ADVENTURE SUMMARY

ABOUT THIS ADVENTURE

By the way, that cover art comes from Grinding Gear Games, and their
concept art for Path of Exile’s “War for the Atlas” expansion.
 OTHER PC GUIDELINES

BACKSTORY

PC LEVEL CONSIDERATIONS
WHAT YOU TELL THE PLAYERS
 WHAT IS ACTUALLY GOING ON

This is supposed to be Bartholomew Creedich. It obviously isn’t my own

artwork: I stole it from Francis Tsai, from his work for Wizards of the
Coast in “Mysteries of the Moonsea.”

Here’s a nice view of Anaris Keep. Alternately, it’s just an art asset that
I blatantly cribbed from InnoGames’ browser game Tribal Wars 2.
No, this is fine. Everything is going to be fine,
don’t worry about it. This friendly piece of
Path of Exile fanart comes from wacalac.
STARTING THE GAME ARCANE BALLISTA

CASUAL DRAGON SLAYING

SO WHY BOTHER WITH THIS DRAGON?

You might notice that this dragon encounter has exactly
nothing to do with the rest of the plot. Certainly, if you were
trying to cut this adventure down to fit a single session, this
fight would probably be the first thing on the chopping block.
That being said, I do think that this introduction serves two
important purposes. First, introducing the PCs as Big Damn
Heroes enhances the horror of then immediately putting them
in a confusing and helpless situation, against an
overwhelmingly powerful foe. Second, this gives the players
some time to get into character and maybe even roleplay a little
bit. The more they flesh out their PCs’ personalities, quirks, and
skillsets, the better you’ll be able to specifically tailor the notes
left behind by their past selves to match their individual
characters, which helps to boost the creepiness factor.
 Talk about a great place to slay a dragon.
This lovely bit of art, dubbed “At Mountains
Feet,” was created by one Josu Solano.
ARRIVING BACK HOME KEEPING TRACK OF TIME
As the plaque indicates, the rate at which time passes is a key
component to this adventure: The PCs only have 24 hours
inside the bunker, so time is a valuable commodity to track. All
of the relevant time-consuming tasks that the PCs might
engage in, such as short or long rests, studying notes (see
Handling Research, page 11), or crafting items (see Gem of
Seeing, also page 11), have durations measured in whole hours,
which should help keep things simple. Assume that the PCs
have some way of accurately keeping time as the adventure
unfurls.

MEMORY AIRLOCK (2)

BUNKER ENTRANCE (1)

WITH THE GEM

Here’s a quick map of the bunker, made easy
courtesy of ProbableTrain’s Dungeon Scrawl.
ENTRANCE (3) READING THE SECOND NOTE

WITH THE GEM

FIRST BEDROOM (4) WITH THE GEM

STORAGE ROOM (6)

WITH THE GEM

SECOND BEDROOM (5)

WITH THE GEM

LABORATORY #1 (7)

ABOUT RESTS
WITH THE GEM
You might want to think carefully about how you handle short
or long rests during the course of this adventure. It’s entirely
reasonable that the PCs will try to take a short or long rest
during their stay here. However, if they put it off for too long,
their rest is likely to be interrupted by one (or more) attacks. In
addition, the rests that the PCs complete will drastically affect
the number and difficulty of encounters that the PCs will be
able to survive over the course of this adventure: feel free to
balance things on the fly to account for this.
LABORATORY #2 (8) A NOTE ABOUT NOTES
These notes are designed to be handed out the players to
provide some direct quotations from the notes PCs are
perusing, and supplement the more general information
narrated by the DM. Rather than just handing them out as-is,
you’ll definitely want to take some time to tailor them do your
specific PCs. I’ve put various parts of the notes [in brackets] to
indicate places where you should substitute in their names,
with suggestions as for which class or type of character would
be appropriate for that note. I would also highly recommend
dropping some trivial notes here, along with some
“bombshells:” have the PCs’ past selves mention names that
the players don’t recognize, but are implied to be past
teammates, siblings, significant others, etc.
THE GEM OF SEEING

WITH THE GEM

HANDLING RESEARCH

ABOUT THE BUNKER

Here’s a gem of seeing. It’s literally just the picture of the gem of
seeing from the 5e “Dungeon Master’s Guide” (you know, the one
from Wizards of the Coast).
THE MEMORY AIRLOCK

HOW CAN WE FIGHT BACK?

WHAT ARE WE FIGHTING?

THE GEM OF SEEING

 NADARR’S JOURNAL THE MONSTERS

 ꝸѦ̻↨┘ꝰ‫ﻻ‬
֎֢
 ‫͍῭ⴟﻫ‬
ⱡ ⁞‾‫ﻻ‬
 Ͳ͚ࢰ̐ ࣺ҈
 ؇‫א‬ჱὧ ͇
͌ﬓ

RIFTLINGS
ꝸѦ̻↨┘ꝰ‫ﻻ‬
֎֢

֎ꝸѦ̻↨┘ꝰ‫ﻻ‬
Medium aberration, unaligned

Armor Class 14 (natural armor)

Hit Points 32 (5d8 + 10)
Speed 30 ft.

This is a riftling STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA

(Image credit: Daren Horley) 17 (+3) 15 (+2) 15 (+2) 3 (-4) 12 (+1) 10 (+0)

Skills Perception +3, Stealth +4

Senses passive Perception 13
Languages —
Challenge 1 (200 XP)

Pile On. The ֎ꝸѦ̻↨┘ꝰ‫ ﻻ‬has advantage on attack rolls against a

creature if it or another ֎ꝸѦ̻↨┘ꝰ‫ ﻻ‬is attached to it.

