to make even the staunchest dragon piddle its scales

when it sees you tear out its ally’s intestines, or incinerate

its head with a blast of ﬁre, or plug arrows into — BAM!

BAM! BAM! — both eyes and its crotch.

¤ A ﬁnishing move is a separate sort of attack. It is com-

pletely different than your skills, feats, proﬁciencies, and

everything else. It is independent of your weaponry and

your speciﬁc spells. You can create a ﬁnishing move that

uses your weapons or spells if you like, of course, but you

can also create ﬁnishing moves in which you do interest-

ing things without them. (See below for some examples.)

¤ When can you use a ﬁnishing move? You can attempt a

ﬁnishing move only once per combat. Other than that,

you can attempt it whenever you like, but if it doesn’t

take out your opponent (i.e., if you fail), you screw it up

somehow and probably wish you had just swung your

sword in the time-honored tradition.

¤ What if you succeed on your ﬁnishing move? You de-

stroy your enemy in some gruesome, impressive, and/or

awe-inspiring way. And you get bonus XP!

¤ How do you know when to use your ﬁnishing move? In a

WFF adventure, the GM should let you know when an

enemy is nearing ﬁnishing move range. He should say, “This

guy’s looking pretty woozy!” or “You could probably bring

P ERFORMING Y OUR F INISHING M OVE

A ﬁnishing move is a full-round action that does not provoke

attacks of opportunity. To perform it, follow these steps:

1) Select the target. If your ﬁnishing move is a melee move,

the target must be within your melee reach. If your ﬁnishing

move is ranged or magic, you must have line of sight to the

target, and it must be within 30 feet.

2) Roll a d20. Add the following:

¤ If you have a melee ﬁnishing move, add your base attack

bonus + your Strength bonus. (If you have Weapon Fi-

nesse, you can instead add your Dexterity bonus.)

¤ If you have a ranged ﬁnishing move, add your base at-

tack bonus + your Dexterity bonus. If the target has

cover from you or is in melee, your roll takes the ap-

propriate penalties — but Precise Shot and similar feats

can help you overcome these, as normal.

¤ If you have a magic ﬁnishing move, add your (highest)

caster level + your key spellcasting ability (Intelligence,

Wisdom, or Charisma).

Note that you don’t get to add bonuses for magic

weapons, Weapon Focus, and so forth on this roll!

3) If your total is greater than or equal to the bad guy’s AC,

you might take him down! (Note that the bad guy might

beneﬁt from cover and/or concealment, however.) Roll a

number of d6 equal to half your character level, rounded

up. (For example, a 3rd-level hero rolls 2d6. A 10th-level

hero rolls 5d6.)If your total is greater than or equal to the

number of hit points the target has remaining, your ﬁnishing

move is successful. Describe it in gory detail!

TEMPLE OF BLOOD

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