Roleplaying Corner Adventure Module: The Darkness of the Dark Queen of the Underdark

A wizard casts a spell!In this adventure module the players will learn that Drow raiding parties have been striking towns around the town they happen to be drinking in. They will follow the sweet scent of adventure to discover the evil secrets of the Dark Queen who rules over an army of the dead from the darkness of the Underdark.

The Darkness of the Dark Queen of the Underdark is an adventure intended for 4-6 characters of level 4-8. It can also be played by 6-12 adventurers of levels 2-4. If you want it can be played by 15 adventurers of level 1 and a 16th adventurer of level 3 but this might get too big to manage. In that case you can have two players play the same character of level 5 which reduces the number of character from 16 to 8, which will include the level 3 character but eliminate 8 level 1 characters. As an alternative to this you can have everyone buddy up and share a character of level 2 with two people playing level 3 characters and then a level 5 character controlled by the Dungeon Master.

Background

Princess Toritha Zonathiq Mollaisisica is a powerful Drow cleric who has finally poisoned her mother and usurped the throne of the shadowy Underdark to rule over her kingdom. Seemingly uselessly she is expending the lives of her Drow warriors in battle against the humans on the surface, but she has an evil scheme to bring back their bodies as magical skeletons. An entire army completely obedient to her! With this she will then conquer the entire world because it is really hard to kill a skeleton since it is already dead. I mean arrows and spears do nothing to them, it takes like a huge club or a mace or something to really lay into them. It's up to the players to unravel this evil scheme and adventure into the extremely scary Underdark to face the new Queen of the Underdark and her many minions.

Scene One: In the Tavern

The characters are relaxing in Ye Olde Sodden Merkine Bare and Grille enjoying mead, grog, and various other old-timesy type drinks that no one actually drinks anymore like sarsaparilla, sherry, or wine coolers. The players should determine the level of drunkenness of their characters by rolling on the Comparative Inebriation By Body Weight and Magical Wards Against Intoxicants (Lord Pabst's Guide to Taverns, Page 45). Characters that are determined to be "somewhat drunk" should spin in a circle several times to disorient themselves before any role playing. Characters that are "pretty blitzed" should begin drinking orange juice and eating cheese and then vomiting into a bucket. If any characters are "shitfaced to oblivion" then they should jump on top of the table and begin urinating on the Dungeon Master's screen while singing "Roxanne".

Inside the tavern are five NPCs which may provide information, companionship, or ribald conversations. Stink-or is the local drunk here (level 4 dwarf town drunkard) in the village of Yeomansrylichbeinberg and he can provide information about recent Drow attacks in the surrounding area. Vanessa Tavernwenche is the senior buxom tavern wench (level 7 human barkrieger) and she can provide wanton companionship for a lusty character as well as some information about how to repair gnomish autogyros. Leona Karpinski is a local aristocrat (level 3 half-elf trophy wife) who is enjoying some iced tea and finger sandwiches in the corner. She will be way too mean to the players for them to get any information out of her because they are lower class and inferior. If the players attack her she will Gate in reinforcements from her loft apartment in the form of D4 filthy socialite hangers on (level 2 unskilled arrogant wretches) and attempt to flee through a secret tunnel beneath her booth while the characters have to see horrible assemblage art and listen to Kayli's turgid narrative about her trip to Aspen.

A wounded guard brings word of adventure!The bartender in the Sodden Merkine is Heath Drinksler (level 5 human bar lord/level 2 soda jerk) who can serve up delicious mixed drinks and lively conversation in equal measure. Heath does have a quick temper and any characters who are "pretty blitzed" or above must make a save versus drunken antics (difficulty mach 3) to avoid enraging Heath. If enraged, Heath will call upon the power of his mighty hammer Consigliore and ask them politely to leave. If they do not comply he will have Vanessa Tavernwenche fetch the local constabulary. Javier Hernandez is the last remaining occupant of the tavern and he works as the short order cook there (level 3 half-orc barbarian chef). Javier does not speak English and will become irritated and curse in orcish if the players enter the kitchen.

