Mortuary Terrain

Sometimes these manifestations are phantasms rather than figments, meaning that only a single character can perceive them. Occasionally they are patterns, visible to all onlookers but carrying mind-affecting side effects. Most phantasms and pattern hauntings cause characters who witness them to become affected by fear—characters who fail a Will save might become shaken (DC 12), frightened (DC 15), or panicked (DC 18). Phantasmal odors might instead cause a character to become sickened (Fortitude DC 13 negates) or nauseated (Fortitude DC 18 reduces to sickened). In their most dangerous manifestations, these effects can duplicate the phantasmal killer (DC 16) or weird (DC 23) spells. Illusory manifestations can also be glamers. Torches might seem to dim or change color. A character’s refl ection in a mirror might seem to be doing something horrible, or it might look like someone else. A close friend might appear as a horrifi c monster. Occasionally, haunting effects that seem illusory are at least partially real, like shadow spells, and can cause real harm to characters. The sensation of fi ngertips brushing the skin might be a phantasm and the feeling of someone walking past might be a fi gment, but the sense of a sharp blow or a wound could be a shadow and deal real damage (generally 1d6, but sometimes more). Similarly, a feeling of unnatural chill in a room could be a harmless fi gment, but it could also be a shadow effect that deals 1d4 points of Strength or Dexterity damage or bestows a negative level.

Telekinetic Effects: A haunting can duplicate any of the following spells: mage hand, open/close, telekinesis, arcane lock, or knock. Hauntings often manifest in objects moving around a room, doors and windows opening or closing at random, doors locking or unlocking on their own, and similar effects. When a character is subject to one of these effects, she receives a saving throw or other roll to resist it as if she were targeted by the spell being duplicated.

Taint and Hauntings: A character who spends the night in a haunted location must make a DC 20 Will save or have his depravity score increase by 1. The saving throw DC might be higher in more severe cases of haunting (see Tainted Locations on page 68).

Exorcising a Haunted Site: Just as in the case of a haunting presence, an exorcist can perform a ritual to cleanse a haunted site. If the exorcist successfully performs the ritual, which requires ten consecutive full-round actions and a DC 20 Knowledge (religion) check, the haunting energies coalesce into a form that renders them vulnerable to traditional methods of removing magical effects, such as dispel magic, remove curse, or break enchantment spells. The effective caster level of a haunted site is the minimum caster level required to cast the highest-level spell duplicated by the haunting. With a successful ritual, the haunting energies remain vulnerable for 1 full round, but the exorcist can continue the ritual, causing the haunting energies to remain vulnerable, by making additional Knowledge (religion) checks each round. See Exorcising a Haunting Presence on page 71 for more details of the exorcism process.

The Dungeon Master’s Guide covers the basics of terrain, both in dungeons and in wilderness environments. A horror adventure might take characters to unusual terrain—in particular, places where the dead are buried. This section describes such locales, using the same format and terminology as in the Dungeon Master’s Guide, Chapter 3: Adventures.

Graveyards

A far cry from the serene parks common in the modern world, graveyards in D&D range from quiet, spooky spots to dilapidated areas where putrescent liquids seep from the thin soil or rotting limbs protrude from overcrowded graves.

The smell of death hangs thickly in the air. Most graveyards occupy the yard outside a place of worship, commonly a temple of Wee Jas. They appear in civilized lands rather than wilderness areas, usually occupying open fi elds. The table below describes in general terms how likely it is that a given square has a terrain element in it. Instead of rolling for each square, use the percentages in the table below to guide the maps you create.

Graveyard Terrain Features —Age of Graveyard— New Moderate Ancient

Gravestone 25 50 75 *

Mausoleum 5 10 20 *

Statue, memorial 10 15 20 *

Tree, massive 1 1 1

Tree, typical 5 5 5

Vault 5 10 15

Wall 5 5 5 * *25 damaged in some way

Gravestone: The older the cemetery, the more gravestones it will contain. The more neglected the cemetery, the more likely that some gravestones lean or have broken or fallen. A graveyard’s boundaries are typically fi xed when it is established, so fi tting in more graves over time means packing the gravestones tightly together, possibly with multiple burials in each plot. When you decide to place a gravestone in a square, don’t worry about the stone’s exact location within the square. It costs 2 squares of movement to move into a square with a gravestone in it. A creature standing in the same square as a gravestone gains a +2 bonus to Armor Class and a +1 bonus on Refl ex saves (these bonuses don’t stack with cover bonuses from other sources). A typical gravestone has hardness 8 and 45 hp. It is theoretically possible to perch atop a gravestone. A character can hop up to the top of a gravestone (see the Jump skill description on page 77 of the Player’s Handbook) with a DC 10 Jump check. Perching on top of a gravestone can give a character the attack bonus for attacking from higher ground. Remaining perched requires balancing on a surface about 3 inches wide (Balance DC 15), which might be sloped (+2 to the DC), obstructed if the stone is old and crumbling (+2 to +5 to the DC), or slippery with rain or moss (another +2 to +5 to the DC). See the Balance skill description on page 67 of the Player’s Handbook. Some gravestones are placed fl at on the ground rather than standing erect. These stones do not offer cover or affect movement in any way. A cenotaph resembles a gravestone but is a memorial marker for those who do not lie buried there (for example, someone whose body was not recovered).

