It's a horrible time to have a curse! Each wielding a powerful item to a family legacy, your players are a group of young adventurers who barely survive an attack on their order of vampire-hunters by agents of Dracula. After escaping, they discover Dracula has placed a curse upon the land which makes restful sleep difficult outside of hallowed areas. Dracula, "alive" on another plane but dead on this one, must be resurrected so they can kill him, end the curse, and avenge their dead. To accomplish this goal, the player characters must journey through forest, marsh, hill, and underground paths to retrieve relics of Dracula's last life from keeps and fortresses overrun by monsters and the undead. If they can resurrect him, he will be weak and easy to kill... but the adventurers aren't the only ones who want Dracula on the Material Plane, and Dracula is not the only vampire in the world. Gameplay overview This adventure takes the players from 2nd through 9th or 10th level on a milestone basis as they choose where to travel in what order to retrieve what they need. Starting at a happy gathering at the Belmonte Order, which the characters are hereditary members of, the campaign kicks off with a bang as the group retrieves their chosen legacy items, salvages what other gear they can in a race against time and a growing number of foes, and then escapes to begin their quest. In addition to the six main "dungeons," there are two optional regional lairs, traveling vampires, and many foes along the way. Most of the towns in the area have managed to survive, providing points of light at which the party may stop, long rest safely, acquire supplies, and socialize. Travel is hazardous! 5e classes are balanced for resource management across a 5-8 encounter adventuring day. The campaign is designed to have a semi-variable flow of encounters as the party traels around the area. Encounters grow progressively more difficult as time passes and the party spends more time within a region. These are not random encounters rolled on a table, but encounters designed to be unique to each area's geography, combat terrain, and mix of foes. As the party spends more time in a region or revisits it, the encounter difficulty increases. Dracula's curse requires a Constitution saving throw to successfully long rest outside of Hallowed areas (towns). The difficulty scales up over time, forcing the party to balance speed and safety as they try to accomplish their goals without pushing beyond the limits of what they can handle. The game concept, general map layout, and some enemy distributions are loosely inspired by Castlevania II for the NES, one of the forerunners of the "Metroidvania" genre. Dracula's Curse is indeed a game in which the forests are dark and full of monsters, and every night is a horrible one to have a curse. Includes 15 Legacy items, from weapons like whips and swords to a shield, a belt, or a decanter of holy water 60+ enemy statblocks 8 unique dungeons with unique layouts & challenges 5 inhabited towns with multiple named NPCs 100+ travel encounters (expect to use 30-50%) The module is printer-friendly with no artwork and straightforward grid maps for location-based encounters which require one.

When the Pathfinder-obsessed daughter of one Qadira's most powerful trade princes goes missing trying to impress the Society, her father angrily demands the Pathfinders track her down or face expulsion from Katheer. Tracking the missing princess leads you to an underground complex filled with traps, tricks, and a creature so powerful, she's lived for a thousand years. Can you save the princess and uncover the power of the Eternal Obelisk?

The first part of the Dreams of Red Wizards adventure path originally published for the D&D NEXT Playtest. Following the events Ghosts of Dragonspear Castle, a new set of adventurer's will see some of the repercussions of that adventure. This adventure is intended to be continued in the Dead in Thay adventure (Note that they Dead in Thay 5e adventure featured in Tales from the Yawning Portal is missing a significant portion of interlude that links Scourge of the Sword Coast to the events within the Doomvault). The adventurers arrive when Daggerford is crowded with refugees from outlying lands. Goblins, gnolls, and orcs have been raiding the countryside. Now, food is scarce and tension is high. Blame for a theft has fallen on the refugees, and the Duke of Daggerford has forbidden more of the displaced from coming into town. After overcoming difficulties to enter Daggerford, the characters learn more about the raids. As they fight against the humanoids and delve deeper in the darkness that encircles Daggerford, the characters learn of Bloodgate Keep. After a final fiendish ambush, they’re ready to confront the real threat to the area. DM Note: This adventure points the adventurers strongly towards Bloodgate Keep but that location does not appear until the Dead in Thay adventure; at several points the party may feel drawn to explore that location rather than continue their investigations around Daggerford. However, since Bloodgate Keep is only eluded to as a source of great evil power, it can serve to easily segue to an entirely different adventure path. As a NEXT Playtest adventure, Scourge of the Sword Coast uses milestone leveling and the included stat blocks for creatures do not necessarily match or even appear in the 5e Monster Manual, nor do they have XP values or challenge ratings. In some places it will reference rules used in the Playtest but dropped or changed in the 5e release, these are unlikely to substantially impact gampley with 5e rules.

In your last adventure you discovered a strange, and somewhat sinister looking, key. After a long wait it appears you have found an answer to what it opens. The good news is that it leads to great wealth, the bad news is that it opens a tomb. Oh yea, there may, also, be some…individuals that want the key too…

"Den of the Rotten Kings" is a wererat lair suitable for four 3rd-level characters. This adventure can be completed in one session.

