Escape the Rituals of the Bone-Melters!

You have looked deep enough into the black abyss. Traveled to libraries long erased from all maps. It’s finally yours. The Skull’s Atlas.

Welcome to this new section on the Skull Azure Blog, all about cool Locations, Plot Hooks and Adventures for your game! I will keep the focus on Magic Items, growing the Skull’s Trove, and you’ll still get the occasional Skull’s Insight, but the Atlas will provide you with playable content ready to be explored by your players!

Enough bookkeeping, it’s time to find our way out of the terrible cavern prison known as the Pits of Sheru. 

The Pits of Sheru are designed to be a challenge for characters level 2-4, a perfect starting adventure for level 3 characters that have been taken prisoner in a deep jungle. 

Stats are kept simple for easy reference and adaptability to other DND systems, and don’t require additional material.

Pits of Sheru Map

The Prison Temple of the Saurians

The Pits of Sheru is a sacred site located deep in the jungles of the South. Many Saurian folks live in these places, but one specific tribe makes this prison its church. The common folk call them the Bone-Melters, black-scaled reptilians, shunned by other tribes for their tyrannical ways and weird religious practices. The Bone-Melters are ruled by a shamanic order devoted to Ska, the Venom. Members of the cult regulate their diet and practice sacrificial rituals to grow large, bright-yellow sacks under their chin. These mutations allow the saurians to produce a potent acid, which they use to expand their diet, eating every part of their prey. It is virtuous for some to even eat humanoid prisoners, as well as other saurians.

Prisoners of the Pits of Sheru usually wait long weeks under the scorching sun, visible from the bottom of one of the cylindrical wells. Their only mistake was venturing too deep in the jungle. The lucky ones are picked first, and brought to the inner chambers, their screams will keep the others awake.

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Visions from Within

A simple tiara with a white gem embedded in a silver moon. Pendants resembling lost holy symbols hang from the crown, their movement causes a wary tingling.

Dream Sharing: When you sleep wearing this crown, sleeping creatures around you share your dreams and are independent actors in them. Creatures around you are also able to see mental images, visions and memories that appear in your mind.

Unconscious Visions: The Crown makes you aware of your subconscious and how it speaks to you in symbols. It can also store either a Vision or a Nightmare. Each time you complete a Long Rest, in which you slept, roll a d12. 

On a 12 you have a meaningful Vision, which is stored in the Crown. The DM can describe details of it and communicate events of the past, present or future. Roll a d20 and record the number rolled. You can spend the stored vision to substitute the rolled number to any d20 roll.

On a 1 you have a Nightmare, which is stored in the Crown. You determine the details of it. As a Bonus Action you can spend the stored Nightmare to make a creature relive it. A creature you can see within 30ft of you must WIS15, taking 3d6 psychic damage on a failure.

The Crown of Dreams can either contain one Vision or one Nightmare, if you have a new Vision or Nightmare, it removes the one currently stored.

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Boing

A lightweight leather belt of a silvery color. A blue line traces along its surface, tilting to constantly be parallel to the ground. The buckle resembles a holy symmetrical symbol of order.

Perfect Balance: You have Advantage on Saving Throws against effects that would knock you Prone. If you are Prone, you can stand up as a Bonus Action and, if you do so, you have Advantage on your next attack roll that turn. The Belt propels you forward in a springy motion, giving you momentum..

Balancing Bind: As an Action you can unbuckle the belt and try to wrap it around an enemy’s wrist or limb. Make an Attack Roll against a creature within 5ft of you, using your DEX, you are proficient with the belt. On a hit the belt swings around the target’s chosen limb, giving it Disadvantage on Attack Rolls made with it. The creature can spend an Action trying to free the limb, making a STR13.

Discover Tips, Hooks and Variations!