Travel Encounter: Magic Monolith Village

Now that we’ve got a few dungeon oddities finished, we’ll premiere the first of another series of posts we plan for this year.  These “Travel Encounters” are designed to be short encounters that take place on a journey.  You should be able to twist them to fit into an overall quest (perhaps an NPC they meet has a clue for the quest, or a location hides a helpful item, etc.) fairly easily.  Hopefully they are better than rolling on a chart for a couple of random foes.

Here is our first installment:

Magic Monolith Village

Magic Healing or Curse, Barbarian Village

A magic monolith has good and bad effects on the people who use it or live near it.

Setup: The PCs may have heard of this special magical healing monolith and seek it out to cure a disease or condition. Or they simple pass the village on their travels.

Potential Plot Points:

• The barbarians are distrustful of visitors and require a tribute. Or
  the are actively hostile.
• Activating the monolith’s magic isn’t obvious. The barbarians may
  be able to help based on what has worked before such as
  smearing the beneficiaries blood on it, etc.
• The monolith’s magical healing comes with a price: either its own
  required tribute or some strange side effect.

Vary the Challenge: The size and strength of the barbarian village can vary and the monolith could have bestowed powers on its protectors.

Possible Twist: The barbarians recently found the smaller monolith and brought it here. Four others are in mountains nearby. If all are united, it will contact an extra-planar entity.

Follow-up Adventure Ideas:

• What are the side effects of the monolith’s magic?
• Someone healed by the monolith has dreams of the other small
  monoliths’ locations.

Switch Genres:

• Science Fiction: The monoliths are devices from an alien race.
• Paranormal: The spirit world is attuned to the monoliths which serve as portals or communicators.