thee tetas ae geet es SSS TI epuataicR ctl tit B eels be ote) ee | f rely F AGE OF Od crag esate by alll Bate er eam Sa ei) raCert erase age) VOLUME 19, NO10 paizo.com/dungeon Cra a eet peso nen Keath Strohm vine ee nll adventuring band from mn may be in over thet The actions in Diamond Lakel attracted the wrath of one ofthe ys 1) ‘ hidden masters. A gang of infiltrators “hore d an enigmatic mastermind plot if A their destruction, and only tracing the ¢ ‘oa ban 7 7 4 “ee An Age of Warms Adventure Pati ¥ ee adventure ther has creer] ADVENTURES THE HIVE Phillip Larwood that her previ its pride and skill is hampered and distracted by lesser concerns—famil, ‘emotion. Once they join they won't begrudge a fesw ‘moments of pain in exchange for the industrious awakening she has to offer them. A D&D adventure for sth 62 DUNGEON OF THE CRYPT 1 High Hunt leaves the streets of ‘Waterdeep and heads beneath the f the Dead where: monstrous criminal overlords compete for the favor oftheir mysterious master. It take more than skill with a blade toccut through the web of deceit and tueachery that surrounds the Vampire xr of Waterdeep. Do you have ‘what i takes to survive the Dungeon of the Crypt? A Foraorren REALMS adventure fi characters. 4 bunaton ocronen 2005James Ryman illustrates classic D&D monster at its best. 32 The Portent Mt. Ze n “I could feel the soft, shivering touch of Oe weeds the lips on the super sensitive skin of my throat, and the hard dents of two sharp gine teeth, just touching and pausing there. COLUMNS Tclosed my eyes in languorous ecstasy (5 8 Editorial and waited, waited with beating heart.” t ri 10 Prison Mail 90 Gamer Guide 94 Dungeoncraft 106 Maps of Mystery “Dracula” | DUNGEON ADVENTURE PLAYER REWARDS! CAMPAIGN WORKBOOK 98 The Cast 100 The Dungeon 102 Critical Threat by rpga.com for more details, tae the following adventure codes: ‘The Hall of Harsh Reflections (127HRiDN)‘ ie uite by hijpenstance, all three adventures this month feature doppelgangers. This didnt seem like a problem at first, since doppelgangers are classic monsters from + the game's earliest days who haven't been seen much these pages in the lst couple years While there's nothing quite like sur- prising jaded yo-something players with the test creature from an obseure source Thave a very soft spot in my heart for erit- ters that existed in the fist edition of the game in particular those from the original ADRD Monster Mana, That tome introduced the black pud- ding, beholder, carrion crawler, couall, ost of the demons and devils, all of the chromatic and metallic dragons, djinni, cfivet, green slime, intellect devourer, Jamia, nightmare, purple worm, Quasit rust monster, and dozens of other crea tres that have existed in every edition ff the game, usually right up front with the first official monster books released fo the new edition. Sure, classics like ‘he drow.and githyanki appeared in later first edition sources, and new creatures like the tielling. choker, and grick have Toaniaged to. push their way into the {anon of “must have” D&D foes, but that ‘original Monster Manual has the greatest ‘concentration of classic monsters short of Gary Gygax's late 1970s miniatures case, And-the sape-changing doppel- anger, bnilliantly realized by the late PLEASURE David C. Sutherland II, stands firmly in the center ofthe pack Bul the doppelganger has a quality most other classic D&D monsters lick: used poorly itcan absolutely destroy campaign Asthe original Monster Manual pats it “Hav- ing become the double for a person, they attempt to do away with that victim and assume its place” The moder description is very similar. If you're looking to pull a switcheroo on your PCs by having a trusted [NBC turn evil i’ dificult to find a better option than a doppelganger. But if you use them how they were originally intended, to replace one ofthe PCS; youve gota poten- tally explosive uation on your hands Lets say you want the doppelganger to ambush a PC, assume that PC’ identity ‘and then infiltrate the party fora last-mi tte betrayal ata dramatically appropriate time. Ifyou run the ambush in font ofall ofthe characters, everyone has to pretend that they don't know about the threat in their midst, and the final “reveal” lacks excitement. Taking the ambushed player out of the room for a brief bit of one-on- one roleplaying only results in boring the rest ofthe players, who will probably assume that they can't completely trust ped friend. Weknew we wanted to use doppelgan cs in the Age of Worms Adventure Path, and we knew we wanted to have them inf trate the party, but until we started play ing with the repercussioas of this tactic their now close. "2. we had no idea how much trouble we had invited upon ourselves. At one point, Edi- torial Assistant Jeremy Walker sentaround an email called “Hall of Harsh Reflections Protest, no less) in which he listed several problems with the infiltration angle, most of them objecting to what an absolute hhose-job we were trying to pull in order to use the creatures as intended without ruining the surprise, When one of the editors uses the phase “it completely vio- lates the trust a player has in his DM not toscrewhim overby iat” you know youve got to go back to the drawing board ‘The final result, as explained in "The Hill of Harsh Reflections,” involves the only realy Sir way to pull offthis type of deception: getting one of the players in con it before the game even begins Ifthat doesn't work, perhaps it’s best to leave ut the infiltration angle entirely, since ‘doppelgangers’ ability to: mimic just about anyone allows plenty of opportu- nities in the realm of the NPC alone. ‘Bulthere's something primalabout using a D&D monster in the way in which it was intended to beused. Choose your PC cohort carefully andl have fn. wrecking the party, ZZK.. Erik Mona * Editor-in-Chief erikm@paizo.comTellus what you think of this issue. White to: Prison Mal, Polo Publishing, 2700 Richards Road, Suite 201, Blleue, WA 98005- 4200 oF send an emo dungeond@palzo.