Frontier Forts of Kelnore, part 2

Last week we started building an adventure using the Frontier Forts of Kelnore supplement from Judges Guild. This is a continuation of that process.

On a related note, I stumbled upon the blog of Anton Ryzbak who built a scale model of the forts. The model isn’t perfect—for example, it’s missing the tower’s roof as well as the battlements that run along the parapets and the keep’s roof—but it’s still pretty darn impressive. I wish I had that talent.

Also, that blog post shows the map for the first two levels. So if you want to look at that when I describe things, feel free.

Optional Tables Overview

Last week we left off at Table 14. According to the book, the remaining tables are all optional. Let’s just look them over:

• Table 15: The is called the “General Table” in the book, but I would call it the “Room Contents” table. It determines if a room is empty or contains some combination of:
  • Disrepairs (roll on Table 16)
  • Monsters (roll on Table 17)
  • Animals (roll on Table 18)
  • Insects (roll on Table 19)
  • Miscellaneous Finds (roll on Table 20)
  • Traps (roll on Table 21)
  • Treasure (there is no sub-table, instead we’re told to “insert an item or items of value appropriate to the level of the adventure patty [sic] and the opposition.”)
• Table 16: Is the “Disrepair” table. If you rolled a disrepair on Table 15, this tables tells you what it is. Results tell you that a (wall, ceiling, or floor) is (crumbled, cracked, disfigured, or collapsed). What's the difference between "crumbled" and "collapsed"?
• Table 17: “Monsters.” This is actually three sub-tables. The one you use depends if the party is low level (1-3), mid-level (4-6), or high level (7-9). You roll here if Table 15 indicated a monster or as an alternative to Table 6 when determining the fort’s principle creature/leader.
• Table 18, “Animal”: A roll on this table produces a non-monstrous animal, like lions and tigers and bears (oh, my!).
• Table 19, “Insects”: Entries range from “butterflies” to “giant wasps.”
• Table 20, “Finds”: 120 items ranging from a basket to a colossal skeleton. At quick glance, this seems to be a subset of the “Ravaged Ruins” tables from Ready Ref Sheets.
• Table 21, “Traps”: Table 21 consists of a main table and 12 sub-tables to generate a unique trap. This looks fun. I’ll be using this for sure.

What I’m Going to Do

Determine “Empty” Rooms

We were told that our fort had “one third of the chambers empty. Only a few vermin would be present in the empty rooms.”

The map has 20 numbered areas, but based on last week’s rolls two of those (the store rooms) have been eliminated leaving 18 areas. One third of 18 is six. To add some randomness I’ll roll 1dF¹ and add that to the 6. I rolled a 0, so there are exactly 6 empty rooms. Let’s roll them randomly. I will re-roll any duplicates, as well as any result between 11–14 (11 is the tower where Ka'taka is, 12 & 13 are this missing storerooms, and 14 is the mess hall where I want Tupo to be cooking).

• Commander’s quarters (15)
• Tower, 2nd Floor (19)
• Crypt (4)
• Crypt (2)
• Executive’s Quarters (16)
• Tower, Third Floor (20)

All other rooms will be occupied by Ka'Taka and her half-orcs.

Room by Room

For each of the rooms I’m going to roll on Table 15. I’ll take the result, but I’ll probably ignore any “monster” or “insect” results unless they’re interesting and fit with the adventure as I see it unfolding.

