A Tower Unto Heaven

Joos de Momper

I wrote this for a flash fiction assignment back in college, during the middle of an obsessive bout of  Binding of Isaac: Rebirth and during the early days of my tiptoeing around the blogosphere. It wasn't (originally) meant as a gameable text, but when you go about channeling roguelikes it happens anyway.

Troika and Into the Odd feels like the way to go, here, with a nice pointcrawl / Ynnian depth system to make the megadungeon more managable. I do have a page of notes describing how I'd do an OSR version of it from a year+ ago, which I have at hand but have not applied directly to this just yet. Those plans can be saved for a follow-up post.

A Tower Unto Heaven

You are alone.

The world dies around you.

A Tower rises unto Heaven

At its roots:

The dead

The scavengers

Those consumed

Those who linger

And you

Salvation waits at the top.

Characters

• Jackal – Starts with the 9mm and the Duffel. Unlocked by default.
• Zealot – Starts with the Tower Shield, the Inscribed Axe, and the Homemade Shotgun. Unlocked by a massacre of the enemy. 
• Ferdinand – Starts with the Embedded Bullet and the Tome of Kings. Unlocked by lifting not a hand in violence.
• Running Boy – Starts with the Package. Unlocked by witnessing a disaster. 
• Sickley – Starts with the Troubling Cough. Unlocked after meeting the Coagulation in the Runoff. 
• Anchorite – Starts with the Book of Forgotten Prayers. Unlocked by finding a hidden place. 
• Duster – Starts with the Tattered Headscarf, the Bullet-Sprayer, and the Sack of Coins. Unlocked by extensive patronage of the Bazaar. 
• Armiger – Starts with the Tarnished Saber and the Cannonade. Unlocked through an act of treason. 
• Deserter Hua – Starts with the Assault Rifle and Little Min. Unlocked by finding the Old Phonograph.
• Bookburner – Starts with the Pile of Ashes and the Handful of Embers. Unlocked by destroying a sign of false hope. 
• Sentinel – Starts with the Guardian Module and Attendant Drone. Unlocked by awakening the heart of the Tower. 
• Evangelist – Starts with the Good Book. Unlocked after finding the truth. 
• Burnt Man – Starts with the Charcoal Heart and the 0K Mind. Unlocked when the gods are challenged. 
• Angel – Starts with the Smiting Rifle and the Nimbus. Unlocked when the rest are dead. 
• Spiral (Hidden Character) – Starts with the End at the Beginning and the Beginning at the End. Unlocked by descending.

 Items

• Old Can of Beans – A scavenger’s meal. It will keep you alive a little longer.
• Handful of Screws – There are points on the skull where they might be twisted in, to pry the mind open. 
• The Nuclear Gospel – “And lo, I saw a rider upon a glowing glass horse, and the rain was like fire…” 
• Lost Days – A grimy stuffed toy with a limp neck. Still smiling. 
• Tattered Flags – Pulled from a ship stranded on a dune. They spell an unknown word. 
• Occam’s Razor – One cannot afford to make undue assumptions when shaving. 
• Holy Woad – The zealots wear it as a second skin. Blood and fury are mightier than any armor. 
• Snail-Shell Necklace – A trinket of no outward worth. 
• Bloody Hands – Survival comes at a cost. 
• “For the King!” – An ancient dirge, inscribed in wax and tattered parchment. 
• Gold and Sulfur Fiddle – A gift, from the dark man at the crossroads. He’s dying. 
• Crown of Teeth – The authority of a decayed queen rests on your brow, a hive for errant enamel knights. 
• Homemade Sutures – Make do with what is available. It will have to be enough. 
• Rust – There’s no telling what it once was, but it might still have some use. 
• Joker’s Deck – 52 cards, all wild. Draw one, and see what happens. 
• A Song from the Moon – Pulled from an Angel’s holy lungs. 
• Right Hand Stone / Left Hand Stone – Two parts of the same whole. One leads, and one follows. One supports, and one undermines. 
• A Punctured Mask – The remnants of an unlucky scavenger. Will you avoid their fate? 
• The Machine Code – The rune-voice of the Tower. Learn its mantras, and speak with metal and stone. 
• Melting Lantern – As it gives light, so it dies. The puddles it leaves glow for a time. 
• Waterlogged Enchiridion – An ancient manual to beasts and beings. Some knowledge might still be discerned from the smeared pages. 
• The Professional – Spend a single bullet for a single death. Be clean and competent. 
• Great Macahuitl – The weapon of an ancient demigod. It can barely be lifted. 
• Plastic Jug of Water – Mind the worms. 
• Cracked Black Pyramid – The blue fire within has died, but the channel to its master remains open. 
• Taboo – They hold power, and release it when broken. Once broken, never returned. 
• The Last Mammoth’s Legacy – A vast and trunkless leg of bone, from an antique beast. 
• Sack of Whitefire Grenades – Let them burn. 
• Heretic’s Heart – It is still warm. Let its power become yours. 
• Head of a Dead Man – It will show you safe passage. It feeds upon flesh, though it has no stomach. 
• What Came Back – Draw upon the power of a soul without rest. 
• What Remains – Shape the form of a body undying. 
• A Piece of the Tower, Upon a String – A remembrance.