After roughly an hour a rain storm will begin to hit the village and Vanessa will close the shutters on the windows. An hour after that the door will bang open dramatically and a traveler will enter. Read the following:

The door opens suddenly and you see a man in rain soaked clothing wearing the uniform of the town watch. He has an arrow in his side.

"I have an arrow in my side," he moans, staggering into the tavern.

He sways unsteadily and then drops down into a booth near the door. The tavern wench makes her way over to him and asks him what he would like to order.

"I have a message to deliver to bold heroes and adventurers of the land!" He cries, standing up again suddenly. "The Drow have set upon our village and no longer are we safe. The Dark Queen has taken many of our villagers alive and even our dead. You may not have heard it happening because of the storm. Now please, adventure through the Forest of Black Darkness and into the dreaded Underdark to combat this scourge upon our peoples!"

The man staggers, grabbing at the arrow wound.

"Please, I have an arrow in my side and have not long to live. Tis your duty as adventurers to honor the king with your heroism. Alas, I am dead."

He then dies.

The tavern keeper provides the characters with a map through the Forest of Black Darkness with the foreboding entrance to the Underdark clearly marked. It is widely known throughout the land that to gain entrance to the Forest of Black Darkness champions must defeat the crazed wizard JJ Barnum who is said to have a magical machine of terrifying destruction.

Scene Two: Journey to the Underdark

JJ Barnum's terrible machine!The journey from the tavern to the Underdark is long and difficult. It takes three days including two days overland and one day inside the Forest of Black Darkness. For the first two days roll a D117 on the table below twice per day to see what the players encounter. On the third day run the mini-scenario entitled "JJ Barnum" as the player's gain entrance into the Forest of Black Darkness.

001-009 While crossing the rock fields of Mordraggoraoraora the party is accosted by a group of d10 Lesser Kobolds. If any of the characters speak Koboldish they will understand that the Kobolds are demanding rocks. The players can either give the Kobolds rocks from their inventory or collect rocks from the ground and give them to the Kobolds. If the players do not want to give up their rocks they can attempt a subterfuge roll (difficulty 85) and if successful convince the Kobolds that they are actually standing on millions of rocks. If the roll fails the Kobolds will become convinced that the players are actually rocks and attempt to capture them to feed to their giant chickens to aid in digestion of hard giant seeds. If the players are forced into a situation where they have to fight the giant chickens there are 8 of them and each can be considered a Great Wyrm Chromatic Dragon.

010-018 The players happen upon a +2 Boomerang of Holiday Tidings (Pg 73 of The Holiday Magic Item Manual) that is being held in the hand of a Football Golem (large size). The Football Golem is incapable of using the boomerang as a weapon, but will repeatedly say "hut hut hut" and attempt to tackle members of the party. The Football Golem was created by the powerful Lich Coach of Moonbrite Starspanner State and it is enchanted to immediately attack anyone wearing blue and white; the colors Moonbrite Starspanner State's arch rival Riverdale University.

019-024 The party is approached by a group of Amish Knights seeking assistance in the raising of a barn. They will offer a modest meal and the inherent rewards of a hard day's work if the players will join Sir Jedidiah and Sir Abraham in riding West three miles to the site of the barn raising. If there are magic users or non-Amish clerics in the group they will be advised to not place any hexes on the barn or otherwise interfere with its future success as a barn.

025-038 While traveling through a dark wood the players catch sight of a pack of Ghost Dads (Failed Movie Tie-Ins Compendium, Page 88) who have become trapped as ghosts without a way of returning to their previous lives as non-ghost dads. The Ghost Dads are not particularly observant and can be easily avoided. However, if the characters approach they will immediately attack with their You Kids These Days and Your Music It's Just a Boop Boop Boop and Then a Beep and then Boop Boop at level 3. Any characters struck by this attack must make a saving throw versus Cos (difficulty H) or believe their last name is Huxtable for D6 episodes.

