Stop evil cultists of the Crushing Wave. The party rescues a member of the Brotherhood of the Cloak in Mulmaster (local mage guild); Drayson Fivestar. Drayson asks them to investigate the murder of his colleague. After some urban investigation, the investigation leads to a former guard tower of the Zhentarim, now occupied by elemental cultists. The tower was submerged in mud, but recently uncovered. The party faces of with the cultists. (Large page count, but feasible as a one shot after some editing, will probably take two sessions at most)
In the village of Elventree, near the oppressive city of Hillsfar, a recent string of strange occurrences has the locals on edge. The factions have gathered here on the borders of the forest of Cormanthor to determine what’s happening. Are these the machinations of Hillsfar, or something more?
"More than five hundred years ago, clans of dwarves and gnomes made an agreement known as the Phandelver’s Pact, by which they would share a rich mine in a wondrous cavern known as Wave Echo Cave. In addition to its mineral wealth, the mine contained great magical power. Human spellcasters allied themselves with the dwarves and gnomes to channel and bind that energy into a great forge (called the Forge of Spells), where magic items could be crafted. Times were good, and the nearby human town of Phandalin (pronounced fan-duh-lin) prospered as well. But then disaster struck when orcs swept through the North and laid waste to all in their path. A powerful force of orcs reinforced by evil mercenary wizards attacked wave echo cave to seize its riches and magic treasures. Human wizards fought alongside their dwarf and gnome allies to defend the Forge of Spells, and the ensuing spell battle destroyed much of the cavern. Few survived the cave-ins and tremors, and the location of Wave Echo Cave was lost. For centuries, rumours of buried riches have attracted treasure seekers and opportunists to the area around Phandalin, but no one has ever succeeded in locating the lost mine. In recent years, people have resettled the area. Phandalin is now a rough-and-tumble frontier town. More important, the Rockseeker brothers - a trio of dwarves - have discovered the entrance to Wave Echo Cave, and they intend to reopen the mines. Unfortunately for the Rockseekers, they are not the only ones interested in Wave Echo Cave. A mysterious villain known as the Black Spider controls a network of bandit gangs and goblin tribes in the area, and his agents have followed the Rockseekers to their prize. Now the Black Spider wants Wave Echo Cave for himself, and he is taking steps to make sure no one else knows where it is." Extra Info from AL.com users: by @marcellarius. "There are a variety of locations in this adventure: the town of Phandalin, a gang hideout, a ruined keep in the forest, a destroyed village, and Wave Echo Cave (a dungeon crawl). The adventure is written in a sandbox style and relies on the players to choose their path. Phandalin offers several side-quests which could serve as hooks for continuing adventures. The premade characters have ties in their backgrounds to NPCs and locations. If you're not using these you'll need to consider other ways to introduce key NPCs."
In this Adventure, the heroes explore the lair of an adult green dragon who has become a dracolich. She is served by living and undead minions and slaves. Pages 302-307
A slaver gang known as the Bloodreavers are terrorizing the countryside from their base deep in the labyrinth under Thunderspire Mountain. But these slavers are only the symptom of a larger threat in the bowels of Thunderspire.
If you're looking for a light-hearted adventure, you've come to the right place. Can a wizard and her beloved chef live a quiet life of baking and brewing, or is trouble destined to enter their innocent kitchen? It's up to the player characters to see what these two have cooked up before things get too hot to handle (without potholders, anyhow). Game designer Andy Collins offers the latest in our series of monthly free adventures. This original Dungeons & Dragons scenario, including full description and stats for a crusty new culinary creature, is suitable for a party of four characters of 2nd level. Adventure Preview When Andolyn met Gendrew, it seemed a match made in heaven. Andolyn was a skilled wizard with a love of a good meal, looking for an excuse to settle down from adventuring, while Gendrew was a master chef looking to create new methods of cooking. Together, they took up a quiet life of baking and brewing, content to live in a small cottage on the outskirts of town. But now one of their experiments has gone horribly wrong, and the characters must save poor Gendrew from his own delicious concoction, while defending themselves from the inhabitants of the cottage, and one unwelcome invader.