Enemies

• Organelles – All that remain are their knotted innards, stumbling in the dark.
• Botflies – Their hosts are barely discernible now, so great is the infestation.
• Black Lung – They exhale the pollution that cooks in their bellies.
• Ambergris-Eater ­­­– When a whale carcass washes into the shallows, they feast with their bone-needle mouths.
• Black Pyramid – Slaves of a greater master. They possess a three-lobed eye of blue fire.
• Censorite – No eyes to see offense, no ears to hear it, no tongue to taste it, two hands to remove it.
• Shadows on the Wall – Shades burned into the very stone by calamity.
• Urchin-heads ­– They carve out the skull and use it as a home. They play in tide pools.
• Celestial Beast – The twelve zodiac species. One can see stars inside their bodies.
• Consumption Drones – The advertisements linger for longer than the product.
• FOD – You want FOD? You get FOD. FOD all the time. FOD for you and you and you.
• Remnants – For some, there is no desire to go on, but no will to die.
• Shades – A heavy-shadowed soul becomes trapped in its own mindless repetition.
• Plague Rats – The fiercest grow to the size of men, bloated on their hordes of siblings.
• Tithe-Takers – Coin makes the gods happy. Their rigid smiles clink and clatter.
• Guardians, Wardens, Protectors – The Tower’s defenders, long silent.
• Copper-Eyes – Bullet talismans tied in their beards, their lives bought for two coins.
• Deathly Merchant – A corpse-medicine seller. He is reluctant to part with his wares.
• Decidui – Leafy servants of the seasons. Their fruit carries the cost of eternal life. 
• Tooth Folk – They traded their queen’s gifts for jagged shards of honor. 
• Shrine-Shield Maiden – They carry the homes of their small gods on their backs. 
• Muddie-Worms – Take care to remove the burrowing eggs each night upon the flats. 
• Whitecap Janes – Their fleshy scalps are a common bandit fashion. 
• Chimeric Mongrel - Years of genetic mastery meets generations of inbreeding. 
• Water Bandit – Dirty jugs of life, stolen and sold. Each one flies his own brand banner. 
• Painted Cherub – A faceless clay servant, bright-painted and giggling 
• Crag Scaler – It plunders the skeletal nests of cliffside birds for what eggs might remain. 
• Scrapling – Children of the old machines, cobbled together in factory wombs, suckling at electric teats. 
• Aborted Ascendant – Not all pilgrims reach the divine. Those who fail are pierced with red spears, and wander the path as warnings. 
• Divine Parasite – The wombs of the gods are barren and riddled with cancers. 
• Thronekeepers – Since the Tower’s creation they have served at the foot of the Throne. To the end of the Tower, they will still serve. 
• Stone-Breaker – Slow of mind and scarred of hand, they carve out quarries for blue-eyed masters. 
• Savings – What is shaved off a product when the first cuts are made. 
• Feastbringer – Longing for guests, it uses what ingredients its body can provide. 
• Whitesmith – A worker of metal, coated in ash and dust. Flames burn behind its goggles. 
• Color Catcher – A collector of shades no longer seen, emotions no longer felt. 
• Sister Executor – Behind the rusted mail and mask of rags, there is a rare kindness.

