The Bleak and The Pearl [SoloDark] Part 8 - The Monolith of the Cyclops Delve 2

 [A Few Baseline Checks]

Doug, here. 

At the start of these "Monolith" sessions, there will be (currently) three basic checks to establish the flow of things and to add a little tension and uncertainty:

• Repairing the Flow: D20 + # of Rooms *Cleared* + Rance's INT bonus vs DC36
• Secrecy of Project: Monolith Activity Level Die (currently d4) vs City Activity Level Die (always d20 unless something big happens).
• Barrier Check: Barrier Die (currently d10) vs Threat Die (currently d10).

In the above, a failure/fumble does not mean the quest is loss while a critical success will not mean the quest is won, etc. An extreme result will be baked into the story. Likewise, a failure of the barrier check does not mean the barriers are just reset, just that they require extra work/activity/cost to keep up. Right now, Marius is covering that. Fact is, let's say that House Marius has 30 House Points. Each failure will do 1d6 damage to those house points. Each success will allow 1d6 House Points to heal. If Marius runs out of HsP, then another quest might be required to help get funding/etc and restore them. I like that.

As for secrecy, once the secrecy check ends up with the secret being found out, it is also not end game, we'll swap that for an interference roll each session. Other factions might end up claiming part of the Monolith. 

As for the Flow, the Ocean Water "Heart" of the system, once that is repaired, it should give some boons and bonuses to the team. There will be a similar system (brain, lungs, stomach) in each other quadrants and we'll pull them in when it is time.

For this session, the results we get are 12 + 5 claimed rooms + 2INTBonus = failure to repair the Heart. Secrecy is well in hand (3 vs 14) The barriers lost the fight (6 vs 8) so Marius took 1 House Point worth of expenditure. Currently have 29 remaining. 

And now on with the show!

[Building a Stronghold]

Grusk, Rance, Inar, and Tom are talking to Nelf in the new "War Room" set up in the area where the old Monolith Crew kept some sort of zoo or menagerie. Inar, Cal, and Blkalkkbl had spent some time discussing the primordial slime entity's experience. From Inar and Cal's approximation, there seems to be a section to the east of here that rises up and so was above the water line the whole time. However, "Blick" (as Inar calls them) avoided that because there were some rather hostile creatures calling it home. 

"At least it is dry," Rance says, "Which means that it might contain some paperwork or writings that were not destroyed by water. We can handle danger, guys." Tom has been agreeing with Rance that it should be a priority. Grusk, though, feels they should go south and clear out some of the newly dried out portions first. 

"We can take these frogs an gators and slimes by surprise as they get used to cracked skin. Secure the other tunnels, and THEN we find out what might be lurking in those sealed off tunnels above us."

Inar has generally sided with Grusk, figuring that dehydrating fish people are less a threat than the complete unknown. 

Nelf ends up casting the deciding vote. "We are precarious right now. Marius had to bring in more troops and retainers. Once those things below decide to come to the surface to find out why their home is turning into a desert, the barriers might not hold."

And with that, Rance and Tom agree that a quick assault might be for the best. It has only been a week since the barrier to keep the tidal water out was built. The area will be flooded, still, but more accessible. Once that dries out, there will be some irate things that might risk pushing through the Grunce folk to get to the sea and that could be dangerous. 

[Tidepool Alice: The Terror of the Sea Hag]

Rance casts his light spell and attaches it once again to his staff [1]. The four push down the stairs where they could go no further last time. Now only the bottom two steps are underwater and as they walk into the sludgy water Tom keeps sweeping the floor with his pole to make sure they are not going into any surprise drop off. 

Shortly they come to a door on their left and stop to stare at it. It is less decayed than would expected by the surrounding area which was just, until recently, almost 60% submerged. Despite the water stained and brackish mildew on the surrounding walls, the door is actually a light creamy color. "Bone," Tom marks, gently examining it. And in the middle of the bone door is a mask in the shape of an old woman from the Old Grunce theater. [2]

"I vote Inar goes first," Tom says with a chuckle. A whispered chuckle. The team prepares. Rance summons Mage Armor around himself. Inar casts Holy Weapon on both his mace and Grusk's axe. [3]

Tom starts to work on the lock, as quietly as he can. The mechanism is in the mask itself and with some work he has it solved. "Long fingers," he quietly calls back. And then, with that, they push the door open and rush inside. 