039-040 The characters encounter a giant rabbit (extremely big size). It will ignore them unless a member of the party is a Carrot Elf, a baby giant rabbit, or an electrical cord, in which case it will attempt to eat them.

041-047 The arrival of The Injurer of Bards (Implausible Lords of the Underworld, Page 535) is prefaced by a burst of discordant music and tortured moaning. This demonic lord exists only to harm bards and in the unlikely event that one of the players in the group has selected a bard, he will attack. Since we both know that only girls and homosexuals make bards - neither group having any time for playing this game - you can expect the Injurer of Bards to discuss his hatred of bards at length and then ask for directions to the nearest unharmed bard.

048-065 The players find an abandoned M1A2 Abrams tank +4. It is actually a cursed tank of hideous laughter and will cause any who attempt to wield it to collapse with hideous and unstoppable fits of laughter. The only way to extricate them from the tank is with a remove curse or a remove tank spell.

066-070 The Spanish Inquisition! This is a great opportunity to roll out all of those fresh and hilarious quotes from Monty Python movies and TV episodes. Be sure to work as many references to the "Knights Who Say 'Nee'" into the encounter. You could possibly even have the Spanish Inquisition be looking for the Knights Who Say 'Nee' and they have mistaken the characters for these fabled knights.

071-080 An old man taking a bath. Players must make a saving throw versus old man taking a bath (difficulty 2) or suffer from the effects of a grease spell for D8 turns. The old man is capable of attacking with either dual long swords or a mace of recursive stories about the good old days +1.

081-115 This is the part in every adventure where the players fight orcs. Use a number of orcs appropriate to almost kill them but not quite kill them. Like if there are 10 players then use like 30 orcs and make sure the orcs all run straight at them and then never retreat. If you roll this encounter twice then replace the orcs with lizardmen, goblins, hob-goblins, half-orcs, troglodytes, or any of the creatures from "Dave's Big Book of 1001 Identical Adversaries".

116-117 The players are attacked by an angry mob infected with conjunctivitis. The mob will demand food, water, and eye drops while tearing at the player's clothes and potentially spreading the dread plague of pink eye to them. Each character should make a save versus eye diseases (difficulty 2k4) or they immediately collapse from conjunctivitis. Over the next three days they will lose d6 strength and d6 intelligence until they become a Conjunctivitis Ghoul (Physician's Desk Reference, Page 104).

Mini Scenario "JJ Barnum": JJ Barnum is a crazy old human wizard who has spent his life of magical study building a machine from an ancient book he found at a garage sale. The machine is called Marmaduke's Mediocre Machine. It resembles a large cast-iron or brass hippopotamus with a smoke stack emerging from it head and two huge crab claws at its front. The Mediocre Machine is controlled from a cockpit in the head which is overly cramped and uncomfortable, it also gets very hot inside. The machine runs on precious gems for fuel so its engines must constantly be fed emeralds, diamonds, and rubies. The hatch that you have to put the gems into is very small and prone to be jammed up by the gems. The machine attacks with its claws and does 85D6 damage, however JJ Barnum must first roll to defeat the target's armor class and - if successful - must then roll a natural 20. If he misses hot brass rivets shoot out of the inside of the cockpit and hit JJ Barnum inflicting 2D6 damage. The machine is immune to all forms of magic, fire, cold, and physical attack, but takes 100 times as much damage from electricity attacks. Once per day the Machine may fire a cone of Charm Person from its dazzling quartz crystal eyes. Players who fail their save and are charmed also immediately gain a permanent level of experience, although they are still charmed for the normal D8 turns.

Barnum and his machine guard the entrance to the Forest of Black Darkness. He will ask the adventurers their business and if they respond in any way other than "our business is pleasure" then they will be attacked. Barnum will fight either to the death or until he runs out of gems to operate his machine with (D3 turns).