Statue, Memorial: Statues are fairly common as elaborate grave markers for those wealthy enough to afford them. As described in the Dungeon Master’s Guide (page 64), a statue functions as a wide pillar, taking up a square and providing cover. A DC 15 Climb check allows a character to climb a statue.

Tree: Many graveyards are kept clear of trees, but some have a scattering of trees and others might have a single massive tree growing inside their walls. (The “1” on the table represents the fact that it is unusual for more than one massive tree to appear in a graveyard.) See page 87 of the Dungeon Master’s Guide for more information about trees as terrain elements.

Wall: A graveyard is generally surrounded by a wall (sometimes called a lich wall). Walls are typically masonry, occasionally superior masonry, as described on page 59 of the Dungeon Master’s Guide. They range in height from 4 feet to 8 feet tall. A lich-gate is a small, roofed entry hall to a graveyard. It contains a platform to support the coffi n while prayers are recited over the deceased. This platform, called a coffi n rest, a corpse rest, or a lich-stone, is about 4 feet high, 2 feet wide, and 8 feet long. It is usually built from the same masonry as the wall. Outside the walls of a graveyard can sometimes be found graves for suicides, criminals, foreigners, transients, or other people not deemed worthy to rest in the graveyard. Such an area is known as a potter’s fi eld. Undead are particularly common around these graves, which might not be consecrated in the same way as those within the graveyard.

Mausoleum: A mausoleum is a small, freestanding building, usually built of stone, for the interment of a single body or a group of bodies, such as members of a family. Mausoleums range widely in size, from just large enough to hold a single corpse to relatively spacious buildings with separate rooms for each member or branch of a family. Mausoleums are very much like small dungeons, usually with superior masonry walls (sometimes reinforced with iron, and intended to last for eternity), fl agstone fl oors, and stone doors securely locked. Some mausoleums include a vault (see below). A charnel house is similar to a mausoleum but is used to hold the remains of a large number of people who can’t necessarily be identifi ed. Sometimes individual corpses can’t even be distinguished from one another, but remains are grouped together—skulls on one shelf, long bones on another, and so on.

Vault: A vault is an underground resting place, usually intended for the members of a single family. The entrance to a vault is often a secret door disguised as a gravestone that lies fl at on the ground (Search DC 25). A fl ight of stairs from the entrance leads down into the vault, which is otherwise like a mausoleum. A crypt is a vault that includes an altar. Such religious trappings often adorn the final resting places of saints

Graveyard features

(particularly martyrs), clerics, paladins, and other champions of a religion.

Other Graveyard Terrain Elements: A mass grave is a single excavation in which multiple bodies are buried. They are used when large numbers of people die within a short time—too many for individual burial (such as victims of a massacre or battle)—and sometimes lie outside the graveyard walls. Charnel pits, by contrast, contain remains dug up and reburied, sometimes sorted like bones in a charnel house. A plague pit is a mass grave dug deep for the burial of plague victims. Mass graves and charnel pits sometimes give rise to large undead formed from multiple corpses, such as corpse gatherers (described in Monster Manual II). When such undead form in plague pits, they invariably transmit the plague with their attacks.

Catacombs

If graveyards are the wilderness terrain of horror campaigns, catacombs are the dungeons. A catacomb is essentially an underground cemetery. Some catacombs are established in natural caves, while others are specifically excavated for burials. Generally, graves are cut into the walls, then sealed with bricks or tiles; sometimes graves are also dug in the fl oors. Graves in a catacomb might consist of simple shelves holding ossuaries (small boxes designed to hold only the bones of a cremated corpse) rather than enclosed spaces large enough to hold a complete body.

Walls: A catacomb built in natural caves has unworked stone walls—at least where graves have not yet been carved into those walls. Other catacombs have hewn stone or masonry walls. Graves carved into the walls and sealed shut are considered superior masonry walls. If shelves are cut into the catacomb walls, they make climbing much easier (Climb DC 10).

Doors: Doors are uncommon in catacombs, usually placed only to guard particularly important graves or chambers.

Doors inside catacombs are almost always made of stone.

Chambers: A typical catacomb is a labyrinthine tangle of passages and small chambers excavated at different times over a long period. Vaults and crypts are common

Illus. by Daarken