Was it destiny or something worse that destroyed the Order of the Opal Fist? A dungeon crawl designed for four 3rd level characters. The original article has a sidebar for scaling the adventure up or down. Pgs. 106-124

There have been disturbing signs over the last few months, signalling that something is wrong in Humblewood. The troubles appear to originate from activity in the Scorched Grove, an ashen plain that was ravaged many centuries ago by a destructive fire. Whatever caused the fire has scarred the land with elemental magic, making it inhospitable to all but strange fire-based creatures. Of late, the Grove has begun to expand. At first, it was hard to notice the slow expansion, but those in tune with nature (especially the Tenders) could see the imbalance in the elemental forces of Humblewood. For many common folk, this imbalance has been experienced as unseasonal dryness, which has led to crop failure and an increased frequency of forest fires. There have also been a number of unusually aggressive emberbat clouds reported far outside of their natural ranges. The true nature of the danger still remains hidden from the people of the Wood. A corvum necromancer named Odwald Ebonhart has stirred the elemental aspect of fire, which has lain dormant beneath the Scorched Grove since its first burning. The aspect’s energies have begun to empower fire-based creatures within the Wood. The increased range of emberbat swarms have brought fires that have expanded the Grove. Many forest-dwellers, who have been left without homes, have turned to banditry to survive. Soon the elemental incarnation will break free, and players must find a way to stop the aspect of fire before it reduces the Wood to ashes.

Rumours tell of a secluded cave where a powerful cleansing artifact resides, guarded by a mythical creature that no one has seen and lived to tell the tale. Heat boils forth from this cave, and tortured shrieks echo on the wind. Do you have what it takes to brave the Lair of the Lava Queen?

A mechanical man discovers his ancestral fortress has fallen to a lunatic derro, but something worse than mad derro haunts the Clockwork Fortress' gears. This adventure is a sequel to Dungeon Issue #115's "Raiders of the Black Ice," although you need not have run that adventure to enjoy "The Clockwork Fortress." Pgs. 42-61

In these lands of eldritch goo, it's a fine line between victory and a sticky situation Tzork, the sentient globe of glass, wasn’t exactly born from a grand spell—it was more of a cosmic "oops". After a backstabbing disciple named Theridus offed his master and snagged the relic, he promised his followers unimaginable power. But instead of turning them into terrifying demons, Tzork turned them into puddles of goo. Now, the once "glorious" cult's mansion is less a temple and more a swamp of melted, failed adventurers, attracting only the most reckless of treasure hunters. 'Morass of the Melting Men' is an adventure for Knave 2e, suitable for low-level PCs. The adventure revolves around an extremely powerful sentient magical item that has gone out of control, melting all the nearby people and turning what was once an evil temple into a swamp of slime, filled with bones and eyeballs. In Morass of the Melting Men, players enter a location flooded with a magical liquid exuding chaotic energy. The longer the PCs remain within the swamp, the more they suffer the unexpected effects of this alien magic. Step inside this morass if you dare — goo and treasure awaits... but mostly goo What you'll find here: A complete 40-page adventure A 20 room dungeon map Several new (and bizarre) magic items such as the magnificent Tray of Force and the powerful Theridus' Head. Several wild random tables of weird and gooey outcomes

The Hag's Hexes is a 66 page guide designed by Dungeon Masters Guild luminaries like JVC Parry and Janek Sielicki alongside rising stars and old stalwarts like Matt Butler, Matthew Gravelyn, and Tim Bannock. It was created with one thing in mind: to make hags more than the sum of their (often meager) Challenge ratings, giving them the mechanics, roleplay potential, and weird magic that can inspire campaigns, lay low kings and warlords, and potentially ensnare unwary Player Characters into campaign-changing curses or long-term bargains that force them into terrible moral quandaries! Split into five chapters, the authors have provided everything a DM needs to terrify their players for years to come. The Bestiary features over a dozen monsters; some are new hags, some are their minions or even their mobile lairs, and one of them -- the Shaitan AKA Desert Hag -- was featured in Monsters of the Guild! Bargains & Curses is a chapter filled with ideas that can kick-start campaigns, threaten valued NPCs, or put Player Characters' very existence and morality at stake. Chapter 3 includes two dozen items of wonderment, weirdness, and dread, ranging from fairy tale-inspired items of whimsy to terribly cursed items of horror. Chapter 4 is titled "Filthy, Vile & Downright Dirty" and provides dozens of roleplaying tips to make hags come alive, new mechanics inspired by and expanding on Volo's Guide to Monsters (coven spell lists, aunties, grandmothers, alternative coven members), and ends with useful combat tactics for each of the hags from the Monster Manual and Volo's Guide, as well as tactics for covens. Finally, Chapter 5 presents five encounter groups (with sub-encounters) to give you quick story seeds and monster lists that you can put together in minutes to create a single encounter or to inspire a full campaign, and ends with three full-length adventures -- each with 3-5 encounters -- that showcase many of the new monsters, rules, magic items, and so on that appeared in earlier chapters. Each of these adventures comes with an encounter map meant to act as inspiration for hag lairs, and they include useful mechanical ideas for terrain effects and descriptive keywords listed directly on the map for added inspiration and easy customization! Designed by Tim Bannock. Written by Matt Butler, JVC Parry, Janek Sielicki, and Tim Bannock. Edited by Matthew Gravelyn and Tim Bannock. Cover Art by Elena Naylor. Cartography by Tim Bannock using Inkwell Ideas' Dungeonographer (Dungeonographer is copyright Inkwell Ideas). Layout & Graphic Elements by Elena Naylor with Tim Bannock. Interior Art by Arcana Games, Bruno Balixa, David Lewis Johnson, Dean Spencer, Earl Geier, Filip Gutowski, Jacob E. Blackmon, Joyce Maureira, Petr Kratochvil, Jayaraj Paul, Brian Brinlee, and Wizards of the Coast.