Bosses

• Inside-Out-Man – He is left vulnerable by an ally scorned long ago.
• Dappled Woman – She dances in the forest glades, oblivious in her joy.
• Ten-Knives, Wasteland King – He wears on his belt the knives that failed to kill him.
• Maid of Autumn – Kindly young death, adorned in dry leaves.
• Lady of Spring – Heavy with verdant growth, what she births she then consumes.
• Lord of Summer – A brief respite from the cold, a weakened spate of heat.
• Miser of Winter – Offer what blood you owe to the turning of the year.
• Tank-Killer – Her rifle has 110 notches scratched above a red ribbon.
• Wheel of the Cosmos – The measure of the world had gone askew, the pace slowed.
• The Dark Fiddler – Keeper of a moonlit crossroads.
• Master of the Frozen Waterfall – He trained so long that the blood in his veins is now ice. He will not move from his vigil.
• The Archivist – Long hours wasted stain her face with ink. She pastes together what has been lost, to no end.
• Conductor of Choirs – Once, the red sky might be rent asunder at the raise of a baton.
• The Organist – It might rise from earthen dreams to play ivory keys and pipes of stone.
• Urchin Chieftess and Harem – The tribe is strong, but the children grumble and bicker.
• Merchant of Merchants – All men pay him tribute, in blood and water and bullets.
• Cloud Keeper – A shepherd of the sky, a shaper of winds, a mourner unto the dawn.
• Scab and Clog – Twin killers, sifting through sewage for treasures and baubles.
• The Highest Elder Trees – The council of roots nears completion, a declaration may come. Perhaps too late.
• Tornod the Slate – He carries a shield torn out of a mountain, and the weight of ancient sins along with it.
• Greater Black Pyramid – Its child herds fly over the land, to seek an ending.
• Lost Delta Strider – Its lonely cry echoes over the mudflats, and goes unanswered.
• Aggressive Advertisement Unit – Mad without its missing, mindless half
• Conjoined Septuplet – Father was proud, mother had certain other opinions.
• Cadaverous Queen – Even in exile, she does not begrudge hospitality to travelers.
• Migratory Memetic Host – The brain is a womb for embryonic ideas, but it seeks a wet nurse.
• Ancient Core Overwatch – The oldest metal grandfather, waking from his dreams of war.
• Lynching-Clock – A machine-tower, frequented by those with no time left.
• Grand Arsonist – When the fire grows bright enough, hot enough, he will at last see.
• Overseer of Zygote Storage – There is a plan. There is a plan. There is a plan. Senior Shield-Mother – Wrinkled and bent, she watches her few remaining students with pride and sadness.
• Sister Superior Executor – She does not wish to do this.
• The Throne Beneath Heaven – The end. The goal. Finality.
• The Iconic (Hidden Boss) – You are the last. He was the first.

NPCs

• Cruel Tai – A bent old man on a wheeled throne of IV drips and waste bags. The bandit clans stay far away from his hollow, except to offer tribute.
• Baba Clink, the Merchant – A master merchant, whose domain is as wide as his waist.
• The Coagulation – A mass of sick and abandoned flesh.
• Man in the Hot, Dark Room – An unknown force.
• Alice, the Witch – She’s always up for a game of cards. A thin pale line runs across her neck.
• The Chorus – A trio of shrouded beings, watching progress from afar. They will occasionally stop their commentary to pass off a bauble to a traveler.

Soundtrack

Departure (Main Menu Theme)
Dealer in Arms and Legs (Bazaar / Shop Theme)
A Moment of Peace (Secret Room Theme)
A Moment Shattered (Secret Room Combat Theme)
Brutality (Miniboss Combat Theme)
The Deed Is Done (Post-Boss Theme)

Coral Dream (Reef Theme)
Knee-deep (Runoff Theme)
Moss and Stream (Deep Woods Theme)
Frozen Dust (The Waste Theme)
Death March (The Long Road Theme)
Skirmish (Outer Ring Boss Theme)

Abandoned Knowledge (Archives Theme)
Star Turning (Zodiac Halls Theme)
Pre-Order Bonus (Consumption Incursion Theme)
Antibody (Sentinel Overwatch Theme)
Under Gods’ Eyes (Temple District Theme)
Further to Climb (Heights Boss Theme)

Gone (Sky Cemetery Theme)
Notes of Moonlight and Fire (Choir Theme)
Without End (House of Years Theme)
“It’s Cold Here” (Apotheosis Theme)
From On High (Summit Boss Theme)

Devil’s Fiddling (Dancer’s Depths Theme)

A Tower Unto Heaven (Final Boss Theme)
Clouds, Be My Home (Credits Theme)

Endings

You have died. Your bones remain in the Tower’s cold halls.

*

He put a crown of scrap on his head and called himself a king.

A squatter in hallowed halls. A tyrant whose domain died long before his ascent.

*

The Throne grants many powers, but it cannot reverse death.

Her flame of revenge went unsated, and slowly starved.

*

He witnessed the cosmos bloom before him.

He had come looking for answers. He found all of them.

*

He placed an offering, wrapped in brown paper, at the foot of the Throne.

His task completed, he vanished, and left his memorial in the snow.

*

The air was thin here, and it was pure.

He danced with the sun, blind and mute.

*

For the first time, he wore no shackles.

He shaved off his beard, and was reborn.

*

His service never wavered, to the very end.

He had fulfilled his father’s orders.

*

“Min…Min, look. We’re going home.”

She held her daughter close, trying to keep her warm.

*

Truth might be changed by fire, or so she thought.

But what then, when truth is but ash?

*

Soon, she had forgotten everything.

Passing fancies filled her eyes and ears.

And she was happy.

*

Perhaps now, it would be set right. Perhaps now, order might be restored.

It called out to its ancient comrades: Come to me, old friends!

Corroded stone and long-dead metal answered with silence.

*

Finding one’s gods often leaves one disappointed in what lies beneath the masks they shed.

