I decided to write up a quick little town based adventure that stands alone, involves a couple of subplots for PC backstories, and gives you enough information to customize it however you want it to be.
No stat blocks, no battle maps – you can pick the ones you want for the level of your PCs, and you can just grab pretty much any street or interior maps you want.
No fixed level because the PCs will determine the CR of the Monsters, and there’s enough of a story here that improvisation should be able to be done if PCs opt to go all murder hobo on folks.
The Grimoire of Hadaria
Materials:
Macguffin:
An old book, thick and filled with pages made from human skin, inked in blood, with gold and silver clasps and a gemstone lock.
Monsters:
- A Minor Monster that is still able to kill easily.
- A Medium Monster that is a threat to the party (1.5 of them for each member of the party).
- A Gigantic Monster that can cause massive destruction and is a deadly challenge for the party as a whole.
People & Places
NPCs
- (A) A creepy Wizard
- (B) Wizard’s Child, with some quality or trait about them that is valuable, but easily lost or wrecked.
- (D) A Corpse, with a generic name.
- (C) A missing Coachman & a mysterious person
- (E) An Old Friend of one of the party members that left under poor terms
- (F) An Old Friend of one of the party members who betrayed the party member, but got away with it.
- (G )A nosy Neighbor
- (H )Nosy neighbor Family Member on the local noble’s payroll
- (I) Boarding house Manager
- (X) An Employee of the club
- (J) The Head of the Town Watch
- (K) A Watchman
- (M) Diner Owner
- (Z )A silent, Hulking Figure that is very strong.
- (T) A short, Nasty Person with magic.
Locales:
- Town
- Wizard’s Home, with library, extensive private gardens, hunting woods on approach.
- Boarding House, where folks rent a room.
- Mean Streets, the area around the town, on the street.
- Tavern/Pub, with live performance & private room.
- Station House, where cross country coaches can leave
- Watch Command, where the town watch interrogates.
- Party Home Base, where the party crashes.
- Cafe/Diner, that serves food
- Inn, with rooms to let
- Friend’s Hideout
- Scary Place, outside the town
Scenes
Wizard’s Home
- Party hired to recover book by (A) who believes it was stolen by (C), after getting too close to (B), of whom (A) is very protective.
- (A) fired (C) for that, and the book vanished.
- Provides last known whereabout, a Boarding House.
- (B) is very much interested in “getting to know” other people, has been sheltered, is very naive about the world and the dangers in it.
- Knows nothing about the book but knows about the Boarding House.
Boarding House
- At the Boarding House, (I) is unwilling to let people snoop, but can be easily distracted by either the party or by some sort of small, annoying creature.
- Investigating the Boarding house, they find a clue that links (C) to a mysterious person and (D).
Mean Streets
- In following up with the clue, the party learns that (D) was often found at a local Nightclub.
Nightclub
- The nightclub is known to the party, because of (F).
- At the nightclub, no one seems to know who (D) is until the party is approached by (E).
- Turns out, (E) recognizes (D) and says they were doing something with (F), but what is unknown.
- (Z) and (T) show up and informs the party that (F) would like to speak with them. Now.
- Once the party meets with (F), they will witness (F) put a curse on an employee who is trying to quit.
- (F) will then insult the part and mock them for being adventurers, bringing up the old betrayal.
- Will want to know what they are doing asking around about (D).
- Will also reveal that (F) and (E) are partners now.
- Regardless of them telling or not, (F) will let them go, with a warning to not come back and stay out of other people’s business.
Mean Streets
- As they are leaving, another employee (X) will ask to meet them.
- When they meet, (X) will say that (D) was there, and is now dead, after (Z) and (T) tracked him down at the Station House.
- (D) often talked about a Scary Place on the outskirts of town that (D) owned, and how some Wizard was trying to buy it from (D).
- Also, (D) was with a Mysterious person, who was supposed to meet them at the Station House the night that (D) died.
- The description of the Mysterious person is similar to but the same as the description of (C).
Station House
- At the Station House, (K) will keep an eye on the Party as they investigate.
- They will find a clue that points towards a diner. (K) will be upset and will haul the party down to the Watch Station.
Watch Command
- There the party will be interrogated by (J).
- They will want all evidence turned over, and the party to stop poking their nose into things.
