The Seat of the Seer

Presented here is the first encounter in the upcoming adventure "Anointing the Seer". Here, a group of giants have taken up residence in a cursed cathedral. Dangerous magic briers guard the exterior, and within the brutes feast on the trapped townsfolk. Feel free to drop it into your games to use as you see fit.

Seat of the Seer

Dungeon Features

Secret Doors in this area are priest-doors, concealed to appear to be part of the ornately carved stone or wood they are set into, and are a DC 18 Search check to find.

The Cursed Seat of the Seer (EL 12)

This temple is much transformed after the attack on it. It is surrounded by magical briars, and inside giants feast on the townsfolk, who have been polymorphed into animals.

Exterior

Surrounded by small outlying buildings, this large and stately temple is completely overgrown with gargantuan brambles, to the point where is is nearly concealed. A large double door can be glimpsed through the thorn-covered trunks of the plants.

In order to enter the temple via the doors one must somehow pass through the patches of brier brambles that block the doorways. If the plants are not killed then they must be defeated in an opposed strength check (DC 19) in order to open the doors. Other methods of entry include teleportation or flying or climbing up and breaking through some of the stained glass windows on the east face of the temple. Either method requires navigating the brambles, which will attempt to grapple the intruders.

Interior

The smell of offal, greasy cooking fires and death permeate this area. The interior of the temple is also sparsely overgrown with patches of the thorny brambles which push up through the flagstones. Several dead peasants and acolytes are caught in their branches. The stone walls are adorned with tapestries of the Seer's visions and the stories of the petitioners helped by them. Several carcases worth of bones lie upon the floor.

1/4 of the squares in the temple are grown over with brambles in approx 10' patches in the first room of the temple. Some of the pillars also have brambles in the chapel.

Creatures: Nearly 100 domestic animals cower in the temple. They are the temple priests and townsfolk who had come to observe the coronation, polymorphed into sheep, pigs and dogs. Several giants and and an air elemental have been left behind by the vengeful family to ensure that the temple is not re-inhabited.

Hill Giants (2): HP 102 each

Ogre Barbarians (3): HP 79 each

Air Elemental (1): HP 136

Tactics: The brutes will likely be roused by anyone entering the temple and will have assembled to defend it. The giants may attempt to push intruders into the brambles as they fight, and will mercilessly bludgeon anyone caught in them. Similarly, the air elemental will attempt to scoop up the rear ranks of any intruders in its whirlwind form and drop them into the brambles. If the group is defeated, the air elemental will return to the warlock to inform him that someone has reclaimed the temple. The giants will fight to the death.

Traps: The exterior of the temple and portions of the first room are overgrown with the effects of the brier brambles spell. Anyone entering the area of the spells effect risks entanglement and the plants sleeping poison.

Treasure: Almost the only thing left in the temple's treasury is a scroll of break enchantment that the temple priest (in his form as a ram) will bring to the party if they are otherwise unable to disenchant the villagers. The giants have little of value on them.

Development: Once the giants are slain and the elemental has fled, the party should be able to disenchant the remaining animals, who creep cautiously up to the PCs once the violence has ended.

Once freed they will relate what happened: the new priestess was in the process of being anointed when a holy trance came upon her. Her eyes rolled up into her head and she began speaking in a strange, strained, voice. "I see... doom! The drake... he is brought low by his son..." The peasants go on to inform their rescuers that a witch and two warlocks, one young and one of middle age, suddenly appeared in a burst of flame and interrupted the anointing of the new Seer and turned them all into animals. One of the older villagers, the abbot of the temple, will angrily go on to identify the witch as the evil old witch who used to live in the village, but was driven off years ago. Some say she inhabits a farm nearby in the wild woods, and the players will be given sketchy directions by one of the village's hunters.

Attempts to scry upon the priestess will fail, as she is in the Dragon's lair, which is warded against scrying.

Ad Hoc XP Adjustment: +15% for difficult terrain (the brambles)