The Ruined Tower of Zenopus Prep Notes, Part Two

Continuing my fluffy prep for The Ruined Tower of Zenopus, Zach Howard's 5e adaption of Holmes' Sample Dungeon. Room A, The Goblin's Abode can be found here.

B. Bone Guards
50x50
Walls are engraved with images of simple, linear figures (like Etruscan vases) in esoteric attitudes.
4 closet-sized alcoves, covered with faded tapestries.
Skeletons will attack as soon as someone is 10’ into the room.
Upon examination, these skeletons aren’t bone—they are the same milky white stone as the dungeon. If destroyed, they will reassemble the next day. Blue tracery will mark any places where they were broken the previous day.


C. Corridors
Most corridors are 10’ wide and 10’ high, and made of tightly fitted white stone.

At the referee’s discretion, some of the corridors may show signs of their long neglect:

1. Earthquakes have shifted the paving stones, causing rises and drops of ten feet or more and breaking up any level surfaces. Passage through this corridor can only be accomplished at climbing speed.
2. The ceiling has caved in. Great stones and earth have fallen in. At its narrowest point, this corridor is reduced to a 3’ square, forcing medium creatures to crawl, and proving impassable to large ones.
3. This corridor dips, and the lower section of it is flooded—either partially or completely.

D. Room of Doors
70x40’
The door entering this room swings open easily, but the other doors are magically held shut, as per Arcane Lock. Breaking or engineering a door open is a DC 23+ check or a Knock spell.

 In the center is a white-stone statue of a Tiberian sage (INT History +15 provides the name Blandus Alblutius, rhetoritician and wizard). The statue faces the door the PCs first enter through. It stands on a round base, which easily swivels.

Turning the statue to face a door unlocks it.


E. Empty Rooms
Several rooms stand empty. At the referee’s discretion, they may suffer the same signs of neglect as the corridors (see above), or they may possess magical effects leftover from Zenopus’ experiments.

1. Gravity is reversed. Upon entering, an unwary creature must pass DEX (Acrobatics) 15 to avoid 1d6 falling damage.
2. One wall is magnetized—powerful enough to yank a weapon from your hand, or drag an armored figure off their feet. STR 15+ to resist.
3. The stones making up the walls, floor, and ceiling pulse with light in the following sequence: 2 rounds of pitch black; 5 rounds of waxing light; 2 rounds of blinding light; 5 rounds of waning light.
4. This room smells of a delicious meal, fine wine, and flowers. The sounds of delighted conversation and distant music just barely reach the ears. The room is otherwise bare.
5. The room is filled completely with an amber jelly. A creature can enter the jelly, which will close seamlessly behind them. In the jelly, one can breathe normally. Movement is quartered and physical ranged weapons will not work. The jelly cannot be removed from the room.
6. A list of words are carved into the lintel across the top of the entrance to this room. If one of these words is spoken aloud while inside the room, the room will take on the appearance of a new environment. Whether these environments are fabrications or actual views on distant locations is not apparent. Walking too far in any direction will cause a collision with the walls of the room. After about a minute, the vision fades away, revealing the room again. The words are: Benthi (a crevasse at the bottom of an ocean); Hadop (a flowered field); Modos (an abandoned city of glass spires); Lim (the dark interior of a wooden shipping crate); Haline (an infernal landscape of fire and magma); Yonell (a frozen field under a starless sky).