A malignant cult has taken root in the mystical and magical realm of Jalmeray. Known and feared throughout distant Vudra, the cult of Dhalavei has expertly destroyed organizations and societies from within for millennia. Now a new sect of the sinister Cult of the Ebon Destroyers has its sights set on Thakur Kharswan of Jalmeray, and the magistrates and bureaucrats behind the throne must hunt down and eliminate the cult before the unthinkable happens. If only there were someone they could trust to behead Dhalavei's cult before the assassins do the same to their beloved ruler…

The Cult of the Dragon has come to Phlan, a lawless refuge on the Moonsea. Now, with no significant authority to stop the cult, other power groups in the Realms--the Harpers, Order of the Gauntlet, Emerald Enclave, Lords' Alliance , and even the Zhentarim--must untite to stop the cult from fulfilling its dark purpose in the city. Join the fight by participating in any one of five different missions aimed at stopping the cult.

Adventure Lies Ahead, Deep in the Heart of the Dymrak Forest Are you ready to meet the Lord Forester's challenge: to put an end to needless death and destruction by doing away with the goblin war chieftain, Kosivikh, and his evil band of raiders? Eager to prove yourselves as new adventurers and to collect a sizable bounty, you travel to the goblins' dungeon in the Dymrak Forest - a place that has captivated your interest for years, a place where few have dared to venture. Only you and your fellow adventurers can put an end to the rampant bloodshed and return peace to the territory. This module is recommended especially for beginner Dungeon Masters and players who are interested in dungeon exploration. Can be used as a follow-up to the DDA3, Eye of Traldar module or it can stand alone Features easy-to-follow rules on dungeon adventuring in the heart of the Dymrak Forest. TSR 9272

As the party faces an ancient foe who has never been defeated, their hunt threatens to unleash the buried ghosts of a forgotten feud between two of Waterdeep's powerful merchant houses. The third adventure in the Vampires of Waterdeep Campaign Arc. Pgs 70-93

Life was quiet and simple in the village of Sandford before the curse; people reported hearing voices in the woods; others dreamt of a tower, white like bone. Then people started disappearing; seasoned loggers and trappers who knew the forest like a second home. Something is spreading its evil around Sandford; could it be that tower? And can your party help save the village? "Tower of Tragedy" is a stand-alone adventure designed for 4th level characters, that involves elements of forest exploration and a short dungeon crawl. "Tower of Tragedy" promises a compelling story, interesting mechanics, and engaging battles. Includes full description for the Village of Sandford, the adventure, a new monster, and two new magical items.

What’s Included Escape from Mt. Balefor is a self-contained 8-10 hour adventure for three to five 5th level characters. This premium module contains a full three-part story, battle maps, and NPC stat blocks. Your Mission Your party of Wood Elves will start in the mines and have to sneak and backstab their way to freedom. There are a number of chances to choose your path, whether you plan to avoid fighting or want to kill every last High Elf in the mines. There will also be a number of ways to affect the world around you if you choose to continue the story after the party escapes from the mines.

Vault of the Blood Mage is a deadly one-shot dungeon adventure for 4-6 8th level characters. Player Characters find themselves locked in a dungeon room with no memory of how they got there. Inflicted with a magical disease that is slowly turning them into mindless zombies, the dungeoneers have to work quickly to find the antidote and escape the vault before succumbing to the deadly affliction. To do so, the characters must avoid deadly traps, fight unique monsters, and solve fiendish puzzles.

Chip off the old block. The dwarves of Underduin and Thunderdelve have made some new friends … and enemies. A stronghold of dwarfs has been takin hostage and its up to the part to save them and return the stronghold to its former glory. XS2 Thunderdelve Mountain may act as a prequel. Pgs. 8-31

"Wherein the local clergy makes the terrible mistake of not hiring enough assassins for the job." Synopsis: The heroes have just returned from the abyss (Occipitus) and reestablish themselves in Cauldron, when they are assaulted by a group of professional assassins. After they repel the attack, they trace back the lead to the temple of Wee Jas, where they find plenty of opposition from the second in command, Ike Iverson. After dispatching of the cleric and securing of a (spare) soul cage, the group finds evidence of a place important to the cagewrights' cause - an ancient underground complex named Karran Kurral. Mounting an expedition to that place, they find more evidence towards the horrific destiny on schedule for Cauldron. However, they gain access to the Soul Pillars after defeating a dracolich, that they can use to gather plenty of intelligence on the cagewrights' plans. Pgs. 12-51