Their true form is in the journey.

*

In his final moments, he forgave those who smote him.

For generations, he would be hailed as a saint.

*

Now, it waited, to see if the cycle had been broken.

*

Time is but a snake eating its tail. A journey ever repeated, without end.

How many had failed?

*

You have replaced the first to climb.

You are worthy to sit the throne.

A Tower Unto Heaven is yours. 
 

Minidungeon: The Lighthouse on the Spur.

Blake Rottinger

Setup

A lighthouse on a spur of rock. Clean. Whitewashed. Attached to land by a sliver of beach that goes under when the tide comes in. The old trading post sits on the land side of the sand bridge. The village is over the hill to the north.

Arrival

Pouring rain, cold and driving. The trading post bears dark windows. A pole with distances and directions to faraway lands leans crookedly out in front. There is a standing bear carved of a single piece of wood. The door is locked.

What's unusual about the Trading Post?

1. Nothing. Bare boards and empty cupboards. It looks like nothing has ever been stocked here.
2. A foreigner in the cellar, chained to a support beam. Beside him is chained a corpse.
3. A hastily-abandoned campsite. Military, by the look of the gear they left behind.
4. Bricks of contraband tea. Many, many, many bricks of contraband tea.
5. A hexagram burnt into the floor, surrounded by goat skulls.
6. Misshapen blobs of flesh and hair, pulsating, humming.
7. Forests of nails have been driven into every flat surface.
8. It is a tropical jungle inside, centered on an embryo in amber.

The Keeper

A young, bespectacled man. Arrived only a few months back. Educated, solitary. Has admirers among the young women in town. Has been dead 1-2 days.

What happened to the Keeper?

1. Hanging from the stairwell (F1)
2. Collapsed at his desk, starved (F2)
3. A nibbled and worried corpse, has lantern and rope with him (Cellar)
4. Gone. Large bloodstain on floor (F1)
5. Fried to a crisp. There is a crack in the lamp (Roof)
6. Mangled in the rocks, impaled. Visible only at low tide (Spur)
7. Died in his bed (F2, save vs contagious disease)
8. Head smashed in (Cave)

Something Special

1. Letters from his lover in the city, hidden in a book (F2 bookcase) 
2. Dabbles in photography (Equipment in cellar)
3. A clutch of salamander eggs in the hearth (F1)
4. Taxidermied fish: large, fanged tropical, contains random spell (F2)
5. Collection of tent revival pamphlets (F1)
6. Ivory-handled pistol. "RG" carved in grip. (F1)
7. Scrimshaw chess set, white demons and black angels. White is one move from reaching checkmate. (F1) 
8. A map of the Eclipsed Sea (F2)

The Caves beneath the Cellar

Tight and coiling passages carved away by the drip drip drip of seawater. Lined with flesh-tearing cave-barnacles.

What is found in the Caves?

1. A corroded skeleton, clutching a rusting heirloom sword.
2. A locked treasure chest, too big to squeeze through the gaps.
3. Glass bottles, all filled with messages.
4. Sigils of chaos, carved into the walls, screaming back the sins of passersby.
5. Carpets of red velvet worms.
6. An oil lamp on a hook, burning bright violet.
7. Distant, chittering laughter. High-pitched mutters of "Bebbyzyx is looking for shinies."
8. Explosive glow-worms.

The Oracle

Something akin to a mermaid, living in the pool at the center of the caves. Slippery skin and wide eyes, gaping mouth and bloodred gills. She desires blood and fresh meat. She was not fond of the Keeper and his prying questions.

What does she say?

1. Nothing at all - she readies to speak, but no sound comes out.
2. A king is born, a mighty king come to reclaim his throne - but shall he be a tyrant?
3. A year of interesting times, of fortunes reversed, the poor made rich and the rich made poor.
4. The world will become cold and chrome, tubes and wires.
5. Mild weather, light chance of precipitation in the afternoon, there is a coup afoot.
6. I'm afraid your bones are filled with ghosts; give them to me and I can fix that for you.
7. Bet on 53. Do not bet on anything else.
8. Fuck that guy upstairs and all the noise he makes, I'm trying to sleep.

Star Warriors, Dungeon Openers, Dinosaur Alignment Spectrum

Cosimo Galluzzi

Star Warrior

Esoteric soldiers who have emptied themselves into the void, and returned bearing the fire of the heavens.

HD, Saves, Weapons and Armor: as cleric

The star warrior unlocks a new stellar chakra with each level.

Level 1: M-type, Root 
By rooting themselves firmly to the ground, a star warrior may deflect d12 damage or resist being knocked prone 1/day. 

Level 2: K-type, Sacral
The star warrior gives birth to an astral familiar of 1/3rd their HD. If it is dismissed or defeated, it will be [level] days before a new one may be made.