To find a cowering youth inside. Strangely dry and looking a blinking their eyes at the sudden light coming in from Rance's staff. "Oh...m..mmm...my. Are you...he...her...hhear. to help?" 

It is Rance who punches through the illusion first, though it is clear that most of the others are aware that something is up. "That's not a person that's a... SEA HAG!" At his cry, the Sea Hag roars out an inhuman gurgle and switches back into her true form, a warty dark shape with a crown of bone and carved skulls, and everyone (but Tom) is clearly shaken as she advances to tear them apart. [4]

Grusk goes to check her advance and to keep her back from the others. He sweeps up with his axe and with a bit of luck manages to land a good hit against her shoulder. Inar rushes in to close in the gap and protect the other two but does not get a hit with his mace, mostly slamming the stone at her feet. Tom's arrow bounces off the brick wall behind her and Rance is forced to also rely on a bit of luck just to get Magic Arrow cast despite the fear quaking him and holding him back. 

In her rage she sweeps one claw towards Grusk and one towards Inar. The high + low assault by Grusk and Inar have definitely caught her off guard because she trips forward and misses both hits. This helps to cheer up the guys who push forward to press their luck. [5]

It also angers her because she goes first and continues to slash out at the Grusk and Inar. Her right claw tears a bit through Grusk's armor and scratch his chest but the left one goes over Inar's head. 

Grusk returns the favor by getting a solid hit against the arm holding him, nearly severing it from her body. The dodging Inar cannot land it. Rance screams "ACID ARROW" and gets a solid hit in her torso while Tom continues to fail to get any solid hits. 

The Hag drops to her knees and screeches "NO! WAIT!" to halt any further attacks, the Acid Arrow still burning inside her chest. "Please. Let me live. I can help you!" Looks from Grusk to Rance to Tom to Inar. I can tell you how to get past Garoshen and his stinking fish people! I know what they fear!" [6]

"Why should we trust you?" This from Tom, whose goblin blood absolutely does not like surprises. Rance, though, is absolutely sure they can. He knows that Sea Hags are usually not this close to the surface. Something drove her up here. 

"Why are you here at the edge of the ocean instead of below?" the young wizard asks, already cancelling his spell before it can finish her off. 

"My...coven...was overran by my sister's and those who survived joined her. Drove her off. I fled up out of the temple that had been my home for centuries to find a safe place and to plot my revenge. Here worked as well as anywhere. It amused me to listen to all the petty talk of the people above. When the city soon falls, the above will be ripe for the taking and maybe something there will help me fight my sister." 

"So, what do you need from us?"

"Free passage out of here, to let me find somewhere else. Some place I can lick my wounds and call out to my old coven sisters so we can get our home back from Specklesnout." [7]

The team discusses it for a moment but all end up agreeing to help get her back to the ocean in exchange for information to help them speed up this process. [8] They find out that her name is Tidepool Alice and Specklesnout is her actual sister (the term sister and sister being a bit confusing in Common, one being a member of a cousin and being from the same brood). In exchange for her pointing out to where Garoshen lives on the map they in turn tell her about the Citadel and how it might be a spot worth for her to use to hide, at least some of the caves nearby. 

"The place with the bull man? Why should I go there? He's a bigger a threat than you."

Grusk holds up Bloodlust, "This was his axe. We have solved that problem." Leaving out the part of slaughtering the tortured minotaur while he was sleeping.

Tidepool Alice laughs at this. "Oh you, you four are fun. It makes sense why I might have had trouble fighting you."

After this she agrees and the group escort her, under guard, to the shipwreck. The Marius retainers and the Keepers are clearly nervous but Rance explains. Inar notes that there is some fear about the four youths in the eyes of their allies. Working with Sea Hags is strange business. She is warned if she ever returns that they will no longer protect her. If they hear any human settlements nearer the Citadel are attacked, they will come and find her. And if Sea Hag fights break out nearby they will intervene. Tidepool Alice agrees to these terms and goes to swim away.

"WAIT!" shouts Tom, "You haven't told us what these fish folk fear!" 

"Why, my little goblin, they fear me. I have long feasted on their babies and their old. They have tried to appease me by driving slimes and beasts to my door. If they think you are sea hags, they might even pay you to get no closer." And with that, she is gone.

