Than Greyhawk: Molé's Basement

From AJS.COM

Contents 1 Setup 2 The Devil 3 End result 4 Using this scenario

Setup

Molé Pembroke, a local merchant of Verbobonc, needed Than's group to investigate his mother's (and adoptive father's) home. Both of his parents had recently died, and the question of where exactly his inheritence had gone to was a mystery to both him and his late mother. Molé had not spoken to his mother for some years, due to her marriage to Gypsum, a wizard of highly questionable standing (the man was reputed to be a necromancer).

The party went to Molé's new estate and discovered a secret dungeon below. There, they found evidence that Gypsum had been training cultists of a demi-god demon of destruction named, Malhugh.

The Devil

In the innermost part of the cultists' lair, the party found a devil who had apparently been summoned just before Gypsum met his untimely end (almost certainly due to poison from an unknown source). From his writings, it seemed as if Gypsum felt that the enslavement of a devil would elevate him among the ranks of his demonic master's favor. The party ignored the devils offers of a deal, and instead called in the Clerics of Pelor who, unfortunately, left lesser accolites in chage of drawing a circle in preperation for banishing the devil. One of the accolites fell prey to the devil's bargaining and was killed when he released it. The devil promptly flew through the ceiling of the dungeon, into the outside and went straight to Verbobonc to kill Molé.

End result

Oddly enough, the death of Than's client and his out-of-pocket expenses were not too bad a set-back. Because of the notariety of dealing with a devil (who killed only one person in the city) and because the release of the devil was blamed on the Clerics of Pelor, Than's business saw a jump in requests. Suddenly he had more work available than he could handle.

Using this scenario

If you wish to adapt this scenario to your own game, you will need to do several things:

• Figure out why/how Molé contacts the party (this is designed to be a low-level session)
• Populate a dungeon for use under Gypsum's home appropriate for the party
• Decide how/why Gypsum died so suddenly in your game
• Gypsum is evil, but he loved his wife. It is important to balance those factors when determining how he died and why he left the devil in the dungeon
• There are some homes near the estate. Rumors and hints should be available, should the PCs stop to talk with the residents
• Decide who the demon Malhugh is. He could be an aspect of Tharizdun, or simply an upstart demon whose influence is growing. He could also be fictional, and his "cult" simply a front for some other evil organization
• There should be dire consequences for doing what the devil initially suggests.

A suggested route is to leave clues for the means to banish the devil, but have the devil offer the players a deal. The initial deal offered will always have a loophole which allows the devil to kill the person who breaks his protective circle, but if pressed, he will make a deal which protects the players. He wants revenge on Gypsum's family, so he would not make a deal which precluded killing Molé.