Level 3: G-type, Navel
Once per day, the star warrior may draw upon their inner spiritual reserves and gain d6 points to be added to whatever rolls they wish. 

Level 4: F-type, Heart
The star warrior anoints their weapon with their heart. Their next [level] attacks are treated as magical. Usable 1/day. 

Level 5: A-type, Throat
The star warrior may make three single words of Command per day. 

Level 6: B-type, 3rd Eye
The star warrior has awakened their third eye, and may now see ghosts, spirits, and auras that would be otherwise hidden. 

Level 7: O-type, Crown
Once per day, the star warrior may awaken any of the stellar chakras in one of their allies. They will be able to use it as a true star warrior would.

Dungeon Openers 

1) The Vault
Stairs leading down to a double door of engraved black stone. A circular hole has been blown through the middle, and the doors bulge outwards. Charred corpses are stuffed in the hole in an apparent attempt to escape. Several managed to crawl through before death.

2) It's Raining Men
Players find themselves falling out of of a stormy and scabrous sky with thousands of others. Snap to black upon hitting the ground. They will awake as they are dumped out of a gigantic iron corpse-wagon. A plague doctor stylite is there, overseeing the operation.

3) Escape Room
Players wake up inside a haunted house. Impossible spaces abound, doors and windows boarded up.  Kicker: the house is buried underground. Presumed modern setting, good for CoC or EE.

Dinosaur Alignment Spectrum

All dinosaurs may be measured according to the following three alignments.

Animal <---------> Monster

Natural <---------> Gonzo

Domesticated <---------> Wild

Spectrum A can replace "animal" with "people" as needed. Specific dinosaurs within a piece of media may be categorized differently. Dinosaur alignments are spectrums rather than binaries. Gonzo includes outmoded models of dinosaurs, including tail-dragging and potentially not having feathers.

Examples:

• Jurassic Park = Monster / Natural / Wild
• Jurassic World = Monster / Gonzo / Wild
• Walking with Dinosaurs = Animal / Natural / Wild
• Dinotopia = Animal / Natural / Domesticated
• Land Before Time = People / Natural / Wildness dependent on environmental factors.
• Dinosaur Clerics = Monster / Gonzo / Wild and Domesticated Variants.
• The Dinosaurs of Waterhouse Hawkins = Animal (with monster flourishes) / Gonzo / Wild

Taking a Look at Video Game Megadungeons

I've been returning to some of my favorite video games recently, and surprising no one there's a lot of dungeon-delving involved. So here's a comparison of maps for those who want to sneakily stock a large dungeon that's already set up.

Darkest Dungeon

Starting with the simplest here. This is the megadungeon by means of just having multiple separate dungeons in the same general area. There aren't any real connections between areas in the game as-is (a situation easily rectified in adaptation) which brings with it the core gameplay loop of returning to the Hamlet after every delve, no matter where you choose.

Enter the Gungeon

Straightforward, the Gungeon is. Town on top, five main chambers beneath, three secret levels with access requirements, and a hidden sixth level for masochists. No major choices, no loops, no crossing paths.

Bonus points for the end goal: find the Gun That Kills The Past. Perfect for setting up a bit of character drama. no one comes to the Gungeon without some ghosts in the closet.

The Binding of Isaac

Still pretty simple stuff: two columns that you can cross between with a fork at the bottom. The  weirdness between floors four and five turned out nicely symmetrical, and provides the main real choice in the delve: Spend time and resources fighting the Hush in ???, or skip ahead to the fork? Cathedral or Sheol?

The b-series levels are taken from the Antibirth mod, on the grounds that it's better than Afterbirth+. They all have entry requirements, so you might be able to get into one of them and then kicked back into the main column when you clear that level.

Nuclear Throne

Again, pretty linear design. The main shifts from the norm are the Crown Vault and IDPD HQ, both of which can be accessed from any other level (the latter is only accessible after the game has been looped), and the fact that you can loop yourself back to the beginning after defeating the Throne.

Dead Cells

With all that out of the way, it's time for the good shit. Forking paths, multiple paths, paths that meet back up, a layout that maps itself to a real space way easier than the others on this list. (Prison on an island, town on the coast with a clocktower, castle on the hill above). Notable on this list in that it is primarily lateral in layout rather than vertical.

Hollow Knight

I lied, this is the good shit. A tangled, interconnected mess of tunnels and caverns to wander through. The occasional friendly face or traveling merchant. Stag stations to unlock and make inter-area transit easier. Lots of optional areas completely separate from the critical path. Absurdly complex, lots of effort required to translate to tabletop, but worth it if it can be managed.