Returning to Alice's room, the party finds a golden statue meant to look like some deep sea isopod, a serrated coral sword that might have been Alice's own, and a pearl in a strange green jar. [9]

[A Bit of Luck, a Bit of Ooze]

Pushing south into the Monolith, the party finds a large, long room that looks to be a gathering place. A massive area to one side has a stone throne upon it, the emblem of Marius nearly lost in the years of water and mold damage. Pillars wrapped in barnacles stand tall to either side. This appears to be some sort of court room of house Marius, possibly to discuss the everyday details. [10]

This is the first room in the place that was not actively trying to kill them so it gives them a moment to take a rest and regroup, with the throne being dry enough they can actually get out of the water for a minute.

After a quick sweep through this room (and a brief recasting of a light spell), the team pushes further south again and find sunlight in front of them. The room they enter was once a store room with a ladder to the surface but now a large hole leads to the air above while trash and detritus wash up below. The team are just starting to poke through the rubble when a large gray ooze (much bigger than the previous one) slithers out from the back wall and washes over Inar before the halfling can get out of the way. [11]

Tom misses and Rance stumbles over the words of his Magic Missile spell and feels the spell disappear from his mind.

Grusk, though, is able to splatter the ooze and pulls it from the enveloped halfling before chopping into little pieces. Tom gets a torch lit to help mark the room from above and the team works out a plan to back out for now and report this opening. And work out where it would be from the surface.  

Before heading back, though, they do find a suit of deeply rusted chainmail in the debris still wrapped around the bones of its owner. That same adventurer who died has a strange ironstone egg inside. [12]

[Another Connection to the Surface]

Tracking back outside, the team finds the opening is behind Baelur's moneylending shop. Baelur is an elderly thief with a stubborn streak. The hole, from the surface looking like a cracked and busted well, has been used by years by Baelur to dump junk and people who have failed to pay him back. The irony being that until the water was drained from the Monolith, it would have actually functioned something like a well...just terrible brackish salt water. 

House Marius options to buy the shop out so they can lay claim to the hole (without it being obvious), claiming they are trying to just run the business. They are able to do this but Baelur makes it cost. 4 House Points (25 remaining) are spent to claim the area. With the slum area dismal vibe and Baelur's own reputation, Marius has some privacy building a new ladder and trap door down into the area. [13]

[Wrapping Up]

The boys sell off their finds and then decide the spend the money from the pearl on a night of party. Down at The Jolly Dragon, know for the various young wizards who gather there, Rance ends up getting into a drunken knife throwing contest and wins. [14]

Doug's Notes: the Blue is the "known" locations of the fuelstones. The Red is Garoshen/Gar Folk territory. Green represents areas controlled by the Keepers. yellow are areas that have been cleared but could be lost because no barriers help to protect them. "X" show alternate paths to the surface.