Scene Three: The Underdark Assault

One of the Dark Queen's sinister skeleton warriors prepares to strike!1. Dead Drow Storage

This is the chamber where the Dark Queen stores the corpses of her Drow warriors who were killed during raids on the surface. The bodies are piled three high in a row of nine and each body is wrapped in soft spidersilk cloth. There are also a few wheeled gurneys, one of which has a body on top, and these are used for transporting the corpses to area 6, The Reanimatorium.

When the players enter, read the following:

You see a sign that reads 'Dead Drow Storage' in crazy Drow runes that you probably can't actually read. The room smells a lot like your grandma's house; like creeping death, decay, and cloying outdated perfume. There is a pile of Drow corpses stacked against the far wall and there is a door made out of heavy Underdark tree wood next to the pile. Leaning against the wall closest to you is an ornate obsidian pitchfork.

The pitchfork is a +1 Cob Slayer and deals an additional D6 points of emotional trauma damage to Corn Cob Elves (one of the Drow's most hated enemies).

2. Habitat for Humanity

Skeleton minions are great and all, but when it comes to pampering their poor motor control and claw-like hands are not very effective. To this end the Dark Queen continues to maintain a large stock of mostly human slaves within her lair. These slaves are kept in line with mind control shackles and sleep on simple straw pallets.

When the players enter, read the following:

It is filthy inside this large but poorly lit room. As you strain your eyes you see a number of men, women, and even children standing around staring blankly ahead or laying flat on their backs asleep on the straw covering the floor. You quickly realize that they are under some sort of spell which makes them about as intelligent as a zombie. You could probably even strip them naked and push them into all sorts of embarrassing sexual positions with each other like you always fantasized about doing with your sister's friends Lucy and Darla. Now is your chance to pay back that cunt Darla for laughing at you when you bent over to put Mountain Dew in the fridge and your asscrack was showing.

The players can free the slaves from their bondage and they will be very grateful. Sexily grateful if you are so inclined. If you are so inclined pass the player notes on how many hot slave women they banged and then make them roll a saving throw versus pregnancy for each one (difficulty N2O).

3. Lair of the Mega Zombie

The Mega Zombie has a taste for an unlucky adventurer's brain!This high-ceilinged room contains the prize weapon of war of the Dark Queen; her enormous Mega Zombie (Monster Manual 3: The Monsters of Camp Spookycapers, Page 201). The Mega Zombie is the magically reanimated corpse of Bonepuncher, a massive Tornado Giant that the Queen's Drow warriors managed to slay. Its chief form of attack is to pick enemies up and crush their heads between its filing cabinet sized teeth. It craves brains, and although dim-witted and slothful, it is stronger than Samson after getting a weave.

When the players enter, read the following:

You enter the room and smell a graveyard. Only like not just a normal graveyard, which doesn't really smell, but like a graveyard where all of the bodies have exploded out of their graves. Like a dead body, really. There is an 80 foot tall zombie in front of you and he says "brains" and starts to approach. Do you talk to him or do you fight him? Answer quickly because he will reach you in several minutes.

The zombie can also be defeated by saying its self-destruct codeword out loud. This codeword is "zombie".

4. The Royal Guard's Rumpus Room

This chamber is used by the Dark Queen's royal guard to relax, just hang out with friends and talk about fun stuff. There is a ping pong table, some bumper pool, an old Crystal Caverns coin-op machine that is totally free, and a couple snack and soda machines. There are always D6+1 Royal Guardsmen lounging around in this room so the players had better watch out.

When the players enter, read the following:

You find yourself inside a rumpus room, with some old video games, bumper pool, foosball, and some other things along those lines. A few of the Queen's Royal Guard are sitting at a couple couches watching Nickelodeon on an old wood-console TV. They're like "sup?" and then you see one of them realizes that you are not supposed to be there and he's all like "man, what the heck?" and then they charge.

If the Queen's Guardsmen are reduced to two or fewer they will flee the room and alert the Queen to the interlopers.