Actions
Claw. Melee Weapon Attack: +5 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target.
Hit: 10 (2d6 + 3) slashing damage and the ֎ꝸѦ̻↨┘ꝰ‫ ﻻ‬attaches
to the target. While attached, the ֎ꝸѦ̻↨┘ꝰ‫ ﻻ‬moves with the
target, and the target’s speed is reduced by 10 feet.
The ֎ꝸѦ̻↨┘ꝰ‫ ﻻ‬can detach itself by spending 5 feet of its
movement. In addition, a creature that uses its action and
succeeds on a DC 13 Strength (Athletics) or Dexterity
(Acrobatics) check can detach 1d3 ֎ꝸѦ̻↨┘ꝰ‫ﻻ‬s from itself or a
willing creature within 5 feet.
GIANT FUCKOFF SPIDERS HARBINGER OF ؇‫א‬ჱὧ‡ﬓ
͇͌
Large aberration, unaligned

Armor Class 16 (natural armor)

Hit Points 184 (16d10 + 96)
Speed 30 ft., fly 30 ft. (hover)

STR DEX CON INT WIS CHA

17 (+3) 12 (+1) 23 (+6) 18 (+4) 12 (+1) 16 (+3)

Saving Throws Dex +6, Wis +6, Cha +8

Skills Athletics +3, Stealth +5
‫͍῭ⴟﻫ‬
ⱡ ⁞‾‫ﻻ‬ Damage Resistances cold; bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing
from nonmagical attacks
Damage Immunities psychic
Condition Immunities charmed, frightened, paralyzed,
petrified, poisoned, restrained
Senses darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 16
THE LONELY Languages —
Challenge 16 (15000 XP)

Innate Spellcasting. The harbinger of ؇‫א‬ჱὧ‡ﬓ’s innate

spellcasting ability Charisma (spell save DC 16, +8 to hit with
spell attacks). It can innately cast the following spells, requiring
no material components:

At will: eldritch blast (3 beams, +3 bonus to each damage roll),

minor illusion, modify memory
3/day: antipathy/sympathy
1/day: circle of death

Actions
THE HARBINGER Slam. Melee Weapon Attack: +8 to hit, reach 10 ft., one target.
؇‫א‬ჱὧ ͇
͌ﬓ Hit: 7 (1d8 + 3) bludgeoning damage plus 13 (3d8) psychic
damage, and the target must succeed on a DC 19 Intelligence
saving throw or be poisoned until the end of its next turn.
Tendril Field (Recharge 6). Each creature of the harbinger’s
choice within 10 feet of it must make a DC 19 Dexterity saving
throw. On a failure the target takes 22 (5d8) pyschic damage
and is blinded and restrained by dark spectral tendrils. An
affected creature takes 22 (5d8) pyschic damage at the start of
each of the harbinger’s turns. The creature can repeat the
saving throw at the end of each of its turns, ending the effect
on itself on a success.

Legendary Actions
The harbinger of ؇‫א‬ჱὧ‡ﬓ can take 3 legendary actions,
choosing from the options below. Only one legendary option
can be used at a time and only at the end of another creature’s
turn. The harbinger regains spent legendary actions at the start
of its turn.
Move. The harbinger moves up to its speed without provoking
attacks of opportunity.
Cantrip (Costs 2 Actions). The harbinger casts one cantrip.
Slam (Costs 2 Actions). The harbinger makes one slam attack.
Feed (Costs 3 Actions). Each creature restrained by the
harbinger’s Tendril Field takes 13 (3d8) psychic damage, and
the harbinger gains 6 temporary hit points.
COMBAT ENCOUNTERS ENCOUNTER #6: THE END

ENCOUNTER #7: ؇‫א‬ჱὧ‡͇

͌ﬓ

OKAY, LET’S BE ASSHOLES

Running a one-shot with disposable PCs offers some unique
opportunities to you as the DM. In particular, a one-shot
means that you don’t need to be concerned with the long-term
health of the PCs, and you can be much freer with afflicting
them with permanent and debilitating effects. Given that this

ENCOUNTER #1: JUST EYES adventure revolves around monsters who can remove victims
from living memory, wouldn’t it be cool if the monsters here
could simply erase parts of the PCs’ pasts? Here’s what I
recommend: every time a PC fails a saving throw against a
harbinger’s slam or the lonely’s Sorrowful Embrace, or just
takes damage from the harbinger’s Feed action, delete
something from their character sheet. Maybe a skill proficiency,
a known spell, or a ribbon class feature. Don’t announce this,
just quietly alter their character sheet. If the player tries to use a
removed ability, look at them with a confused look on your face
and say “[Feature]? No, [PC name] has never had [Feature],
what are you talking about?”

HOW TO CONCLUDE THIS

ENCOUNTER #2: RIFTLINGS


ENCOUNTER #3: ESCALATION 


ENCOUNTER #4: MORE CREEP 


ENCOUNTER #5: HARBINGER
 THE SECOND BUNKER
EXITING THE BUNKER


GETTING THERE

 Another piece of Path of Exile fanart, this
time from Alex Manis.

OKAY, BUT I’M A JERK, AND

THAT’S ALL TOO OPTIMISTIC

BORING STUFF