Final Thoughts

• I would be most likely to adapt the Dead Cells or Darkest Dungeon maps.
• The "single descending column" format seems to be pretty standard for roguelites.
• Dark Souls 1 goes without mentioning, which is why I did not mention it.
• Darkest Dungeon as megadungeon is the easiest to throw together by far.
• Mark Brown's Boss Keys series is a super-good and far more in-depth look into video game dungeon design. Season 1 is Zelda, Season 2 is Metroid.
• Hollow Knight is so good, people.

Gullet of the Rust Demon

I am not particularly skilled in choosing fonts.

Cut it close to the buzzer, but here it is! My entry to this year's One Page Dungeon Contest.

Womb of Annihilation

I doubt anyone reading this will care about spoilers for Tomb of Annihilation, but I'll declare them anyway.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Tomb of Annihilation  is a pretty good adventure. There are a good deal of weird WotC-isms in it (have you ever wondered about your NPC guide's exact height and weight? Tomb of Annihilation has you covered.) but on the whole it's a solid adventure with solid wilderness support and solid dungeons. You could run it without a whole lot of elbow grease.

But that's no fun.

Basic Premise

Acererak is trapping the souls of the dead in a giant machine and feeding them to an Atropal, which is currently located  at the bottom of an ancient dungeon in an abandoned city in the middle of an uncharted rainforest in a distant land. The lead-in is that resurrection spells have stopped working, those who have been resurrected previously are beginning to decay, and you've been sent to investigate it.

Elbow Grease Note 1:  Twice as many immortal oligarchs as you thought you wanted.

 

Tomb of Annihilation comes with the setting presumption that resurrection is common enough in-setting that people are noticing something going wrong. At first, I wasn't fond of this conceit and was considering dropping it entirely (an easy enough task), as I'm not super fond of the idea of resurrection as a commodity, but then I reconsidered.

Resurrection is expensive. It requires a 13th level wizard to cast, and if we're using +Skerples medieval price list, which is nice and abstracted, the component cost is the equivalent of 100,000 US dollars.

(For extra math fun, calculating the value of 1gp with the current per-ounce market value of gold, times 16 ounces per pound and divided by 50 coins per pound, we end up at $205,760 for a resurrection spell if a GP is only 50% gold.)

This is on top of the fees for hiring a 13th level necromancer, which could easily be ten times or more the cost of the components.

In short, it's bloody expensive. The only people who would even have a chance to access to it would be the rich and powerful, who would be able to become more rich and powerful by installing a revolving door to the afterlife.

The people who are sending you on this mission will reap all the benefit, despite doing none of the work (the book itself says that they've already sent people to Chult and failed. The only actual payment you receive from your patrons are 50gp up front, and a single magical item upon completion. Starting at level 1 just emphasizes that you're disposable lackeys. )

The book already uses the Red Wizards of Thay as an enemy faction that is out to twist everything to their own advantage. This works as-is. One set of immortal oligarchs are already taken care of.

Your patron is a woman named Syndra, who is supposed to be a member of the Harpers. I haven't got a clue what in Sam Hill the Harpers are supposed to be, so they have now been turned into the Harper East Seres Company (Or +Jacob Hurst 's Martel Company) Your friendly neighborhood expansionist venture-capitalists that have formed their own little government,who are now also immortal.

Both the Red Wizards and the Harper Company want the resurrection problem solved. Wizards want the Soulmonger for themselves, the Company doesn't yet know that it exists. The two groups loathe each other.

Elbow Grease Point 2: All about the politics

 

The module mentions factions, but few of them are actually important to the goings on in Chult. With rival groups of immortal oligarchs meddling in local affairs on top of local factions, that is a huge oversight.

The Harper Company
"It's just jungle now, but with some forward-thinking it transforms into something beautiful. Think about it. Rubber, cocoa, cotton, tea; plantations from horizon to horizon. Mines producing more oil and gold than we can imagine. And diamonds!"

• Wants: The end of the death curse, a return to the status quo, economic control of Chult
• Does not want: The Red Wizards gaining anything, the Merchant Princes getting too uppity and thinking they run the place.
• Is currently: Throwing poor people at the problem until it gets solved.

The Red Wizards of Thay
"The Chultans' aspirations mean nothing; They do not play with the long view in mind. No one ever does. They just think they'll live forever all on their own." 

• Wants: The Soulmonger, monopoly over resurrections and all other necromancy
• Does not want: The Harper Company gaining a foothold in Chult, Chult becoming anything more than a backwater, control of Chult for themselves, the Soulmonger destroyed.
• Is currently: Sending veteran problem-solvers to solve the problem.

The Merchant Princes
"In my grandfather's time Port Nyanzaru was a few huts and a palisade, and now we'll be selling tej in Lankhmar and Corpathium by year's end. No more "dark continent", no more superstition, just the Princes' stamps on crates of fine Chultan goods."