Rather than make you suffer through each roll, here’s the final results:

#	Name	Description/Notes
1	Basement	Insect & Disrepair. Insect table result is “scorpions.” That fits. Disrepair table says “disfigured floor.” This is perfect!2 In the NW corner of the room is a large hole in the ground, maybe a foot or two across. A big scorpion lives in there. This isn’t the 4HD giant scorpion of the rule book. This will be a 1d4 HD monster. If it hits the hit itself only does 1d4 damage, but the player must make a CON save vs poison (+2 bonus) or be wracked in a burning pain, effectively paralyzing the character for 1d6 turns (not rounds). The half-orcs know about the burrow and simply avoid it. Sometimes, for entertainment, they’ll toss a giant rat or a prisoner to the scorpion. There’s also a couple half-orc guards here at the bottom of the staircase.
2	Crypt	Empty Treasure & Disrepair. Instead of rolling on the disrepair table, I’m just deciding that there’s a large crack on the northern wall near the NE corner. A portion of the tribe’s treasure is hidden in a cloth sack deep within the crack. A player will need to reach in and feel around to find it.
3	Crypt	Monster (skeleton) & Trap. This is a crypt, so skeletons would make sense. On the other hand, we already have one unrelated monster (the scorpion in Basement (1)). And there’s nothing here to trap. I’m overriding the dice, and just saying that some half-orc guards are here. Because of the rolls for the Well (8), there is a hole in the ceiling around the walls of the well leading to the courtyard.
4	Crypt	Empty Disrepair & Find: A “crumbled” wall. Let’s say it’s the eastern wall. The find is a hinge. Hmmm. This is supposed to be a crypt. Let’s say the alcoves that held bodies had doors that covered each “body spot.” When the wall crumbled that all broke, but there’s still a hinge partially attached. It means nothing, but the players will waste minutes examining it.
5	Crypt	Monster (Shriekers) & Trap. The additions table (last week) told us that a tunnel in the eastern wall leads 350 yards to the east. Shriekers are giant mushrooms that “scream” when anyone gets close to them. It’s the perfect thing to put by your secret entrance as an alarm. We will could consider them as a trap as well. The noise will attract the half-orcs from both Rooms 1 and 3.
6	Courtyard	Animal (Wolverine) & Treasure. Neither of these make sense, so I’m ignoring them. Instead, we will have some half-orc guards here.
7	Gate	Table 15 says Empty, but I say half-orc guards would be at the gate.
8	Well	Disrepair (Collapsed floor) & Find (Colossal harness). First part is easy… the water level is lower than when the fort was build, and that caused a sink hole that drops (1d6 damage if falling) into Crypt (3). There is a makeshift bridge made of wooden planks the leads to the well itself. As for the Colossal Harness–I’m stumped. I really don’t like the Find table. Let me re-roll. The new result is “Half-sized Statues”. Ok–around the lip of the well are three statues of water nymphs. There were once finely carved, but centuries of exposure have ruined them. They can still fetch 10 gold pieces each (or 45 for the set) from the right buyer, but they each weigh 15 pounds.
9	Stables	Insect & Disrepair. I’m not even rolling on the insect table. The stables hold 6 wolves3 that the half-orcs are keeping. The half-orc mistakingly believe that these fully grown, normal wolves are really dire wolf puppies and they hope to use them as mounts when they’re older. Either way, the wolves are trained and will attack if commanded to.
10	Parapet	Find (Hauberk) & Trap (Acid). I’m going off script again. The find is going to be water nymph statues again, like the ones found by the well. But these are mounted above and outside the gate, like gargoyles. At the defender’s command, they spit acid down below… almost like a murder hole. Half-orc archers patrol the parapets.
11	Tower (ground)	Monsters & Treasure. Ka'taka is here. She wears an unholy symbol worth 85 gp. She also has the key to Commander’s Quarters (15).
12	Storeroom	N/A: This is now part of the courtyard.
13	Storeroom	N/A: This is now part of the courtyard.
14	Mess hall	Monster: Tupo is here. It’s a kitchen, so I’m just making up some finds… a big cauldron, some wooden spoons and plates.
15	Commander’s quarters	Empty Treasure. It doesn’t make sense that there would be unguarded treasure here, so I’m going to override the dice and say that it’s “treasure and a trap.” Two rolls on the trap tables and we find that it’s “deadfall” trap that will drop a heavy (or fast!) stone for 3d6 damage. Ouch! The trap will be sprung if anyone enters the room without unlocking the door with Ka'taka’s key.
