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View Full Version : DM Help Filling in the details of an alien crypt...



tribalxgecko
2015-11-29, 10:08 AM
I have a game tonight, in about 8 hours. Now, normally this would be all fine and dandy, but this week has been crazy to say the least. I had today off and planned to sitdown and do my prep for the game tonight, but low-and-behold...I got called into work until 5pm, an hour before my game starts. That means my prep time has been wiped out. With that said, here I am, coming to you fine folk to see what you can give me. Here are the details:

Game: Stars Without Number
Setup: The players are visiting a shattered moon, conveniently named Sepulcher. They have taken a fellow scientist there to do some studying on what was an old civilization that he believes have something to do with the origin of psionic abilities, the scream, or perhaps both.

The aliens have am ancient Roman type of theme. The temple they are visiting is very large, however, it only has a few rooms (5). They are just very large. I basically need help filling in the details of the rooms with interesting stuff, encounters, and things to do.

What I already have: I do have a couple of details to work off of.

1) First, there are several frozen bodies that have been ripped apart on the steps and just past the main entrance of the building. They are now frost covered and frozen, so it is hard to say how long they have been there. I don't yet know the history behind these guys.

2) There furthest back room has a variety of old alien pre-tech lighting things that cast a dim orange glow. In the center is a pyramidal shape rising up out of the floor. There will be some sort of hidden entrance to it. In truth, it is the tip of a pyramid, which has been buried by ice, snow, and other debris over multiple millenniums. Eventually, only the top part was left, and so whoever, or whatever, made this temple built it around the remaining part of the pyramid that was still left uncovered.

Inside is a huge alien entity, that is still alive, sorta. I say huge, because the pyramid is the coffin. Its body is a dried up husk of a mummy, and it is dead in that sense, but its mind is still awake. It is able to tap into living creatures mind, controlling their cognitive and motor skills, essentially turning them into puppets. It feeds off of their thoughts, and eventually drains them to the point of a bumbling idiot.

To get back to the task at hand, and as I said above, I have the premise, but I don't want just a bunch of empty rooms, or rooms with 'debris' around. I want some interesting stuff for them to do and encounter. I have a couple ideas jotted down, but I am headed to work in 20 min, and I know I am not gonna have a chance to do any prep while I am there.

So what'ya say, can ya help a fellow GM out? Maybe? Pretty Please?? Thank you!!!

NowhereMan583
2015-11-29, 02:51 PM
Have you been reading Charles Stross? This totally sounds like the pyramid from the Laundry Files.

Anyway, it's a temple, right? So there should be places where people would actually worship. Rows of pews, blasphemously shaped idols, bloodstained altars. Maybe a couple reliquaries that hold mummified parts of something truly disturbing. Ask yourself how their worship would be conducted, and you'll have a lot to build off of.

Similarly, how did the thing wind up trapped in the pyramid like that? Decide how that happened, then leave evidence to that effect scattered around.

ReaderAt2046
2015-11-29, 04:51 PM
I have a game tonight, in about 8 hours. Now, normally this would be all fine and dandy, but this week has been crazy to say the least. I had today off and planned to sitdown and do my prep for the game tonight, but low-and-behold...I got called into work until 5pm, an hour before my game starts. That means my prep time has been wiped out. With that said, here I am, coming to you fine folk to see what you can give me. Here are the details:

Game: Stars Without Number
Setup: The players are visiting a shattered moon, conveniently named Sepulcher. They have taken a fellow scientist there to do some studying on what was an old civilization that he believes have something to do with the origin of psionic abilities, the scream, or perhaps both.

The aliens have am ancient Roman type of theme. The temple they are visiting is very large, however, it only has a few rooms (5). They are just very large. I basically need help filling in the details of the rooms with interesting stuff, encounters, and things to do.

What I already have: I do have a couple of details to work off of.

1) First, there are several frozen bodies that have been ripped apart on the steps and just past the main entrance of the building. They are now frost covered and frozen, so it is hard to say how long they have been there. I don't yet know the history behind these guys.

2) There furthest back room has a variety of old alien pre-tech lighting things that cast a dim orange glow. In the center is a pyramidal shape rising up out of the floor. There will be some sort of hidden entrance to it. In truth, it is the tip of a pyramid, which has been buried by ice, snow, and other debris over multiple millenniums. Eventually, only the top part was left, and so whoever, or whatever, made this temple built it around the remaining part of the pyramid that was still left uncovered.

Inside is a huge alien entity, that is still alive, sorta. I say huge, because the pyramid is the coffin. Its body is a dried up husk of a mummy, and it is dead in that sense, but its mind is still awake. It is able to tap into living creatures mind, controlling their cognitive and motor skills, essentially turning them into puppets. It feeds off of their thoughts, and eventually drains them to the point of a bumbling idiot.

To get back to the task at hand, and as I said above, I have the premise, but I don't want just a bunch of empty rooms, or rooms with 'debris' around. I want some interesting stuff for them to do and encounter. I have a couple ideas jotted down, but I am headed to work in 20 min, and I know I am not gonna have a chance to do any prep while I am there.

So what'ya say, can ya help a fellow GM out? Maybe? Pretty Please?? Thank you!!!

Add some mechanisms around the final chamber to dampen psionic abilities (the worshippers would need protection from the hunger of their god). Your call on whether or not they should work, but at least one party member should be able to recognize what they do/did (maybe have to roll knowledge for it, though). Also add a lot of frozen bodies with no appearent cause of death (the entity drained them until they didn't even have enough intelligence to feed themselves, at which point they starved to death.