• Wants: To become a major player in the global market, to drag Chult kicking and screaming into the Century of the Fruitbat, to play with and then become one of the Big Boys, to get access to resurrection for the Princes.
• Does not want: Monarchist movement to gain power, news of the undead plague or death curse to spread and make them look bad.
• Is currently: Distracting the populace with dinosaur races and tej, trying to get a leg up on the Harper Company via corporate espionage.
  

Liara Portyr and the Flaming Fist (A mercenary subsidiary of the Harper Company)
"Fucking spear-chuckers need to learn who really runs the world."

• Wants: To "pacify" and "civilize" Chult. To get filthy rich by looting the jungle and oppressing the locals.
• Does not want: Interruptions of their making money, Chultans thinking that they should be in charge of their own country and lives.
• Is currently: Putting pressure on the Princes via pirate-permissive patrol practices
  

Mwaxinare
"When I'm queen, no one's going to tell me what to do. I don't need to be babied, I don't need protected - I will be queen and I will show everyone how things are supposed to be!"

• Wants: To claim her rightful position as queen of Chult, to toss out the merchant Princes and the foreigners, to return Chult to an overly-idealized former glory.
• Does not want: To remain hidden for much longer, to actually have to deal with the reality of governance.
• Is currently: Biding her time in Kir Sabal with her brother, chomping at the bit.

The common folk
"Welcome to Chult: Home of the world's friendliest mosquitoes."

• Wants: Food on the table, money in the bank, hot water, soft toilet paper, a new mosquito net, a good night's sleep, a brighter future.
• Does not want: The curse to continue, to end up with someone's boot on their neck, to completely abandon who they are in exchange for the benefits of modernity.
• Is currently: Feeding an undercurrent of worry beneath the new prosperity.

The Yuan-ti
"The apes learning to talk was entertaining at first, and quickly became less so."

• Wants: To awaken the Night Serpent, to keep humans out of their jungle.
• Does not want: Acererak to stay any longer, to be betrayed by Acerak, to admit that they know that Acererak is definitely going to betray them.
• Is currently: Protecting the lost city of Omu, preparing for the return of the Night Serpent, preparing for a sudden but inevitable betrayal.

Acererak 
"IT WAS ME! IT WAS ME THE ENTIRE TIME! YOU ALL BOUGHT IT! FOOLS!"

• Wants: To feed souls to the Atropal, to cause widespread misery and suffering for his own amusement.
• Does not want: The game to end, to have his wants challenged by anyone or anything.
• Is currently: Overseeing the Soulmonger, planning future schemes, figuring out how to betray the Yuan-ti.

 

Elbow Grease Point 3: Expanding the curse 

 

In the module proper the Soulmonger captures all the souls of the dead, blocking resurrection or phylacterization. I can only presume that captured souls are stuck in a whirling torment of pain and misery as the Atropal devours them, but we can make it more horrible. This part was originally intended as a replacement for the death curse, but it works better as an addition to it.

What if the Soulmonger wasn't just a trap for the souls of the dead, but one for the not-yet-living?

[Aside] There was a fantasy full conversion mod for Civilization 4 called Fall From Heaven II. It was and still is fantastic. In it, the primary evil religion had a shrine they could build called "Stigmata on the Unborn". While the effect in that game was powering up your units depending according to how high the Apocalypse Counter is, I always imagined it as a method of attacking rival civ's population growth. So there's the inspiration for this.[/Aside]

This effect of the death curse is still in nascent stages - we have not reached Children of Men stages yet, but the important thing is that the potential is there. The effects will spread, and gradually grow worse.

Right now, people are worried. The last few months have been filled with deformities, defects, and miscarriages most common of all. The people know this; midwives talk, after all. The Merchant Princes and their representatives deny that anything is going on; this is not a conspiracy on their part, but the simple belief that curses are just local superstition, waiting to be driven out by their modern mercantile rationality. (Of course, being filthy rich means you can blunt many of the worst side effects of the curse, for the time being.)

The reveal of this aspect of the curse should be a good OH SHIT moment for players. Not only because of the potential consequences, but for providing a moral quandary: destroying the Soulmonger ends the curse on the unborn (definitely a good thing), but further entrenches folk like the Red Wizards and the Harper Company in their power (not a good thing), thus permitting them to further meddle in the affairs of Chult to their own ends (definitely not a good thing). Beating the bad guy will not solve all your problems.

Elbow Grease Point 4: The cosmic abortion in the room

This guy reminds me of something. I just can't put my finger on it...

Hmmm...

Hmmmmmmmmm...

It's on the tip of my tongue, I swear...

Nope, can't think of it. It's probably nothing.

...

You can't just put a cosmic abortion in the room and not deal with the fact that there's a cosmic abortion in the room, Wizards of the Coast!

Elbow Grease Point 4: Dealing with the cosmic abortion in the room 

 

Res minimus: Levels 5 and 6 of the Tomb should be a horrible nightmare fleshscape, as is befitting the title of this post. The giant undead fetus is right there, stone corridors aren't going to cut it any more.