The Curious Tale of Wisteria Vale is the script of a play written in Common. It is split up into three acts, telling the story of a heroic bard before he becomes corrupted by evil. A wizard named Ryllia Liadon donated the book to Candlekeep as an entrance gift. She didn't tell the Avowed that the book contains the secret to accessing Wisteria Vale, a magical demiplane created by the Harpers to imprison a bard named Arrant Quill until they could free him from the influence of an evil artifact. The book has been hidden in the Candlekeep archives for three years, but the Harpers have finally discovered a cure for Quill's corruption, and the time has come to visit Wisteria Vale once more.
When an attempt to arrange an early inheritance backfires, a man of lesser ambition than Vanthus Vanderboren would no doubt withdraw into his sister's manse to hide under her skirts and pray that the truth of his patricide remain hidden. Fortunately for Vanthus, lack of ambition has never been a problem. Now the Vanderobrens' prodigal son slinks east along the coast of Blood Bay, lured by rumors of an incredible prize kept in a smuggler's hideout called Kraken's Cove. Yet what he is destined to find there is far more than a lucrative bit of banditry. What awaits him is the savage tide. "The Bullywug Gambit" is the second chapter of the Savage Tides Adventure Path, a complete campaign consisting of 12 adventures appearing in Dungeon magazine. For additional aid in running this campaign, check out Dragon magazine's "Savage Tidings" articles, a series that helps players and DMs prepare for and expand upon the campaign. Issue #349 of Dragon magazine looks into the region surrounding Sasserine, and provides useful information if your PCs wish to explore this area more thoroughly than they do in the course of this adventure. The hidden caves of Kraken's Cove have long served the pirates of the Crimson Fleet as a place to stage their smuggling operations. When their latest cargo backfires, the PCs find themselves faced with something far worse than murderous pirates. Pgs. 12-48
An Introductory Adventure for Storm King's Thunder. As evening approaches, you spot a wooden signpost next to a trail that heads north into the hills. Nailed to the post are three arrow-shaped signs. The two marked “Waterdeep” and “Daggerford” follow the High Road but point in opposite directions. The third, marked “Nightstone,” beckons you to follow the trail. If memory serves, Nightstone is roughly ten miles up the trail. This is Chapter 1 of the greater story available for free on the Dungeon Master's Guild.
Evil Reigns in the Elven Ruins Where elves once built the shining city of Myth Drannor, demons and devils now prowl in search of prey. Ancient evil slumbers beneath mossy stones, waiting for those foolish enough to venture within its grasp. Bold swordsmen, stealthy rogues, and skillful wizards have all met their end within the walls of Myth Drannor. But the lure of the city's magical treasures still draws heroes and villains alike to tempt death—or worse. Drawn by the dream of limitless magical power, the Cult of the Dragon has carved out a secret stronghold in the heart of the ruins. Using the power of a corrupted pool of radiance, the Cultists stand poised to attain their goal of subjugating all of Faerûn... unless a group of brave heroes can stop them first.
The Approaching Swarm is a short adventure for four 9th-level characters. The party can consist of any mix of classes, but it should include at least one character that is good in wilderness settings, such as a druid, ranger, or barbarian, and at least one cleric. This scenario should prove a reasonable challenge for characters from 8th to 10th level. The adventure takes place in a swampland that is near a small settlement. A band of rag-tag settlers have carved out a small settlement, called Crivdall, on the edges of a great swamp that is infamous for its terrible creatures. The area is rich with resources, and the settlers have done well hunting and foraging in the swamps. Unbeknownst to them, however, an insane druid has taken notice of their transgressions and wants them to leave. The druid, Aleretheral, is a half-orc with a curious affinity for insects and vermin. The swamp is home to numerous breeds of monstrous insects, some of which the druid has begun to breed to make them even larger and more aggressive. Through his abilities, Aleretheral has set enormous vermin onto the helpless settlers, preying on them as they venture into the swamp. With autumn rapidly coming to a close, the settlers are becoming desperate as more of their numbers are killed by hordes of marauding vermin.
In this adventure, the Lord Commander of the Sharn Watch hires the heroes to investigate the murder of an actress. The investigation quickly spirals into a bloody dispute involving a dead wizard’s spell-book, political rivalries, and secrets that might foment war among the Five Nations. Pgs. 1-37
Dare to defy death in this adventure for the world’s greatest roleplaying game. The talk of the streets and taverns has all been about the so-called death curse: a wasting disease afflicting everyone who’s ever been raised from the dead. Victims grow thinner and weaker each day, slowly but steadily sliding toward the death they once denied. When they finally succumb, they can’t be raised—and neither can anyone else, regardless of whether they’ve ever received that miracle in the past. Temples and scholars of divine magic are at a loss to explain a curse that has affected the entire region, and possibly the entire world. The cause is a necromantic artifact called the Soulmonger, which is located somewhere in Chult, a mysterious peninsula far to the south, ringed with mountains and choked with rainforests.