- (J) will also know about both histories with (E) and (F) and warn them off, saying those are bad people.
- (J) plans to lock them up, but right then (H) will appear, with (G), and force (J) to let the party go.
Home Base
- As they leave, the party will encounter (B), who is lost, scared, and in danger — because of following them.
- It will be too late to do anything, so the party should return to home base, with (B) and (G), who will remind them of rent or say how worried they are about them.
- They did a divination, and that’s how they knew the party was in trouble. (G) will know what the book is, and say that it is bad, bad, very bad.
- The next morning, (B) will mention the diner and being hungry, because (C) had told them about it.
The Diner
- As the party arrives the Diner, (T) will be there, but will leave shortly after paying for their food.
- The food will be good, but when done, (M) will deliver a small object on a plate and try to get away quickly.
- On a DC8 perception check, the party will realize it is a Magical Rube and contains a deadly monster.
- This will be a bloody fight.
- There will be considerable damage and noise, and (K) will show up.
- The Cook, the Dishwasher, and (M) can all be slain, but at least one of them must live long enough to say that (C) is holed up at the Inn.
- (K) will take (B) home and says that someone has it in for the party.
The Inn
- The party can now go to the Inn. On the way there, they will meet (F), who will come along either openly or sneakily.
- There they will find that the Mysterious Person is indeed (C) in disguise.
- (C) will not know what has happened to (D).
- When they find out, they will tell the party that the book is the secret to performing a horrible ritual, and that (B) is the sacrifice for that ritual.
- That (C) stole the book and (D) sold a fake copy of it to (F), and they were planning on taking the book a long way away, as the only place it can be used is the Scary Place.
- (C) still has the book, but right then, the party is attacked by terrible monsters.
- The Monsters want the book — they will kill anything that tries to stop them, but once they have the book they will flee (assuming they can get it).
- The Monsters will take the book back to (A).
- If the party retains the book and kills all the monsters, (C) will say that they are all in great danger and need to get out — but there’s no Coaches out of town until the day after tomorrow — and the ritual must be performed tomorrow night.
- At that point, (F) will appear and offer a great hideout: their place.
- Nobody knows where it is, and (F) lives in an upscale area.
Hideout
- On arrival at (F)‘s place, the party is ambushed by (E) — another betrayal.
- (F) will try to capture the party, using sleeping powder or similar means.
- If (F) fails, they will flee, leaving (Z) and (T) to take care of the party while they make their escape with (E).
- (F) will head to the scary place, which (T) will admit if about to die.
- If (F) does capture the party, then the party will all awaken at the Scary Place the next day.
- Also, will kill (T) for failing to kill to the party at the diner.
Scary Place
- At the Scary place, (A) and (F) will meet, having struck a bargain.
- Once (A) has the book in hand, they will kill (F) and will begin the ritual.
- (B) will be hauled out and placed as a sacrifice.
- An immense, horrific, terrible evil will spring forth but will be angry that the sacrifice no longer has the important quality about them and will go after (A) instead.
- Their battle will be terrible, and (B) will be caught in the middle of it.
- The party can attempt to help stop the creature but will be attacked with magic by (A), and if they attack the creature, it will attack both them and (A).
- If the party attempts to rescue (B), the monster will not stop them and (A) will ignore them — but (E) will try to stop them.
- (B) will only be concerned about (K), who is secured away in a locked place nearby, and is responsible for having wrecked the special quality of (B).
- Both the Monster and (A) will attempt to kill the party once the other is defeated, so the party should focus on that then.
Epilogue
- If they win, they will be left with the book, (B) will go off with (K), and (C) will leave town.
- (B) will honor the payment and give them a bonus. and (K) will give them a bonus as well: the nightclub.
In terms of a few things to spice it up, I have left out Motifs, Keywords, Atmosphere, and Genre.
My suggestions:
- Motif: Rain. Lots and lots of rain. Hint of rain, thought of rain, actual rain.
- Keywords (words you use often in description) Shabby, Slick, Slimy, Shiny, Sickening
- Atmosphere: Grimy, bitter, cynical, demeaning
- Genre Options: Gothic, Noir, Ancient World, Mystery, Western, Action Adventure.
The general storyline is an adaptation, and I have used the above to run a side quest in a town a few times.
For a VTT you’ll need a map for each of the Locales, and you can reuse the Mean Streets one.