Res maximus: Acererak is the Atropal's father.

Maybe he's the actual father, maybe he's only acting in loco parentis. Perhaps it was a divine miscarriage instead of a cosmic abortion. It doesn't matter: whatever you might come up with is better than "he found it on the Negative Energy Plane" and I don't want to ruin the image with explanations no one wants or needs.

[Aside] The crazy thing is that this is practically in the book as-is: they just don't give it any focus. The height and weight of your guide are super important, I guess. [/Aside]

The horrible beating heart in the middle of this campaign is that relationship. Acererak cares for the Atropal (by feeding it souls), but demonstrates a simultaneous and paradoxical apathy to it (he only appears after it has been killed, and certainly doesn't care about its state of torment). I doubt I need to spend much more time explaining how the psychopathic undead troll-DM is a really, really bad parent.

Elbow Grease Point 5: Back to the beginning

But the cool thing about that horrible beating heart (Finally! The end!) is that it calls back to Point 1:

The only applicable difference between Acererak and the Red Wizards or Harper Company is time.

Acererak has reached the point where wealth and power have fundamentally lost meaning to him because he will never run out of either - he can just build a new overly-elaborate death trap when the current project is winding down. The Red Wizards and the Harper Company aren't at that point yet, but are already stretching their abuse and exploitation muscles. The Merchant Princes aren't on the playing field just yet, but they will be if they have their way.

There will be more Acereraks in time, and Chult is set to become an Atropal of its own. The older established generation exploiting the younger so that it decays before it has grown.

Settings with commoditized resurrections aren't fun, kids. This is where you end up.

Elbow Grease Point 6: A few ifs

If the Soulmonger falls into the hands of the Red Wizards
The curse will be lifted, but they will swiftly enforce a monopoly on resurrections and undeath. The Harper Company will be cannibalized and disbanded. The Merchant Princes will be prevented from ever getting their hands on resurrection services. Chult's dawning golden age stalls out.

If the Harpers remain a major power in Chult
The Merchant Princes will be bought out - never officially, but lopsided trade agreements and crooked distribution rights (in exchange for resurrecting the leadership) will see the Princes become yet another (fantastically wealthy) subsidiary of the Harpers. The Burning Fist will become the boot stomping down on the Chultan neck. Chult will be exploited to the last acre, and by the time the people realize that they've been had, an independence movement will become much more difficult.


If Mwaxinare reclaims her throne
She will find herself surrounded by enemies on all sides and with next to no allies, vastly outmatched in resources, guile, and governing ability. An agreement might be made with the Merchant Princes or another faction, but she has no power of her own beyond lingering cultural significance. She courts disaster.

If the Soulmonger is used by the party
Difficult, but possible with a powerful enough necromancer. The scope of the curse can be modified with the device - for example, the curse on the unborn might be lifted, while the ban against resurrection might remain. Souls passing to the afterlife might be trapped en masse, individually, or set free.


You can, of course, utterly destroy both the Harper Company and the Red Wizards. Not fast enough that they won't retaliate, mind. You'll also need the cooperation of the Yuan-Ti, or their removal from the premises.

The the Soulmonger is allowed to continue its business unchanged
The curse on the unborn will spread outwards from Chult. Within a few months there will be more deaths than live births. In a year's time, there will be no live births at all.Within five years, the entire hemisphere will be effected.


If the above, and the Atropal is dead
After nine years, when the curse has spread across the entire world, the Soulmonger will finally contain enough souls to summon the Night Serpent. It will rush out like a black river from the gulfs between the stars, devour the offering, and usher in a second age of the serpent.

If the above, and the Atropal lives
If the Soulmonger is still active, the Atropal will be born into divinity in 280 days. A maelstrom of pain and hate and fear will burst forth from the deepest jungles of Chult, obliterating the Soulmonger, the Tomb, and the lost city of Omu. Most of the country's population goes mad instanteously from the initial wave of psychic torment. Everything that dies, down to bacteria, will be raised as undead. The jungle will become a landscape of perpetual rot.

If something else happens
You're clever folk, I'm sure you'll think of something

50 Dungeon Hobo Signs

Click for full size

I threw in some real hobo signs to go along with the dungeon-specific ones, since the basic needs of an itinerant worker are pretty stable across the board.

In-game, I'd say that any previously-delved dungeon will have some of these carved or drawn on the walls. Some might be misleading, some might be no longer accurate, but they should be true enough that they can be an aid to players' navigation and help them in making choices. Compare "there are passages to the north and west" to "north passage is marked 'ooze territory / safe campsite'. west is marked 'disabled trap / monsters can be reasoned with / don't look behind you'".

They're pretty helpful on the DM side too if you need quick ideas for rooms.