5. The Giant Bee Chamber

This is where the Dark Queen keeps her giant bees. She has them because she like honey and she thinks bees are cute. I think bees are cute too.

When the players enter, read the following:

Don't you think bees are cute? There sure are a lot bees in this room. Busy bees. Big bees. They seem friendly, but then again, what bees don't? The bees attack.

There are 12,473 bees capable of fighting. Treat each as a large sized giant insect. They will attempt to sting the characters to death and then mutilate their corpses feeding the bloody remains to their groaning and bulging horse-sized larvae.

6. The Reanimatorium

The Reanimatorium is the centerpiece of the Dark Queen's scheme to rule the world. This is the factory where she and her wizards use dark magic to animate the skeletons of fallen Drow and enemy soldiers and turn them into an unfeeling army of the dead.

When the players enter, read the following:

There are a lot of pretty scary looking skeletons in this room. The whole room smells like a chemistry teacher's special room that he keeps a key to and there are these big bubbling vats with cranes over them. You can guess that they lower corpses into the vats and turn them into the skeletons through some sort of magic. Then a wizard or something makes them come to life. Oh wait, there is a wizards now, and he looks mad!

The wizard is Magdrguul Hosenfeffer and he is a Level 8 Necromancer. He doesn't really want to fight, in fact he is a pacifist, but he must do battle in the name of the Dark Queen. He will do so by summoning Barn Imps using Monsters Summoning Barn Imps (All Things Barn Imps, Page 2,430) and casting Not Quite Magical but Definitely Unusual Missile at the players.

7. Underdark Cafeteria

Even Drow have to eat and they do their eating in style in this well appointed and fully modern kitchen and cafeteria. The players may be able to disguise themselves as Drow and get a taste of whatever crap the Drow consider good food like baked tree roots, mushrooms, spiders, boogers, and those big grub worms that burrow in the ground.

When the players enter, read the following:

You enter a well-lit cafeteria where the Drow warriors and workers of the Underdark are enjoying their lunch. You see plastic trays heaped with piles of brown sludge and squirming things that are really gross because the Drow are gross and evil and only eat things like baby bats and snake faces. No one immediately notices you and they have a juice bar which looks like it might be okay if you avoid the flavors that are made from spiders.

There are 8 Level 2 Lunch Ladies and a Level 5 Lunch Maven in the cafeteria as well as 2D6+2+D10+3+D117 other Drow enjoying their lunch. These Drow are of various levels and abilities so roll on the random table on Page 35 of "Otiluke's Tome of Drow Kitchens and Dining Areas".

8. There is a Troll in this Room!

There is a troll in this room! I don't know why or how it got there. It has no food, the doors are locked, and there is no furniture in the room. Just a troll standing there waiting to attack.

When the players enter, read the following:

You pick the lock and open the door and there is a troll. It seems like it may want to fight.

If the troll is killed the players find D6x1000 gold pieces, D8x100000 silver pieces, D12x1000000000 copper pieces, a short sword +2, a magic carpet of Arabian enjoyment, three vials of cure dunderhead, a pouch of infinite business cards and unwanted coins with gum stuck to them, a trained tiger named Rococo, a crossbow of caterwauling +1, a monkey's paw, and a ring of invisibility to radar.

9. Banana Storage

A slime waits for unwary heroes to approach!This is the room where the Dark Queen keeps her vast prize of bananas. They are mysterious bananas with purposes unknown.

When the players enter, read the following:

The room is full of bananas. There are somewhere between 40 and 550,000 bananas in this room. It smells like bananas.

Some of the bananas are magical but not in a good way. For every banana eaten by the party roll a D6, on a result of 1 consult the chart on Page 66 of "Bananas: Curses and Venoms". It should be noted that if someone contracts Banana Angeloliosis they will not turn into a seraphim until after the adventure is over.

10. Uh-Oh Pah-Skettiohs

This room seems empty except for a floating skeleton and a floating sword. Characters might think this is some sort of wizardry or witchcraft but it is actually an optical illusion. The skeleton and sword are floating inside a Greater Slime Pudding (Slimes, etc, Page 124) and the pudding is hungry.