MECHANICAL NOTES

1. Spell Check 11+4 clears the DC11. Note, I am not going to list out every single spell check/etc but will mostly just encapsulate it in the story though I'll highlight a few rolls when it helps to explain.
2. Used Knave 2's tables for this one. Color was 31 --> Cream. Symbol was 57 --> Mask. I had rolled room contents before the door and got 10 --> Boss monster. On my table I got "make or choose" and will go with a Sea Hag. So some care is given for her to take care of her lair. 
3. Inar got a success on his first casting and a Crit on his second. Grusk's Bloodlust has +2 to hit (total +9) and gets +2 to damage (+5 total). 
4. Sea Hag was not surprised (had probably heard them talking, knew it was just a matter of time). So I went with her making herself into a (Random Realities) 6,2 --> Timid | 6,4--> Youth. However, her roll to cast the glamour was just a 3+2 = 5 and everyone's WIL check was higher with Rance's being highest. On the other end of the luck spectrum, only Tom made the DC15 CHA check to resist the terror effect so 2 rounds of combat the other three will be hitting at disadvantage. At least they get to go first in initiative.
5. ShadowDark only has fumble tables on spells as far as I can tell however she rolled 1s for BOTH of her attacks. That's the kind of bad luck that normally inflicts Rance trying to get his spells off so in this case I am going to say it dispels the terror a round early. Note, I had to spend a luck point just to not lose Magic Missile with Rance.
6. She failed her morale check. Rolled twice on the SoloDark prompt and got "Start Plan" + "Secure Victory" which felt obvious. Did check the oracle and yes she is telling the truth. In exchange she wants "Fortify Order" and "Defeat Glory". Slightly harder to full on explain but I have an idea. I also checked to see how forthcoming she will be and it's decent. Besides, what good is it to hide details in a solo game for a completely optional side quest? I'd rather build the lore than punish myself.
7. These names and a couple of the details are derived from Skerples' The Monster Overhaul. If the Sea Hags ever return, I will use more details from that.
8. This is the first time in this entire campaign that a vote roll ended up with everyone agreeing "yes". Neat. 
9. Since this could have been a proper boss fight in a world where the rolls didn't speed run it so much, went for 3 treasures. Rolled a tapestry that made no sense so rerolled and got "jewel encrusted scarab" so made it more "oceanic" (45gp). Got a serrated great sword that I made into a coral sword (12gp), and a Kytherian Cog [+1 Luck at the start of the session] that I swapped into another deep-sea variation. This last is worth 300gp. All told, I'll give them +5XP for this encounter and to make up for skipping out last time around, since there are treasures and boons and such [and I am purposely inflating the XP to help accelerate the campaign some]. Since +1 Luck is a bit weirder in SoloDark I rolled a random description for Alice's Pearl and got that it allows the user to teleport a short distance away but gives the carrier disadvantage on CON checks. As useful as that is, they are probably going to just sell it.
10. Room's contents are empty and prompts were Pursue Victory and Push Mundane.
11. Finally triggered the first passage to the surface. Rolled a "Treasure" room with a guardian monster. This one was marked as strong so I'll give them +6HP and +2AC and +2 (+5 total) STR. There is just one, though, feasting on the animals (and unfortunate people) who get washed into tossed down from the hole above. Rance and Tom are not surprised, but Inar and Grusk are. The Ooze is attacking Inar. It hits with a crit but luckily only does 4 total damage. Then Tom misses, yet again, and Rance even with advantage whiffs (but not fumbles) the spell.
12. Armor is worthless after being underwater so rolled again and got an egg of a cockatrice but Rance, for once, whiffed his knowledge roll and has no clue what it might be, yet. 
13. A mixture of ShadowDark's own tables with Random Realities to get these results. Slum. Poor shop. Money Lender. Bael-us. Elderly. Stubborn. Thief. Since it's a poor moneylender in a slum, rolled at advantage on oracle to see if Marius could purchase it. Got a 19 so very yes...with a but. The but was to roll on HP to see if they have to put in a good chunk of resources and they lost 4. 
14. Carousing roll +2. Total = 8. Knife throwing contest. They get their luck token back and +4XP, bringing them all the way to Level 3 +17XP each. The name of the tavern was just generated using ShadowDark. 

DOUG'S NOTES

Combat continues to be basically a single monster versus the squad so I think next time I'm going to make it more 2+ or some such because have to scrap is part of the fun. Grusk is a danger and I'd like to see some sweat (besides Rance and/or Inar getting hit from behind).

Garoshen leads me wanting to make the "fish folk" into alligator gar derived. So, taller, thinner but with a worse bite. 1 trident +1 (1d6) and 1 bite +2 (1d8). AC and STR reduced by 1. 

I enjoyed the Sea Hag "fight" because it was exactly the sort of fight that could have gone south but it ended up adding some lore. It might be fun to bring the Hags back soonish. 

Otherwise I think the story mostly works for itself as is and look forward to the boys trying to work out some more territory and build up towards a big fight with the gar folk. Also, I've now set myself up to there being the "dry tunnels" with some danger inside. Have no idea what that is about but I'll wait and figure it out once I get there. 

CREDITS AND RESOURCES

This game is played using Shadowdark and SoloDark, both by Arcane Library and Kelsey Dionne (et al). The map in this delve is "The Halls of Amon-Gorloth II" by Dyson Logos with added annotations and colors by me. 

Other resources used in this campaign are

• Knave 2nd Edition by Ben Milton
• Random Realities by Cezar Capacle
• The Monster Overhaul by Skerples
• Bestial Ecosystem Created by Monster Inhabitation by Courtney C. Campbell and others.
• The Book of Random Tables: Dungeons, The Great Book of Random Tables, and The Great Book of Random Tables: Quests by Matt & Erin Davids. 
• The Solo Adventurer's Toolkit One & Two by Paul Bimler
• GM's Miscellany: Dungeon Dressing by Raging Swan Press.

The illustrations for this delve were generated while testing the the new ChatGPT4o + Dall-E. It is partially an exercise at futility (heh) but I am using the weird glitch outs to add in another layer of oracle in this experiment.

The Alligator Gar photo is by Greg Hume - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=30364231