16	Executive’s Quarters	Empty Monster & Disrepair. I’m probably going to ignore the monster. I roll a gelatinous cube. Ok–I like this. Why else would such a prime room be unoccupied? And it’s right off the mess hall. The half-orcs use this as a trash disposal.
17	Tower (1st floor)	Monster & Disrepair. Not even rolling: The monster is a couple of half-orc footmen that will rush to attack anyone entering the parapet from the door. The disrepair is that the ladder leading to the trapdoor to room 19 has been removed. The half-orcs did this because they know what’s in Room 19 and don’t want to go there.
18	Barracks	Find & Trap. The find is just going to be 19 sets of smelly half-orc bedding. The trap… let me roll! It’s a plain pit. let’s just say that’s it’s not so much a trap as a disrepair. There’s a hole in the floor in the SW corner that will drop an adventurer into the gelatinous cube in room 16. Maybe the half-orcs use the hole as a squat toilet, and keep it covered with a thin mat when not in use. Players shouldn’t step on random floor mats, so that should be warning enough.
19	Tower (2nd floor)	Empty Monster (Stirges) & Trap. I love stirges. I probably overuse them. The problem I have here is “why don’t they just feed off the half-orcs?” So I wanted something less mobile. I know that the next room is an insect, so how about a giant tick? Still a blood sucker, but less mobile. But they’re powerful. Time for a custom creature. I call it the “Bloodvine.”4 This room is completely covered in ivy, but there is a “lump” in the corner. The ivy covers the floor almost to the knee. Looking in under the vines at the lump reveals a half-orc body. The body is completely desiccated. We’ll talk more about bloodvine next week, but it’s pretty obvious what it does.
20	Tower (3rd floor)	Empty Insect & Disrepair.  No insect, just more bloodvine.  This disrepair is just the missing ladder.
–	Keep’s Roof	Treasure & Trap: My first thought was that it seems silly to put treasure on the roof, but there’s some logic to it. There’s only one way to the roof, and people might not think to look there. So ¼ of the treasure will be located up here. Let’s roll on the trap table. A gas trap that covers 1 square and causes blindness. No need for magic on this one. Let’s put the treasure in a small metal box that’s suspended by a chain inside the chimney. The fumes from Tupo's cooking are so foul that anyone who looks down the chimney and fails a CON save will be struck with blindness for 1d6 turns.
–	Outer Stables	Treasure & Trap: A treasure seems weird here, so let’s think about it in non traditional terms. The outer stables are “pens” where they keep prisoners. Right now one of the prisoners is a human merchant, Oggo Medson, that the band is holding for ransom. If the players free him, he can reward them at some point in the future. A trap makes sense. A few rolls indicates that the trap is an ochre jelly. Let’s say that there’s a pit in front of Oggo’s cage, and if the proper precautions aren’t taken, opening the cage causes the pit to open.

End of the Third Quarter

This post is too long already. Let’s end it here. Next week we’ll do the treasure, tell you about the bloodvine.  In the post after that we'll, assign the remaining half-orcs to each room, and do any other finishing touches.

What do you think so far?

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1. A dF is a “Fudge die” or a “Fate die.” They were developed by Steffan O'Sullivan for his Fudge role-playing game. They produce a result from -1 to +1.↩

2. According to Orkin, “… Scorpion burrows can be a meter deep, depending on the dryness of the location. To form a burrow, scorpions dig to a depth where moisture and temperature are suitable and comfortable. Burrows are usually only made to accommodate one scorpion … Some scorpions wait at their burrows to ambush their prey.”↩

3. I wanted the half-orcs to have a pet. I randomly rolled a lion, and thought that was cool.  Especially for a desert. I talked to James and he said “wolves!” Whenever you talk to James the answer is always “wolves!” Then he said “Dire wolves that I can ride,” because, for James, the only thing better than a wolf is a giant prehistoric wolf that you can ride. That inspired the joke here.↩

4. Apparently there’s something called bloodvine in World of Warcraft. This is not that.↩