When the players enter, read the following:

You see a skeleton floating in this otherwise barren room. It may be floating through magic or it may be trapped inside the body of a greater slime pudding. You can be the judge for yourself.

The Greater Slime Pudding is bipolar and may stop fighting suddenly to sulk.

11. The Dark Queen Awaits!

The Dark Queen is as evil as she is large breasted!This chamber is the immense bedroom of the Dark Queen. The Dark Queen is a powerful cleric and can probably kill the party but she will try to use guile and her feminine charms (Charisma 40, imagine how hot that is, mmmmmmm). If she cannot convince any of the players to join her army or have sex with her then she will attack them.

When the players enter, read the following:

From the dank corridors of the Dark Queen's secret lair you enter her finely appointed quarters. There is gold everywhere. Even the gold chairs have gold gems on them. Then you see this really hot Drow chick in this tight shirt where you can her nipples and she has washboard abs and is wearing this sheer silk cloth thong thing so you can see a camel toe. Man is it hot. Then she comes up to you guys and she is like "I hope you have come to pay me a visit in my bed" she winks and licks her lips. Then she adds "If not you can join my army, I will gladly have more warriors just go to the Reanimatorium and climb into one of the alchemical vats" and she licks her lips and pushes her boobs together so you can see more cleavage.

If the players elect to join the Dark Queen's army they can continue playing as skeletons only they have to obey whatever the Dark Queen commands and this usually involves marching around, standing in formation, or basic secret lair maintenance and cleaning. If any of the players have sex with the Dark Queen she will have sex really fast and then say "uuuuuuuuh now you are mine" and make sure to say "it feels awesome" but then the bad part is they are her eternal slaves. Assuming the players decide to fight the Dark Queen will summon her skeletal minions to assist her, bringing D10+2 per round. She generally uses paralyzing spells like Hold Guys and Freeze Monsters, but will also use more offensive spells like Ray's Righteous Ribbon and St. Andersen's Electric Shredder.

When the players manage to slay the Dark Queen she will scream and a bookcase will fall revealing her secret; the Unicorn Princess. She and 50 big white unicorns bust out of the book case and are like "thanks for rescuing us" and she is really hot but she has to stay a virgin to become the Unicorn Queen but she may do oral.

Scene Four: Conclusion

With the Dark Queen defeated the Unicorn Princess will once again be free on the Island of Strong Words. She offers a unicorn mount to each of the characters as reward for their heroism and that's pretty convenient because when the players return to Yeomansrylichbeinberg they find a parade going on in their honor. The king is there and he places a medal around their necks (it's on a string) like in the movie "Star Wars". There are some people playing drums and there are also fireworks. Then there is a banquet. Then the players can go onto other adventures, or I guess they could decide to settle down, or even marry their unicorn and start a family of unicorn centaurs, unless they were unicorns themselves in which case it would just be regular unicorns as the offspring. It also works like that if they use polymorph so I guess a wizard could theoretically make a unicorn or a unicorn centaur, but no matter what their house would have to be a lot like a barn with beds maybe.

That Adventure Module Sucks

Dr. David Thorpe is back once again with a brand new installment of sucking. The crabby dickhead takes on some of our readers as well as the oft-maligned Avril Lavigne.

It goes deeper than ties and white belts, though. To thousands of people, hearing the name “Avril Lavigne” mentioned in the same breath as the word “punk” is like being slapped in the face with the bloated corpse of their counterculture. Typing those two terms into Google, in fact, will yield countless sites dissecting her connection to that term. She’s hailed as a “punk princess” by some sites and derided as a reprehensible poseur by many more. The truth of the matter is she has more in common with Marilyn Manson than Sid Vicious, in a strange way.

I suggest you endure his rant once again!

– Zack "Geist Editor" Parsons (@sexyfacts4u)