The adventure begins with the characters discovering the recently murdered Returned, Varyas, and confronting his killers. Varyas's gold mask bears a code on it, one that points toward the sage Khea who lives in the nearby polis. When the characters investigate, they learn from Khea that the writing is undecipherable except for the first line, which refers to the legendary Court of Orestes, a site sacred to the god Phenax. She also notes that a recent earthquake has uncovered a cave along the Khystonos River that could be the secret site's location. If so, then perhaps within lies the key to deciphering the mask, along with its own treasures. With the information provided by Khea, the adventurers set forth into the wilds, where they'll face multiple storied dangers before reaching the Court of Orestes. Once at the lost holy site, the characters discover ancient guardians, as well as an unliving entity with the potential to reveal Phenax's lost secret.
HSING bears foul news: SEER has been captured. While exploring the ruins of Ulcaster in search of knowledge pertaining to runes (or perhaps even how to create them), they were separated and now the pseudodragon fears the worst. Without SEER's guidance, the efforts of the assembled factions in these recent events may all be for naught.
Death slithers across the Dunes. Nightmares of desert horrors trouble the dreams of the innocent while raiders grow ever bolder beyond the walls of the great city-state of Tyr. Bandits and merchants chase rumors of a temple hidden in the desert, an ancient shrine to the primordial Ul-Artha said to safeguard a fragment of the artifact known as the Crown of Dust. Can the heroes recover a caravan lost in the wastes, repel the threat of vicious raiders, and win the relic form the perilous temple? Now that Tyr is free of Kalak the Sorcerer-King, opportunity abounds in the city and the surrounding wastes. But some see Kalak's fall as the beginning of Tyr's end, and the unpatrolled deserts nearby are rife with danger. Outlaws openly defy the city's Revolutionary Council and threaten outlying holdings. If Tyr is to thrive, heroes must arise to tame the lawlessness and evil that threatens the free city.
An unusually severe drought in a remote area recently worsened dramatically when three lakes dried up almost simultaneously. The locals suspect foul play, and the foulest player they know is a bugbear named Relgore -- the leader of a highly successful group of humanoid bandits. Could he be seeking revenge for the militia attacks that recently dispersed his band?
Listen up! You're in my dungeon now, Morty! On Earth C-141, I'm a LEGENDARY D&D adventure writer! When people think of impossibly difficult dungeons or winding, labyrinthine maps, those things ain't Gygaxian - they're SANCHEZIAN! I do whatever I want over there, and they eat it up! I'm a celebrity Dungeon Master there, too! My livestreamed show, Cynical Troll, gets a billion views a day! It seemed a little selfish to contain all that GREATNESS to a single dimension, so I lifted one of the all-time favorite Sanchezian adventures and snuck it back here to dimension C-132. (Usually that kind of s**t is frowned upon, but it's just a D&D adventure. We're not exactly violating the Prime Directive or whatever.) This is a good old-fashioned dungeon crawl for a party of 1st-level adventurers, whose character sheets in this box should also contain. They'll probably reach 3rd level by the end of it. So here it is. This adventure brought peace to a warring galaxy. What did you ever do? Oh, you picked up this adventure? Good start. And awaaaay we go!
In ages past, the wizard Karavakos made a deal with devils, which resulted in him being trapped in an extradimensional pyramid, unable to escape. His only hope for escape is to lure adventurers into the Pyramid, in hopes that they will destroy his splinters and return his power to him. But his wife Vyrellis, whom he slew in a rage when the Pyramid formed, still lingers in spirit and wants nothing more than to see him laid low... Although set to allow PCs to just fight through each encounter, tips are included for PCs negotiating with the factions trapped in the pyramid.
A black dragon’s treasure hoard has been located in the Twilight Marsh, and within it are secrets that hold interest to the factions. With the dragon marauding over the countryside, the horde is left unguarded. Now is the time to plunder its lair!